standing all catched one after another; they being, as he fays, like the wicked of the world, not afraid, though their fellows and companions perish in their fight. And you may observe, that they are not like the folitary Pike, but love to accompany one another, and march together in troops.

And the baits for this bold fish

PEARCH:

are not many; I mean, he will bite as well at some or at any of these three, as at any, or all others whatsoever: a worm, a minnow, or a little frog, of which you may find many in haytime; and of worms, the dunghill-worm, called a brandling, I take to be beft, being well scoured in mofs or fennel; or he will bite at a worm that lies under cow-dung, with a blueish head. And if you rove for a Pearch with a minnow, then it is best to be alive, you sticking your hook through his back-fin; or a minnow with the

hook

hook in his upper lip, and letting him swim up and down about mid-water, or a little lower, and you still keeping him to about that depth by a cork, which ought not to be a very little one: and the like way you are to fish for the Pearch, with a fmall frog, your hook being fastened through the skin of his leg, towards the upper part of it and laftly, I will give you but this advice, that you give the Pearch time enough when he bites, for there was fcarce ever any angler that has given him too much. And now I think beft to rest myself, for I have almost fpent my fpirits with talking fo long.

Ven. Nay, good master, one fish more, for you fee it rains ftill, and you know our angles are like money put to ufury; they may thrive, though we fit still and do nothing but talk and enjoy one another. Come, come, the other fish, good master.

Pifc. But fcholar, have you nothing to mix with this difcourfe, which now grows both tedious and tirefome? fhall I have nothing from you, that seem to have both a good memory and a chearful fpirit?

Ven. Yes, mafter, I will fpeak you a copy of verfes that were made by Doctor Donne, and made to fhew the world that he could make foft and smooth verses, when he thought smoothness worth his labour; and I love them the better, because they allude to rivers, and fish and fishing. They be these :

Come live with me, and be my love,
And we will fome new pleafures prove,

Of

Of golden fands, and crystal brooks,
With filken lines, and filver hooks.

There will the river whisp'ring run,
Warm'd by thy eyes more than the fun;
And there the enamel'd fifb will stay,
Begging themselves they may betray.

When thou wilt Swim in that live bath,
Each fifb, which ev'ry channel bath,
Moft am'roufly to thee will fwim,
Gladder to catch thee than thou bim.

If thou, to be fo feen, beft loath,
By fun or moon, thou dark'nest both,
And if mine eyes have leave to fee,
I need not their light, having thee.

Let others freeze with angling reeds,
And cut their legs with fhells and weeds,
Or treacherously poor fifh befet,

With strangling fnares, or windowy net.

Let coarfe bold bands, from flimy neft,
The bedded fifb in banks outwreft;
Let curious traitors fleave filk flies,
To 'witch poor wandring fifbes eyes.

For thee, thou needst no fuch deceit,
For thou thyself art thine own bait :
That fifh that is not catcht thereby,
Is wifer far, alas, than I.

Pif. Well remembered, honest scholar, I thank you for these choice verses, which I have

6

heard

#

heard formerly, but had quite forgot, till they were recovered by your happy memory. Well, being I have now refted myself a little, I will make you fome requital, by telling you fome obfervations of the Eel, for it rains ftill, and because as you fay, our angles are as money put to use, that thrives when we play, therefore we'll fit ftill and enjoy ourselves a little longer under this honey fuckle hedge *.

Although Pearch, like Trout, delight in clear fwift rivers, with pebbley gravelly bottoms, they are often found in fandy clayey foils; they love a moderately deep water, and frequent holes by the fides of, or near, little streams, and the hollows under banks.

The Pearch spawns about the beginning of March: the beft time of the year to angle for him, is from the beginning. of May till the end of June, yet you may continue to fish for him till the end of September; he is best taken in cloudy windy weather, and, as fome fay, from feven to ten in the forenoon, and from two to feven in the afternoon.

Other baits for the Pearch are, loaches, miller's-thumbs, flicklebacks, fmall lob, and marth, and red-worms, well fcoured, horfe-beans boiled, cad bait, oak-worms, bobs and gentles.

"

Many of these fish are taken in the rivers about Oxford; and the author of The Angler's fure Guide fays, he once faw the figure of a Pearch drawn with a pencil on the door of a houfe near that city, which was twenty-nine inches long, and was informed it was the true dimenfion of a living Pearch. "Angl. fure Guide. 155.

The largest Pearch are taken with a minnow, hooked with a good hold through the back-fin, or rather through the upper-lip; for the Pearch, by reafon of the figure of his mouth, cannot take the bait cross-wife, as the Pike will: when you fifh thus, use a large cork-float, and lead your line about nine inches from the bottom, otherwise the minhow will come to the top of the water. But, in the ordinary way of fishing, let your bait hang within about fix inches from the ground.

1...

CHA P.

CHA P. XIII.

Obfervations of the EEL, and other fish that want fcales, and how to fish for them.

J..

I

PisCATOR.

Tis agreed by most men, that the Eel is a most dainty fish; the Romans have efteemed her the Helena of their feafts, and fome the queen of palate-pleafure. But most men differ about their breeding: fome fay they breed by generation as other fifh do, and others, that they breed, as fome worms do, of mud; as rats and mice, and many other living creatures are bred in Egypt, by the fun's heat, when it fhines upon the overflowing of the river Nilus: or out of the putrefaction of the earth, and divers other ways. Those that deny them to breed by generation as other fish do, ask, if any man ever law an Eel to have a spawn or melt? and they are answered, that they may be as certain of their breeding as if they had seen spawn: for they fay, that they are certain that Eels have all parts fit for generation, like other fifh *, but to fmall as not to be easily difcerned, by reafon of their fatnefs; but that difcerned they may be, and that the he and the fhe-Eel may be diftinguifhed by their fins. And Rondeletius fays, he has feen Eels cling together like dew-worms.

That fishes are furnished with parts fit for generarion cannot be doubted, fince it is a common practice to caftrate them. See the method of doing it in Philof. Trans. Vo!. XLVIII. Part II. for the year 1754. Page 870.

And