162 NOTES ON FISH AND FISHING. 



and seen many attempt the operation ; but I never yet 

 saw a trout brought out of water in the human hand after 

 tickling. There is most respectable authority of ancient 

 date for trout-tickling, and the belief in the tradition and 

 possibility of performing the operation is almost universal. 

 In Beaumont and Fletcher's Rule a Wife and have a 

 Wife, Act ii.j occurs the following : — 



" He is mine own, I have him ; 

 I told thee I would tickle him like a trout." 



And we read, in the Haven of Health, published in 1636, 

 concerning the trout, — 



" This fish by nature loveth flattery, for being in the water it will 

 suffer itself to be handled, coaxed, and led astray, whose example I 

 would wish us maidens not to follow, lest they repent after." 



Bunyan, too, in his Apology for his Booh, doubtless alluding 

 to trout, says, — 



" Yet fish there be that neither hook nor line, 

 Nor snare, nor net, nor engine can make thine ; 

 They must be groped for, and be tickled too, 

 Or they will not be catch 'd, whate'er they do." 



How can I doubt, then, but that trout are tickled? 

 And yet I do — for that most illogical and unreasonable 

 of all reasons, viz. the fact that I never saw one tickled, 

 and never met a person who plainly declared that he him- 

 self had tickled and so caught one. Putting salt on the 

 tails of birds is a most excellent device for catching these 

 shy creatures, but the difficulty is to apply the salt. So 

 doubtless tickling is an admirable way of beguiling trout ; 

 but do they really allow themselves to be tickled ? 



