FOREST AND STREAM. 
Sept. i6, 1905.! 
rens in September, when salmon fishing is ended, the 
fish seldom taking a fiy after that period, but lay- 
sluggish in the pools. So I advise taking gun if one 
wishes to continue on ip September or later. 
Twol hours still further upon the railroad you reach 
the beautiful Bay of Island, on the Humber Basin, 
into which empties the Humber Rivei-, most justly 
celebrated as the best of all Newfoundland rivers, as 
its record has never been beaten as to size and number 
of fish taken in its water, as is proven by our fellow 
countrymen who make their summer camps on its 
banks, especially about the falls, where almost any 
|hour of the day in August one can see salmon leaping 
that obstruction, and I have heard of eight being taken 
lin the forenoon by one rod. It did not fish well early 
this season, as the river was over its banks and very 
dirty. There are a number of good rivers near the 
Bay of Islands, but one must camp if he goes afield. 
Fox Island River and the Serpentine, both easily ac- 
cessible from Petrie’s Hotel, about a mile from _ the 
station, and commanding one of the most attractive views 
in the world. One could easily imagine oneself in Nor- 
way, the high mountains running down into^ a vast 
fjord. It is a good small hotel; but do not forget you 
must walk, as there is only one trap, like a training 
sulky, in the town. At the Bagg Bros.’ everything can 
be procured, guides, camp outfits, etc., thoroughly re- 
liable. From here one can go 300 miles by rail through 
a wilderness, to St. Johns, the capitol, but a wilderness 
interlaced with rivers, streams and lakes all filled with 
the gamiest of the fish family — the fontinalis. There 
are Deer Lake, Indian, Grand, the Terranoveau River, 
and others, too numerous to mention. 
’ I will give a few tips to brother sportsmen, which 
may be useful. 
The fare from New York to Halifax and return via 
Red Cross Line is $24. Halifax to Bay of Islands via 
Sidney, Cape Breton Island, eleven hours train, thence 
steamer Bruce, six hours, to Port au Basque; no charge 
for berth; then by rail six hours to Bay Island and re- 
turn to Halifax, $23.50. Stop-overs are allowed on this 
ticket at all stations. The fisherman must remember that 
on arriving at NewToundland he must leave a deposit of 
20 per cent, of the value of his rods, guns, cameras, 
canoes, etc., which will be returned to him on his return, 
'if he has the articles which he brought into the country 
still in his possession. Ordinary hotels and farmhouses 
i$i a day or $5 and $6 a week. C. DuB. W. 
Izaak Walton and the ^^Compleat 
Angler/^ 
A Lecture by Mrs. Comstock before the Chautauqua Assembly. 
(Concluded from page 217.) 
That the opportunity for thought was one of the chief 
attractions that angling had for Izaak Walton no reader 
of “The Compleat Angler” can doubt. He says : “It re- 
mains yet unresolved, whether the happiness of man in 
this world doth consist more in contemplation or action. 
Concerning which two opinions I shall forbear to add a 
third by declaring my own, and rest myself contented in 
telling you, that both these meet together, and do most 
properly belong to the most honest, ingenious, quiet and 
harmless art of angling. And first I shall tell you what 
some have observed, and I have found to be a real truth, 
( that the very sitting by the riverside is not only the quiet- 
\ est and fittest place for contemplation, but will invite an 
j angler to it. Peter Du IMoulin observes that when God 
( intended to reveal any future events or high notions to 
i his prophets, he then carried them either to the deserts 
( or the seashore, and having so separated them from 
’! amidst the press of people and business, and the cares of 
t the world, he might settle their minds in a quiet repose 
1 and there make them fit for revelation. And of the 
} apostles of our Saviour, of which twelve we are sure he 
i chose four that were simple fishermen, and it may be 
) noted first, that he never reproved these for their employ- 
t ment or calling, as he did the scribes and money-chang- 
1 ers. And secondly, he found that the hearts of such men 
! by nature were fitted for contemplation and quietness— 
I men of mild, and sweet, and peaceable spirits as indeed 
t most anglers are. And it is observable that it was our 
; Saviour’s will that these our four fishermen should have 
a priority of nomination in the catalogue of his twelve 
; Apostles. And it is yet more observable that when our 
I- blessed Saviour went up into the mount, when he left the 
? rest of his disciples and chose only three to bear his com- 
i pany at his transfiguration that those three were all fish- 
I ermen.” 
j “Ven. Sir, though I am no scoffer, yet I have, pray let 
me speak it without offense, alway# looked upon anglers 
i as more patient and more simple men than I fear I shall 
find you to he. 
“Pise. Sir, I hope you will not judge my earnestness 
to be impatience, and for my simplicity, _ if by that yOu 
‘ mean harmlessness, or that simplicity which was usually 
found in the early Christians, who were as most anglers 
are, quiet men and followers of peace — men that were 
so simply wise as not to sell their consciences to buy 
riches, and with them vexation and a fear to die, if you 
mean such simple men as lived in those times when there 
were fewer lawyers, when men might have had a lordship 
conveyed to them in a piece of parchment no bigger than 
your hand, though several sheets will not do it safely in 
this wiser age — I say, sir, if you take us anglers to be 
such simple men as I have spoken of, then myself and 
these of my profession will be glad to be so understood.” 
Another important fact in Walton’s enjoyment of ang- 
lying was that with all his mind he believed it to be a 
! true" art and practiced it as such. We find everywhere 
! in his lines this belief suggested or openly expressed, and 
as the practice of any art is uplifting if done worthily, so 
was Walton ever on a higher plane because his angling 
was a true art. Much testimony of this do we find in 
“The Compleat Angler.” 
“As to angling it is an art, and an art_ worthy the 
knowledge and practice of a wise man. O, sir, doubt not 
hut that angling is an art. Is it not an art to deceive a 
trout with an artificial fly ; a trout, that is more sharp- 
sighted than any hawk, and more watchful and timorous 
than your high-mettled Merlin is bold? Doubt not, there- 
fore, sir, but that angling is an art, an 4 an art worth your 
learning; the question is rather whether you be capable 
of learning it, for angling is somewhat like poetry, men 
are to be born so ; I mean with inclinations to it, though 
both may be heightened by discourse and practice, but he 
that hopes to be a good angler must not only bring an 
inquiring, searching, observing wit, but he must bring a 
large measure of hope and patience, and a love and pro- 
pensity to. the art itself, but having once got and prac- 
ticed it, then doubt not that angling will prove to be so 
pleasant, that it will prove to be like virtue, a reward to 
itself” 
Again lie says impressively : “For I tell you, scholar, 
fishing is an art, or at least, it is an art to catch a fish.” 
But it. is not because he says so that we believe his 
angling an art but because as we read we are profoundly 
impressed with his technique, all knowledge, -vyhether 
gained from books or experience, is made to minister to 
his art. Take his directions for making flies : “I confess, 
no direction can be given to make a man of dull capacity 
able to make a fly well, and yet know this, a little practice 
will help an ingenious angler in a good degree, but to see 
a fly made by an artist in that kind is the best teaching 
to make it. And then an ingenious angler may walk by 
the river and mark what flies fall on the water that day, 
and catch one of them, if he see the trouts leap at one 
of that kind. And then having always hooks ready hung 
with him, and having a bag also always with him, with 
bear’s hair, or the hair of a brown or sad-colored heifer, 
hackles of a cock, several colored silks and crewels to 
make the body of the fly, and the feathers of a drake’s 
head, and black or brown sheep’s wool, or hog’s wool or 
hair, thread of gold and of silver, silk of several colors, 
especially sad-colored tO' make the fly’s head, and there 
be also other colored feathers both of little birds and 
speckled fowl. I say, having those with him in a bag, 
and trying to make a fly, though he miss it at first, yet 
at last shall he hit it better, even to such a perfection as 
none can well teach him. And if he hit to make his fly 
right and have the hick to hit also whe,re there is a store 
of trouts, a dark day. and a right wind, he will catch such 
store of them as will encourage hiin to grow more and 
more in love with the art of fly-making.” 
When Walton describes the making of a minnow we 
see another phase of him which gives us the opinion that 
he found women better skilled in the manufacture of bait 
than in using the same to catch fish ; though the lady in 
question .evidently caught the fisherman with her minnow 
with small trouble and true skill, he says : “I will show 
you an artificial minnow that will catch a trout as well as 
an artificial fly, and it was made by a handsome woman, 
that had a fine hand, and a live minnow lying by her.” 
Then follows a detailed description of the cunning work- 
manship and he adds : “The eyes were of two little black 
beads, and the head was so shadowed and all of it so 
curiously wrought, and so exactly dissembled that it 
would beguile anw sharp-sighted trout in a swift stream.” 
Evidently he was sometimes nettled by people who had 
little appreciation of scientific fishing. Hear him: “’Tis 
an easy thing to scoff at any art or recreation ; _ a little 
wit, mixed with ill-nature, confidence and malice, will 
do it.” 
A lesson is here, and that is to make an. avocation 
mean much to us, do it well. Have a fad and enjoy it. 
We do a little here and a little there and none of it too 
well. See how Walton made his recreation a perfect 
thing and all enjoyment. 
Walton’s long and happy communion with nature 
taught him that many things were to be desired rather 
than great riches. “And for you that have heard many 
grave, serious men pity anglers let me tell you, sir, there 
be many men that are. taken by others to be serious and 
grave men whom we condemn and pity. Men. that are 
taken to be grave, because nature hath made them of a 
sour complexion, money-getting men, men that spend all 
their time, first in getting, and next in anxious care to 
keep it ; men that are condemned to be rich, and then 
are always busy or discontented ; for these poor rich men, 
we anglers pity them perfectly. Nay, let me tell you there 
be many that have forty times our estates, that would 
give the greatest part of it to be healthful and cheerful 
like us ; who with the expense of little money have eat 
and drank, and laughed and angled, and sung and slept 
securely, and rose next day and cast away care and sung, 
and laughed, and angled again; which are blessings the 
rich man cannot purchase with all his money. Let me 
tell you, scholar, I have a rich neighbor, that is always 
so busy that he has no leisure to laugh, the whole busi- 
ness of his life is to get money and more money; he is 
still drudging on, and says that Solomon says, ‘the dili- 
gent hand maketh rich,’ and it is true indeed, but he con- 
siders not that ’tis not in the power of riches to make a 
man happy, for it was w’isely said by a man of great 
observation, ‘there he as many mysteries on the other 
side of riches, as on this side of them.’ And yet, God 
deliver us from pinching poverty and grant that, having 
a competency, we may be content and thankful. Let us 
not repine or so much as think the gifts of God unequally 
dealt, if we see another abound with riches, when as God 
knows, the cares that are the keys, that keep those riches 
hang often so heavily at the rich man’s girdle, that they 
clog him with weary days and restless nights, even when 
others sleep quietly. We see but the outside of the rich 
man’s happiness. Let us, therefore, be thankful for health 
and a competence, and above all, for a quiet conscience.” 
That his scholar is an apt pupil in this philosophy we 
see in the following : “I sat down under a" willow tree 
by the water side, and considered what you had told me 
of the. owner of that pleasant meadow in which you then 
left me; that he had a plentiful estate and not a heart 
to think so ; that he had at this time many lawsuits de- 
pending and that they both damped his mirth and took 
up so much of his time and thoughts that he himself had 
not leisure to take the sweet content that I, who pretend 
no title to them, took, in his fields, for I could sit there 
nuietly and, looking on the water, see some fishes sport 
themselves in the silver stream, looking on the hills I 
could behold them spotted with woods and groves; look- 
ing down the meadows could see here a boy gathering 
lilies and ladysmocks, and there a girl cropping culver- 
keyes and cowslips, all to make garlands suitable to this 
present month of May. These and many other field flow- 
ers so perfumed the air that I thought that very meadow 
like that field in Sicily ._of which Diodorus speaks. As I 
thus sat joying in my own happy condition, and pitying 
S88 
this poor rich man that owned this and rnany other pleas- 
ant groves and meadows about me, I did thankfully re- 
member what my Saviour said, that the meek possess the: 
earth, or rather they enjoy what others possess and enjoy 
not. For anglers, and meek, quiet-spirited men, are free 
from those high, those restless thoughts, which corrode 
the sweets of life. There came to my mind at that time 
certain verses in praise of a mean estate and an humble 
mind. They were written by Phineas Fletcher, an ex- 
cellent divine and an excellent angler : 
“No empty hopes, no courtly fears him fright. 
No begging wants him middle-fortune bite, i j 
But sweet content exiles both misery and spite. . i 
His certain life, that never can deceive him, , 
Is full of thousand sweets, and rich content ; i .1 
The smooth-leaved beeches in the field receive him ] i 
With coolest shade, till noonday’s heat he spent; ij ; 
His life is neither tossed on boisterous seas, : J. 
Or the vexatious world, or slothful ease: J 
Pleased and full blest he lives, when he his God can please.*’’ 
Much and close association with nature did not serv® 
to make Walton a recluse or hermit but rather served to 
make him discriminating in the choice of his companions. 
We need never fear that there was aught to shock the 
delicate sensibilities in the conversation of those who gath 
ered in “that honest ale house, where we shall find a 
cleanly room, lavender in the windows, and twenty bal- 
lads stuck about the wall.” Walton was fastidious in his 
selection of comrades, but once he found them congenial 
he was the prince of good fellows. He says of a man : 
“To speak truly, he is not to me a good companion, for 
most of his conceits were either Scripture jests or in- 
decent jests, for which I count no man witty. But a 
companion who feasts the company with mirth and wit 
and leaves out the sin, he is the man.” 
Again he says: “Well sung, Coridon; this song was 
sung with mettle, and it was choicely fitted to the occa- 
sion. I shall love you for it as long as I know you. I 
would that you were a brother of the angle, for a com- 
panion that is cheerful, and free from swearing and 
scurrilous discourse is worth gold. I love such mirth as 
does not make friends ashamed to look upon one another 
next morning, nor men that cannot well bear it, to re- 
pent the money they spend when warmed with drink.” 
Omar says : “See that thou drinkest not thy wine in 
the company of some clown, riotous, having neither wit 
nor manners. Naught but dissensions can conte of it. In 
the night time thou wilt suffer from his drunkenness, his 
clamor and his folly. On the morrow his prayers and 
his penitence will cause thy head to ache.” 
Many a fisherman of our time who finds in Walton the 
injunction to “Go to yonder sycamore tree and hide your 
bottle of drink under the hollow root of it” pays little 
attention to bis constant teachings to drink from that 
bottle with moderation and restrain its use to the meal 
time. He is a believer in true temperance and says he 
would “rather be a civil, well governed, well grounded, 
temperate, poor angler than a. drunken lord.” 
Walton's Respect for Law, 
He believed in obeying all laws, and like the true sports- 
man of to-day he was the bulwark of the game laws, for 
these be the usual months that salmon come out of the sea 
to spawn in most fresh rivers and their fry would about 
a certain time return back to salt water if they were not 
hindered by weirs and unlawful gins, which the greedy 
fishermen set and so destroyed them by thousands. 
That which is everybody’s business is nobody’s busi- 
ness ; if it were otherwise there could not be so many, 
nets and fish that are under the statute size sold daily 
among us, and of which the conservators of the waters 
should be ashamed. 
It is, however, when we realize how profound was 
Walton’s appreciation and enjoyment of the beautiful in 
nature that we can understand that his angling meant 
not only the practice of an art but that the field of this 
art was a gallery of ever changing, ever more beautiful 
pictures painted by nature’s hand, a hand whose technique 
has never been questioned. I have always felt very sorry 
for those of my acquaintance who found their most beau- 
tiful pictures in an art gallery; I always felt that those 
people were trying conscientiously to love beautiful things 
which is about as hopeless an effort as I know, and about 
as futile in its results. The one who best appreciates 
the painted picture is the one who^ has seen it and felt it 
and loved it a thousand times before in nature. Izaak 
Walton was a true artist even though he never saw a 
painted picture and never painted one with aught save 
words. Here are some of his word pictures. 
Walton’s wit is subtle ; it is rather an undercurrent of 
quaint humor that now and then touches the surface, but 
is always felt to lie underneath his discourse : “I will 
give you some observations on how to dress a carp, but 
not till he is caught.” Again he consoles his scholar : 
“Nay, the trout is not lost, for pray take notice, no man 
can lose what he never had.” 
“But turn out of the way a little, good scholar, toward 
yonder high honeysuckle hedge, there we’ll sit and sing 
while this shower falls so gently upon the teeming earth, 
and gives yet a sweeter smell to the lovely flowers that 
adorn these verdant meadows. 
“Look, under that broad beech tree I sat down, when 
I was last this way a-fishing, and the birds in the adjoin- 
ing grove seemed to have a friendly contention with an 
echo, whose dead voice seemed to live in a hollow tree, 
near to the brow' of that primrose hill, there I sat view- 
ing the silver streams glide silently toward their center, 
the tempestuous sea; yet sometimes opposed by rugged 
roots and pebble stones, which broke their’ waves and 
turned them into foam, and sometimes I beguiled tim« 
by viewing the harmless lambs, some leaping securely in 
the cool shade, while others sported themselves in th« 
cheerful sun. As thus I sat, these and other sights had 
so fully possessed my soul with content that I thought, as 
the poet hath happily expressed it, I was for that time 
lifted above earth. 
“I tell you, scholar, when I sat last on this primrose 
bank and looked down on these meadows, I thought of 
them as Charles the Emperor did of the city of Florence, 
that they were ‘too pleasant to be looked on, but only 
on holy days.’” 
Nor does Walton lack an. eye for details and the genre 
picture, as is evidenced by the following description of 
