ETYMOLOGY OF BAIT. 53 
ETYMOLOGY OF BAIT & ENTOMOLOGY 
OF MAY-FLIES AND STONE-FLIES. 
BAIT. 
Not the least important, and certainly the most 
widely-extended subject falling under the legitimate 
cognisance of the fisherman, is comprised in the small 
word of four letters that heads this chapter. The whole 
practice of “fysshinge with an angle,” as Dame Juliana 
Berners, our earliest piscatorial authoress, terms the 
gentle art, is founded on the expressive word Bazt. As 
well might we go to the mart without money, to the 
camp without courage, to the court without courtesy, as 
to lake or river without bait. He who might be simple 
enough to do so would truly “ be in very like case to 
the gentleman angler, that goeth to the river for his 
pleasure, and returneth home lightly laden at his 
leisure,” as so described by Mr. Thomas Barker in 
his fishing treatise entitled The Delight, published 
more than two hundred years ago. At Banco Regis 
a man may, it is said, sue in forma pauperis, but it 
is utterly useless to go empty-handed to the bank of 
