LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PLATE

XI. THE POPHAM, SHANNON, AND OWENMORE FLIES

I. LANDING NETS, ETC.

II. THE SLIDER AND OTHER FLOATS, ETC.

III.-KNOTS, HITCHES, ETC.

IV. SPINNING FLIGHTS, LEADS, ETC. .

V.-SPINNING TACKLES BAITED.

XII. SALMON FLIES: THE TARTAN, SNOW FLY, AND SPEY DOG

341

ON

ANGLING.

CHAPTER I.

BOTTOM-FISHING.

THE ORIGIN OF ANGLING-POND-FISHING PUNT-FISHING-BANK-FISHINGTHE GUDGEON-THE POPE-THE BLEAK-THE ROACH THE RUDD-THE DACE-THE CHUB-THE BARBEL.

THE ART OF ANGLING is a very ancient one, and it is difficult to say when it did not exist. Indeed, man might even and doubtless has taken a lesson from Nature herself. For the Angler or Fishing-frog (Lophius piscatorius) has for its necessities as complete a rod, line, and bait appended to its nose, and uses it with as much skill in decoying within reach of its voracious maw the unwary fish who are deceived by the shining appearance of the filament forming the bait, as the deftest fly-fisher amongst his human imitators. The fishing parties of Antony and Cleopatra will be fresh in the memory of every schoolboy,* while representations of fish and fishing have been found upon some of the oldest tombs and most venerable remains extant. In

* The story of Antony employing divers to fasten fish on to his hook is, no doubt, a singular specimen of angling. But the Chinese may be said to practise the plan habitually. The rocks and stones at the bottom of the sea on the Chinese coast are covered with small shell-fish. Two men go out to fish; one holds a line to which is a baited hook; the other, a diver, takes the hook and a hammer and dives to the bottom, and there he begins cracking and knocking to pieces the masses of shell-fish. The fish draw round to feed. The diver selects his fish, and literally thrusts the hook into its mouth, and his friend above pulls it up.

B

2

THE EARLY MASTERS.

every community in savage life, too, are found instruments of angling; rude enough, but sufficiently effective for the wants of those employing them; showing the various arts used in fishing to have been of primitive and universal invention.

It is not, however, our purpose to give a retrospect history of angling. Our business lies with the present, and with a very brief notice we shall dismiss the past.

One of the first treatises in the English language on angling is that of Dame Juliana Berners, or Barnes, in the Book of St. Albans. It is entitled The Art of Fysshynge with an Angle,' and was published in 1486. There were other authors who added to the stock of angling literature, but the next one of note was the well-known Isaac Walton, who wrote The Contemplative Man's Recreation,' and first published it in 1653, and in fifteen years it ran through five editions. Since then, with the additions by Cotton and Venables, the book has run through more editions than perhaps almost any book ever published.

From that time down to the present the number of writers upon angling matters has abounded beyond measure, and the literature of angling is one of the richest branches of literature we have. As the writers have increased, each one adding his particular notion or two to the common stock, so has the art progressed towards perfection, and, long ere this, fish would have become extinct, but that nature has wisely ordained that, as the fishermen become learned in their art, the fish shall become learned also, and thus hickory and horsehair, gut and steel, are robbed of a portion of their destructiveness; and although our dear old friend and father Isaac, no doubt, would form a most agreeable fishing companion, we question, if he revisited the scenes of his former exploits, with the same tackle he used then, whether he would not find rather more difficulty in 'pleasuring some