PLATO—BYRON—ARISTOTLE 107 
When expressing astonishment at the variety and extent of 
Aristotle’s knowledge, one of the characters of Athenzus asks 
from what Proteus or Nereus he could have found out all he 
writes about fishes and other animals.!_ The curiosity of the 
questioner was natural. It is, however, probable that Aristotle, 
from living for several years close to the sea and from his 
intercourse with fishermen, had amassed a big fund of informa- 
tion about fishes and other aquatic animals. 
His knowledge of the Mediterranean fishes not only exceeded 
that of any ancient writer, but also, if Belon, Rondolet, and 
Salviani be excepted, that of any writer before Risso and Cuvier. 
However true may be the criticism of Dr. Giinther that 
Aristotle’s “‘ ideas of specific distinction were as vague as those 
of the fishermen whose nomenclature he adopted,” the fact 
cannot be gainsaid that Aristotle was; and remains, a very 
great Naturalist as well as a very great Biologist. 
To him 2 by right belongs the distinction, which (except 
incidentally in Mr. Lones’ work 3) I have so far failed to find 
Byron closes his note with ‘‘ But Anglers! No Angler can be a good man.” 
Walton received many a shrewd blow, especially from his contemporary 
Richard Franck, whose Northern Memories, with its appreciation of the Fly and 
its depreciation of Izaak’s ground-bait, found less favour than the Compleat 
Angler. His worsting of Walton at Stafford runs, “‘ he stop’d his argument 
and leaves Gesner to defend it: so huff'id a way.” Again, ‘‘ he stuffs his 
book with morals from Dubravius—not giving us one precedent of his own 
experiments, except otherwise when he prefers the trencher to the troling- 
rod! There are drones that rob the hive, yet flatter the bees that bring them 
honey.” 
1 Deipn., VIII. 47. Rabelais would seemingly make Aristotle his own 
Proteus, for Pantagruel (IV. 31) discovers him with his lantern at the bottom 
of the sea spying about, examining, and writing. This lantern has long been 
coupled with that of the Sea-urchin, but as a few pages later on we find our- 
selves in the Pays des Lanternois, it is probably a reference to a philosopher’s 
lamp, like that of Diogenes. 
2 The Natural History (of which the text I use is Bekker’s) is practically 
the only work by Aristotle discussed here. For me, being no “ Clerk” 
although “ of Oxenford,” it is not, as— 
“‘ For him was lever have, at his beddes heed, 
Twenty bokes, clad in black or reed, 
Of Aristotle and his philosophye, 
Than robes riche, or fithele, or gay sautrye.” 
3 Aristotle's Researches in Natural Science, by Thomas E. Lones (1912), 
from whose book I borrow and to whose kind advice I owe much. At last 
we have a really admirable translation of Hist. Anim., which is by Prof. D’Arcy 
Thompson, Oxford, tg10. The notes are those of an expert zoologist, thor- 
oughly familiar with classical literature, ‘ 
r 
