A 'RUSTIC PHILOSOPHER. 79 



Very delicate food are these lamperns, quite as 

 good as the lampreys themselves, whose excellence 

 is reported to have cost England one of her kings ; 

 yet I never knew but one person who would eat 

 them, and very few who would even touch them, 

 they also being called poisonous. 



In Germany they know better, and not only eat 

 the lamperns themselves, but, packing them up in 

 company with vinegar, bay leaves, and spices, export 

 them as an article of sale. 



The solitary sensible individual of whom I have 

 made mention was truly a wise man. He used to 

 offer the young urchins of the neighbourhood a re- 

 ward for bringing lamperns, at the rate of a half- 

 penny per wisketful. 



A wisket, I may observe, is a kind of shallow basket, 

 made of very broad strips of willow ; and a wisket filled 

 with lamperns would be a tolerable load for a boy. 



So, for the sum of one halfpenny, that philosopher 

 was furnished with provisions for a day or more. 



Eeally, the prejudice against the lampern is most 

 singular. Even near London, when lamperns lived 

 in vast numbers in the Thames, they were only used 

 as bait, being sold for that purpose to the Dutch 

 fishermen. In one season, four hundred thousand 

 of these creatures have been sold merely for bait for 

 cod-fish and turbot. 



The scientific name for the lampreys is "Petromy- 

 zon," a word signifying " stone-sucker ". The name 



