The Lamprey. 
387 
“ Lamprey, a fisli of the sea, and of the sweet water, well knowne, 
long and sliding; depictured and described at large by L am p re y 
Rondolet in his 3 chapter of his fourteenth booke.” 
So writes the learned commentator on Du Bartas. 
Fuller, describing Worcestershire, tells us that— 
“ lampreys, in Latin lamjoetrce, a lambendo petras, from licking the 
rocks, are plentiful in this and the neighbouring counties in the river 
Severn. A deformed fish, which for the many holes therein, one would 
conceive nature intended it rather for an instrument of music than for 
man’s food.” ( Worthies of England , vol. iii. p. 87.) 
Drayton writes:— 
“ The lamprey, and his lesse, in Severn genral be.” 
( Polyolbion , song xxvi.) 
The unwholesomeness of the lamprey grew into a 
proverb in consequence of the tradition that Henry I. 
owed his death to his partiality for this fish. In the old 
works on cookery it is recommended that the lamprey be 
stewed with good wine and herbs. 
Du Bartas, in his curious jumble of Greek and Hebrew 
mythology, writes (p. 42) :— 
“ His sweetest strokes then sad Arion lent 
Th’ inchanting sinnewes of his instrument: 
Wherewith he charm’d the raging ocean so, 
That crook-tooth’d lampreys and the congers row 
Friendly together, and their native hate 
The pike and mullet, for the time, forgate.” 
It may not be out of place to quote the poet’s apology 
for this incongruity. In the jDreface to his chief work, a 
long poem on the Creation, Du Bartas announces that 
he presents no profession of his faith, but a poem, which 
he has adorned “as much as the subjects will permit 
with all those most excellent jewels plucked and picked 
out of all sciences and professions.” Deferring to the 
then universal practice of introducing heathen deities into 
