ON THE THAMES. 309 
to catch the creature which but yesterday. he was as- 
serting had so little brains. The brain of the fish is 
quite sufficient to keep him off the professor’s hook, 
angle he never so wisely. For my own part, I have 
often been laughed at for bad sport. Returning from 
fishing one cold winter’s day, when the jack were 
not on the run, I met a foxhunter coming home from 
a run across country. “Why,” said he, “Buckland, 
you never bring home a fish, and you are always 
fishing: it is very extraordinary.” “Not at all,’ I 
replied ; “you are always out hunting, my friend, and - 
I never yet saw you bring home a, fox.” 
There is a species of harmless monomania peculiar 
to anglers, which others, who have not been bitten by 
it, can by no means appreciate. The angler will walk 
‘miles, and then fish all day; he will go through all 
sorts of hardships and difficulties for the sake of 
catching fish; and when.he has got them, and shown 
them—for this is a great part of the fun—he often 
does not know what to do with them, unless, of 
course, he happens, lucky man, to be in a trout or 
salmon country. Again, there may be often plenty 
of fish, and they won't bite; alas, how often does the 
angler sing this melancholy song! The Cockney fish 
about London have had their noses pricked by the 
hook too often, and know the smell of cobbler’s wax 
and varnish too well to be caught by anybody who 
holds a “ wand,” as the Scot calls a fishing-rod. Some- 
