294 THE COMPLETE ANGLE E. [PART I.. 



your hook into his mouth, aud out at his tail ; and then, 

 having first tied him with a white thread a little above his 

 tail, and placed him after such a manner on your hook as he 

 is like to turn, then sew up his mouth to your line, and he 

 is like to turn quick, and tempt any trout ; but if he does 

 not turn quick, then turn his tail a little more or less towards 

 the inner part, or towards the side of the hook ; or put the 

 minnow or sticklebag a little more crooked or more straight 

 on your hook, until it will turn both true and fast : and then 

 doubt not but to tempt any great trout that lies in a swift 

 stream. 1 And the loach that I told you of, will do the 

 like : no bait is more tempting, provided the loach be not 

 too big, 



And now, scholar, with the help of this fine morning, and 

 your patient attention, I have said all that my present 

 memory will afford me, concerning most of the several fish 

 that are usually fished for in fresh waters. 2 



Ven. But,, master, you- have, by your former civility, 

 made me hope that you. will make good your promise, and 

 say something of the several rivers that be of most note in 



1 The minnow, if used in this manner, is so tempting a bait, that few 



fish are able to resist it. The present Earl of told me, that, in 



the month of June last, at Kimpton Hoo, near Wellwyn, in Hertfordshire, 

 he caught, with a minnow, a Rud, which inasmuch as the rud is not 

 reckoned, nor does the situation of his teeth, which are in his throat, 

 bespeak him to be a fish of prey is a fact more extraordinary than that 

 related by Sir George Hastings, in Chap. IV., of a Fordidge Trout (of 

 which kind of fish none had ever been known to be taken with an angle), 

 which he caught, and supposed it bit for wantonness. H. 



* Since Walton wrote, there has been brought into England from Ger- 

 many a species of small fish, resembling carp in shape and colour, called 

 Crucians ; with which many ponds are now plentifully stocked. 



There have also been brought from China those beautiful creatures Gold 

 and Silver Fish ; the first are of an orange colour, with very shining scales, 

 and finely variegated with black and dark brown ; the silver fish are of 

 the colour of silver tissue, with scarlet fins, with which colour they are 

 curiously marked in several parts of the body. These fish are usually 

 kept in ponds, basins, and small reservoirs of water, to which they are a 

 delightful ornament. And it is now a< very common practice to keep them 

 in a large glass vessel like a pxinch-bowl, with fine gravel strewed at the 

 bottom ; frequently changing the water, and feeding them with bread and 

 gentles. Those who can take more pleasure in angling for than in behold- 

 ing them which, I confess, I could never do may catch them with 

 gentles; but though, costly, they are but coarse food. H. 



