,M,9-"RLF

UNIX

ERSITY OF

CALIFORNIA

MR. BENTLEY'S
W PUBLICATIONS

NOW READY.

THE PILLARS OF HERCULES; OR, A NARRATIVE OI

TRAVELS IN SPAIN AND MOROCCO, IN 1848. By DAVIE

URQUHART, ESQ., M.P. 2 vols. Svo.

" Full of talent. Nothing can be better than many chapters of this work."—
Daily News.

" Written with eloquence and not unfrequently a bold and picturesque style
He describes the most attractive parts of Spain and Barbary." — Bentley's Mis-
cellany.

" A learned, curious, and entertaining production, adapted for every taste."—
Literary Gazette.

II.

CITIES AND WILDS OF ANDALUCIA. By THE HON. R

DUNDAS MURRAY. 2 vols. post Svo.

" Among the best and most amusing books of travels we have seen. Mr Mur
ray's pictures are admirable. Engravings add to the manifold attractions of thest
pleasing volumes." — Morning Chronicle.

III.

THE CRADLE OF THE TWIN GIANTS, SCIENCE ANE
HISTORY. By THE REV. HENRY CHRISTMAS, M.A., F.R.S.
F.S.A., Librarian of Sion College. 2 vols. post Svo. £\. 4s.

" There is no want of inte/est in this book. The curious anecdotes, th«
strange traditions, &c., which abound in this work will render it popular."—
Athenceum.

" It is long since we have turned over the pages of a book, whether historica
or fictitious, so alluring in character, or so enthralling in interest." — Sun.

THE FAIRFAX LETTERS, JOURNALS, &c. Comprising th«
Correspondence of the Parliamentary General with all the most dis
tingiiished Personages of the Popular Party. Now first Publishec
from the Original MSS. EDITED BY ROBERT BELL, ESQ. 4 vols.
8vo.,with many Portraits. 60s.
" Full of interest."— Examiner.
" Of the value of this work it would be difficult to speak too highly."—

Britannia.

NARRATIVE OF AN EXPLORING EXPEDITION TO THE
DEAD SEA AND THE SOURCE OF THE JORDAN

Undertaken by Order of the Government of the United States. By

W. F. LYNCH, U.S.N., Commander of the Expedition. Svo., with

numerous Engravings, bound, 21s.

" The sojourn at Tiberias, the trip on the sea of Galilee, the descent of the
River Jordan, thence to the Dead Sea, the account of the voyage on its waters,
the exploration of its shores and the neighbouring country, have the interest of,
discovery with the peculiar attractions which this region and its Scriptural and
historical associations always create." — Spectator.

Mr, Bentley's New Publications.

VI.

NARRATIVE OF AN EXPEDITION TO EXPLORE THE
WHITE NILE. Undertaken by Order of Mehemet Ali. By
CHARLES P. REILLY. From the German. 2 vols. £1 Is.
" We can conceive few things more exciting than this voyage -which the writer
accomplished, and has here recorded. It excites well-merited admiration at the
author's enterprise, energy, and perseverance." — Blacktcood's Magazine.

VII.

TRAVELS IN WESTERN AFRICA, IN 1845 AND 1846. BY
JOHN DUNCAN. Second Edition. 2 vols. post 8vo.
" We were prepared for a sensible and carefully written book, nor have our

expectations been disappointed. For an account of the death of Mungo Park,

and other important matters, the reader will do well to consult this work." —

Athenaeum.

VIII.

THE NAVAL HISTORY OF GREAT BRITAIN. BY W. JAMES.

6 vols. 8vo, with Portraits, £2 14s.

" A work of which it is not too high praise to assert, that it approaches as
nearly to perfection, in its own line, as any historical work ever t\\<\."— Edinburgh
Review.

fx.
THE COURT AND REIGN OF FRANCIS I., KING OF

FRANCE. BY Miss PARDOK. Author of "Louis XIV., and

the Court of France/' "The City of the Sultan," Sfc. 2 vols., 8vo.,

with numerous Portraits.

" The spirit of the best memoir writers has here been caught by Miss Pardoe."
— Britannia.

" Hume and Robertson treat rather of the monarch and his statesmen. Miss
Pardoe aims at combining all, and has been successful." — Spectator.

MEMOIRS OF THE HOUSE OF ORLEANS. INCLUDING
SKETCHES AND ANECDOTES OF THE MOST DISTINGUISHED CHA-
RACTERS OF FRANCE DURING THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGH-
TEENTH CENTURIES. BY DR. COOKE TAYLOR, Author of " Roman-
tic Biography of the Age of Elizabeth," " Manual of Ancient and
Modern History," &c. 3 vols. 8vo., with Portraits, &c., neatly
bound, 42s.

" These memoirs are so clever and brilliant that v;e counsel the country gentle-
man to place them beside his Evelyn, his Defoe, and his Crabbe. It is by far the
most brilliant and successful book on this subject." — Morning Post.

XI.

ITALY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. BY JAMES
WHITESIDE, Q.C. Second Edition, Revised, in 3 vols.
" Equally remarkable for the liberality of the political opinions, the fullness of

the information, and the scrupulous accuracy of the facts." — Morning Chronicle.

xi r.

A VOICE FROM THE DANUBE: OR, THE TRUE STATE
OF THE CASE BETWEEN AUSTRIA AND HUNGARY.
By AN IMPARTIAL SPECTATOR. Post Svo.

SPRING-TIDE;

THE ANGLER AND HIS FRIENDS.

SPRING-TIDE;

OR,

THE ANGLES* AND HIS FEIENDS.

JOHltf YONGE AKERMAtf.

Lord, who would live turmoiled in the court,
And may enjoy such quiet walks as these ?

SHAKSPEAKE, K. Henry VI.

LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.

M.DCCC.L.

LONDON ."

Printed by S. & J. BEKTLEY and HENRY FLET,
Bangor House, Shoe Lane.

PREFACE DEDICATORY.

M838948

TO

JOHN HUGHES, ESQUIRE,

OP

DONNINGTON PRIORY,

IN THE COUNTY OF BERKS.

MY DEAR SIR,

To yon, as a kind friend whose
streams I have often fished, and of whose
hospitality I have as often partaken, — to
you, as the preserver and restorer of ic Owld
Grumbleton," I have ventured to inscribe
this little volume.

Other reasons, however, induce me to
make free with your name. Your fond-
ness for the remains of that dialect which
I have here incidentally attempted to vin-
dicate and illustrate, is well known, — a

I

viii PREFACE DEDICATORY.

fondness inseparable from attachment to
the homely race by whom it is still
used.

My hints on Fly-fishing contain, I fear,
little that is not already known to the
practical Angler, and may only serve as a
guide to those who may be tempted to
pursue one of the most delightful of field-
sports, which, of old time, the Ecclesias-
tical Canons did not deny even to the
Clergy.

Some of our countrymen may, perhaps,
derive half an hour's amusement from those
portions of the dialogue in which I have
attempted to defend from the charge of
utter vulgarity, the language of the rustic
population of the Southern and Western
parts of England. That among an unlet-
tere.d race there should be much in their
speech which may be denominated vulgar,
is unquestionably true ; but there are also
a great number of words and phrases which

PREFACE DEDICATORY. IX

are as certainly the remains of an old
tongue once used in England even by the
educated. This dialect has greatly changed,
and is still changing, and we may both
live to find that it is destined to undergo
a still further mutation.

It appears from Higden, whose Chronicle
was written in the 14th century, that in
his days the people of the West of England
could understand the language of their
countrymen in the Eastern parts of the
Island, but that the men of the South
actually could not understand those of the
North. He instances especially the dialect
of Yorkshire, which he describes as grating
and uncouth in the extreme.* Caxton, in
his edition of Trevisa's " Polychronicon "
(A. D. 1482), modernized the language and
adapted it to his time : — " Therefore I,
William Caxton, a symple person, have

* Tota lingua North umbrorum, max i me in Eboraco,
ita stridet incondita. — Lib. i.

PREFACE DEDICATORY.

endeavoured me to write first over all the
said book of ' Polychromcon,1 and some-
what have changed the rude and old
English, that is to wit, certain words which
in these days be neither used nor under-
standon."

In 1654, a little less than 200 years
later, when Evelyn visited Beverley in
Yorkshire, he was shown over the church,
by a woman who spoke the language of
Queen Mary's days.* This shows that
our language was continually changing as
civilization advanced, and that even in the
provinces, people, in towns and cities at
least, had begun to discard their ancient
dialect, and adopt a mode of speech founded
on a more recent model. To changes like
these Waller alludes : —

But who can hope his lines should long
Last, in a daily changing tongue ?

It is my belief, that the evidence of

* Diary, sub anno 1654.

PREFACE DEDICATORY. xi

provincialisms in our old MSS. are not so
plain as some writers would lead us to
suppose. It seems rather, that most of
the works which have been preserved were
written with a view to their being gene-
rally comprehensible to Englishmen, and
not in the dialects of particular districts.
Robert of Gloster is a singular exception :
we have nothing so decidedly characteristic
of the language of the West of England,
and this so closely resembles the speech of
the Berkshire, Wiltshire, and Gloucester-
shire peasant of our day, that if read to
him carefully, it would be far from unin-
telligible.

It is well known to those who have
made our provincialisms their study, that a
certain dialect and its modifications pre-
vails in a certain division of England, the
geographical limits of which may thus be
sketched : — East and West, from Dover to
the Land's End, and North and South

Xll PREFACE DEDICATORY.

from the Warwickshire Avon to the Isle
of Wight. In all the counties included
within these limits we have varieties, it is
true, but varieties of one dialect, and in
that dialect may be traced innumerable
relics of the language of our Saxon fore-
fathers. Nor is it in words alone, many
of which have become obsolete among the
educated, that we find traces of an older
language. The pronunciation of many yet
recognised is so clearly that of the original
tongue, that we need cite but two exam-
ples; namely, Dew, pronounced Deaw, and
Few, pronounced Feaw. In the South and
West of England, either of these words
may be taken as the Shiboleth of the
rural population; but it is not so with
Brad amang, and ady pure Saxon, still
found, not only in the South and West,
but also on the Northern borders of Eng-
land.

It is obvious that in many districts of

PREFACE DEDICATORY. xiii

England the language has been so much
changed by the march of civilization, as to
be no longer characterised by the most
marked provincialisms; while, on the other
hand, in many villages of the Western
counties, the language has not very mate-
rially varied for centuries past. We cannot
doubt but that the speeches which Shak-
speare puts into the mouth of Edgar, when
personating Mad Tom, are a sample of the
language of the Warwickshire clown of his
day. One sentence is especially worthy of
notice : " Chill pick your teeth, Zir " (Zear,
Act iv.). Now this form of speech is
entirely obsolete in Warwickshire at the
present day, while <c chill" and u cham "
("I will" and "I am") are still used in
parts of Somersetshire ; and it is only a
few weeks since that a Kentish gentle-
man, settled at Henley- in -Arden, found
that none of his neighbours knew what
a " keeler " was (a shallow vessel used

XIV PREFACE DEDICATORY.

in brewing), although their great country-
man's line,

" While greasy Joan doth kele the pot/'
was, of course, so familiar to all of them !

But it is not my purpose to discuss at
length the changes to which our tongue
has yielded, nor to weary you with elabo-
rate attempts at philological illustration ;
nor need I desire to enlist YOUR sympathy
for a too much neglected and too often
despised race. We know well that though
the rustic has sometimes a woodbine at
his cottage-door, he has more frequently
penury and want, and disease within ; and
that though, unlike the artisan, he at cer-
tain seasons of the year may trudge to his
labour with the lark above his head, he
at others returns hungry, and cold, and
weary, to a cheerless home where food and
fuel are scanty.

Should the day happily arrive when the
condition of the agricultural labourer may

PREFACE DEDICATORY. XV

be permanently improved, none will rejoice
more heartily than the Angler, whose pur-
suit leads him to the retired nooks and
corners of our birth-land, and affords him
so many opportunities of studying the habits
and feelings of a race to whom England
is so much indebted.

Believe me, my dear Sir,
Your affectionate friend

and fellow-countryman,
J. Y. AKERMAN.

LONDON,
St. Valentine's Day, 1850.

It is good in discourse, and speech of conversation,
to vary and intermingle speech of the present occasion
with arguments, tales with reasons, asking of questions
with telling of opinions, and jest with earnest : for it is
a dull thing to tire, and as we say now, to jade a thing
too far. BACON, Of Discourse.

L'accent du pays ou Ton est ne, demeure dans
Tesprit et dans le coeur comme dans le langage.

ROCHEFOUCAULT.

Vita rustica sine duhitatione, proxima et quasi con-
sanguinea sapientise.

COLUMELLA.

FIRST DAY.

Cunctas veris opes et picta rosaria gemmis
Laniger in calathis, aspice, Maius habet,

Mensis Atlantigense dictus cognomine Maise,
Quern merito multum diligit Uranie.

AUSONIUS.

Again the merry month of May

Has made our hills and valleys gay ;

The birds rejoice in leafy bowers,

The bees hum round the breathing flowers ;

Blythe Morning lifts his rosy eye,

And Evening's tears are tears of joy.

BURNS.

SPRING-TIDE.

FIBST DAY,

SENEX, JULIAN.

Senex. THIS way : our road lies along
this path and over yonder stile, on the
other side of which is the river. What a
morning for the Angler ! The sun has
hidden himself, and those light clouds bode
no rain, while the gentle south wind stirs
the leaflets and curls the surface of the

water.

A day with not too bright a beam ;

A warm but not too scorching sun ;
A southern gale to curl the stream,

And, Master, half our work is done.

O the merry month of May ! how often
have I sighed for these scenes of my early

SPRING-TIDE.

childhood, while pent up in chambers in
London. Truly must a man have experi-
enced such durance to render him fit to
enjoy the country as he ought.

Julian. There is some truth in that re-
mark. Often, when looking on a beautiful
prospect, I have noticed that my country
companion did not participate in my rap-
tures. Yet even scenes like these are
cheerless in foul weather: we cannot have
perpetual May.

S. God forbid that we should, for then
we should lose the benefit of contrast. Yet
I am not one of those who would forsake
the country even in foul weather. No,

not

When the rotten woodland drips,
And the leaf is stamp'd in clay.

It has its charms for me in all seasons.
What sight more beautiful than hedge-
rows and coppices glittering in the sun's
rays on a frosty morning ! Flocks of wild

FIRST DAY.

fowl, no longer secure in their sedgy re-
treats, are scouring the country in all direc-
tions ; small birds, tamed by hunger, draw
near your dwelling, and robin in his scarlet
pourpoint, perched on the window-sill, begs
a crumb from your trencher.

J. Excellent ! You should write a
panegyric on Dan Winter, and recite it to
the owls who haunt the tall elms near the
house. One of these creatures kept me
awake the whole night when I last visited
you. Its hooting was incessant.

S. Not a word, as you love me, against
the " anchorite of birds." I have an espe-
cial veneration for such of the feathered
race as haunt old buildings, and delight
in watching the jackdaw in church-towers,
though he differs much from my solemn
friend the owl. Just observe them about
the turrets of the old minster in a cathedral
town. Garrulous gray-pates vie with the
bipeds below them. They chatter, quarrel,

SPRING-TIDE.

fall out, and cuff it at times, like the lords
of the creation : doubtless like them, too,
they prate of politics and of a pedigree,
but they cling with filial fondness to the
old fane, however fierce the storm may
howl around it. But of all birds " com-
mend me to the owl.'"

J. Do you recollect Drayton's picture
of your favourite ? —

" 'Twas near the eaves and shelter of a stack,
Set to support it at a beech's back,
In a stubb'd tree with ivy overgrown,
On which the sun had scarcely ever shone,
A broad-faced creature, hanging of the wing,
Was set to sleep while every bird did sing."

S. Ay, ay : he who wrote the lines —

" Can grave and formal pass for wise,
When we the solemn owl despise ? "

was a Cockney, and knew nothing of the
bird. Minerva did not* despise him when
she adopted him for her crest, and thousands
of Attic drachmas, still existing, attest that
the Athenians held him in veneration as I

FIRST DAY.

do. Other birds may be loud at prime and
complin, but the owl's is the midnight
service. Apart from the superstitious feeling
from which some of the best informed of us
are scarcely free, there is something inex-
pressibly solemn in the note of the bird of
night. Have you ever, when threading a
wild wood, come upon some ivy-sheltered
nook protected from the blaze of the noon-
tide sun, and seen the owl perched in his
solitary retreat so near you that you might
strike him down with your staff? I have,
when a boy, often encountered him in that
way, and felt awed at the presence of the
majestic bird. How he loves the moulder-
ing pile which piety raised and fanaticism
shattered from roof- tree to crypt ! His
lineage could tell of the times when rude and
impious hands battered and defaced corbel
and mullion, and delicate tracery, wrought
by the cunningest craftsmen in Christendom.
Here he abides in dignified solitude, from

SPRING-TIDE.

which he emerges only when the world is
asleep.

J. Yes, all except the poacher and the
night-prowler. And here I am disposed to
say a word in behalf of your favourite. I
verily believe he assists in imparting awe
and solemnity to darkness, and this has a
salutary effect upon the morals of your
village population. When once your chaw-
bacon becomes habituated to late hours
and night-walking, he is, if young, easily
persuaded to become poacher, and so on
from bad to worse until the hulks or the
gallows closes the scene.

S. True every word of it, and there-
fore long let that noble bird be honoured.
Long may he find a refuge in the retreat
he loves ! " The illuminated rites, the swell-
ing organ, the monkish magnificence of pro-
cessions have passed away ; theirs was but
a transient possession, but your owl shall
be mitred abbot to the end of time."

FIRST DAY.

J. Your friend, however, excites no
veneration among the birds of the air,
who thrash him soundly when they catch
him abroad. " Mine heritage," says the
prophet, ' c is unto me as a speckled
bird ; — the birds round about are against
her."

S. I have often thought of that passage
as I have seen the owl reeling and blunder-
ing through the air at daylight, assailed
by small birds of all sizes, even including
the titmouse and the wren. But these
little creatures sometimes attack the cuckoo
and the hawk as their common enemy in
the same manner, and occasionally suffer
for their temerity from the talons of the
latter. Such allusions in Holy Writ re-
mind me that a few years ago some witling
talked of writing a book to show the ac-
quaintance of the inspired writers of the
Old Testament with natural history, as if
Nature's huge volume did not lie before

10 SPRING-TIDE.

them in those ancient days when books
were few and precious.

J. Wonderful discovery ! I believe there
is an advertisement not long since issued,
announcing a work illustrating Shakspeare's
knowledge of natural history !

S. A veritable mare's nest ! — but here ""s
the river, and yonder comes my ally,
Simon Paradice, a true specimen of the
" Chawbacon " — shrewd, but honest, and
grateful for little kindnesses.

J. I confess I have little sympathy with
these clods. There is in them a good deal
of low cunning under the mask of sim-
plicity, and their manners are intolerably
boorish.

S. Hold there ! I cannot bear to hear
my smock-frocked friends and neighbours
so vilified, " nor shall you do mine ear
that violence.1'' I have all my life loved
these simple people whom you abuse.
Coarse, and even brutal, many of them

FIRST DAY. 11

certainly are, but take what class you
will, I believe you will find within it a
larger number more vicious, and with in-
finitely less excuse for bad living. To me
there is something affecting in the hard
and simple lives of these people, who,
when well-disposed, present better examples
of Christian patience and resignation than
may be found even among the educated.
If you knew them as well I do, you would
confess that the agricultural labourer is a
long-suffering and enduring creature — rude
and unpolished, but often honest and sub-
missive to his superiors, to a degree that
you will look for in vain among the half-
educated and often half-infidel mechanic.
I can never forget that our Great Master
and Teacher chose for his companions on
earth men of the simplest habits and hum-
blest walk of life ; and often as I have
looked upon the cluster of white frocks in
the aisle of our village church, and watched

12 SPRING-TIDE.

the serious up-turned weather-beaten coun-
tenances of the group — often, I say, have
I, while contemplating this sight, prayed
for the simple faith of those poor clowns.

J. Well, perhaps if I had lived longer
among them, as you have, I should be more
reconciled to their habits ; but their dialect
puzzles me sorely — it is English run
mad !

S. There, again, let me venture to set
you right. It is no jargon, as many have
supposed ; on the contrary, it more resem-
bles the language of the great Alfred —
you stare, but it is true — than that I am
now using; and this I hope to show you
before we part. Well, Simon [Simon comes
forward] are we to have any sport to-
day?

Simon [making his obeisance]. I haups
zo, zur; there 's a girt un or two, about
dree pound a piece, down by them elmin
trees yander.

FIRST DAY. 13

J. \aside\. A sample of the language
of Alfred the Great ! O Gemini !

S. Give me my rod, and help this gen-
tleman to put together his.

Simon. Eez, zur.

S. [searching his pockets], u Eh,*" as
the great Christopher says, — " not in our
coat, not in our breeches, not in our hat ! "
— run up to the house, Simon, and fetch
me my fly-book ; you '11 find it on the
hall table [exit Simon at the pace of a
hunted hare~\. Now then let me tell you
that one of the two last words uttered by
that fellow was more like the language of
Alfred, and Beda, and ^SDlfric, than our
own.

J. Indeed ! Pray let me hear — which
of them ?

S. Why that which sounds to moderns
the most rustic of any — the word " Eez,"
which is most palpably nothing more than
the Anglo-Saxon gese, the g being perhaps

14 SPRING-TIDE.

soft, or, as the learned suppose, having
been softened like y under the Norman
rule. In this way a geclepid " became
yclepid, a form in which it is found in
our literature up to a comparatively recent
period.

J. If you run on at this rate, you 11
make a proselyte of me for a certainty.
Here comes our henchman. This is a
sweet spot, which old Walton himself would
have revelled in. You remember Withers1
lines : —

" Two pretty rills do meet, and meeting, make
Within one valley a large silver lake,
About whose banks the fertile mountains stood
In ages passed, bravely crown'd with wood,
Which lending cold sweet shadows, gave it grace
To be accounted Cynthia's bathing-place."

/S. Yes, Withers viewed everything with
a poet^s eye, and rightly considered a
running stream indispensable to the perfect
beauty of a landscape. Witness another
passage in the same poem : —

FIRST DAY. 15

" For what offence this place was scanted so
Of springing waters, no record doth show ;
Nor have they old tradition left that tells ;
But till this day at fifty-fathom wells
The shepherds drink."

Without running streams a country loses
half its charms. The ancients considered
them the proper ornaments of sylvan beau-
ty ; hence Maximus Tyrius tells us the
mountains were sacred to Jupiter, but
the valleys to Diana. And now let us
try our skill against one of the denizens
of this pretty water.

J. What's your fly?

S. Try a hackle and a " yellow dun."
Like most persons who cast a fly, you
have, I suppose, your crotchets, and would
not for the world put two of the same
sort on at the same time, though I'll
venture an even bet that the " bob-fly"
is taken four times out of five in pre-
ference to the u stretcher." This you
may soon test by ringing the changes.

16 SPRING-TIDE.

J. I am, as you know, but a novice
in fly-fishing, so I shall implicitly follow
your advice, which is a very fair answer
to some of the quackeries on Angling.
" Put on a palmer or hackle," says one
oracle, " and another fly supposed to be
in season, and when you have taken a
fish, open his belly and see which he has
been feeding on, — then use a fly of the
same colour."

iS. I have heard the same stuff gravely
enunciated by people who never once
paused to consider its utter absurdity, and
who set me down as a Johnny-raw in
the science, when I ventured to remark
that I would fish any river with three
palmers of my own choosing.

J. There must, however, be very differ-
ent fishing in different rivers, some requir-
ing more dexterity than others. The Irish
and Scotch are good anglers, I believe.

S. Undoubtedly ; but some of them

FIRST-DAY. 1 7

would find it difficult to fish such streams
as these. In sharp running water you
must strike the moment you feel your fish,
or he is gone ; but where the current
runs sluggishly, it is necessary to give him
time, or you lose him to a certainty.
Much of the angler's success, however,
depends on his acquaintance with the
water, and the wrhereabouts of the fish.
But, come, let me see you throw for a
trout. I think you will find one lying
just to the left of that tuft of weeds.
Can you reach him ?

J. I Tl try. There !

S. You moved him. Wait a moment.
He seems inclined, but let him recover
himself. Wind up a foot of your line,
and, if he takes your fly, be sure you
do not let him plunge into the weeds.
Now try again. Well done ! — you have
him. Walk down stream with him, and
wind up as fast as you can. He's a fine

c

18 SPRING-TIDE.

fish, and shows excellent sport. Be ready,
Simon. Let him feel the play of your
rod, but do not pull him too hard. So !
that was well done !

J. He^s evidently averse to any ac-
quaintance with the fool at the other end,
and declines a meeting.

S. His struggles are vain. See, — he
reels, and shows his golden side ! It 's all
over with him. Give me the landing-net,
Simon. Now lead him to the bank. No
— non placet — another struggle for life or
death, but in vain. Bring him in. There,
sir, he 's yours, — a well-fed fish, and a good
pound and a half.

J. Faith ! this is worth all the bottom-
fishing in the world !

S. Ay, truly, and your quarry is more
elegant. Your fly-fisher may take to troll-
ing when trout-fishing is over, but he
looks impatiently for the return of Spring.
Some skill is needed, too, in playing a fish

Page 18.

FIRST DAY. 19

with light tackle such as this, but you
may tow a jackass down stream with
jack-tackle ; or, as the " Young Angler's
Instructor " acutely observes, " you can
only lose him by not giving him time."

J. A friend of mine never fishes with
more than one fly at a time. What think
you of the practice ? This fish, you see,
took my bob-fly, and in his floundering and
plunging I feared the other would become
entangled.

S. Mr. Penn, who, in his u Maxims
and Hints,*" has given us some of the best
instructions on trout- fishing, has a remark
on the subject which is a good answer to
all that has been said. " The learned," says
he, " are much divided in opinion as to
the propriety of whipping with two flies
or with one. I am humbly of opinion
that your chance of hooking fish is much
increased by your using two flies, but I
think that by only using one you increase

20 SPRING-TIDE.

your chance of landing the fish.'1 There
can be no doubt of this, and I have illus-
trated it myself occasionally, having caught
with one fly a fine fish, and with the
other a most obdurate weed or a bramble,
which has either broken my tackle or suf-
fered the fish to shake himself loose.
Notwithstanding this, I prefer using two
flies, because I think the " bob," as you
draw your line across the stream, more
frequently invites the attention of the fish ;
moreover, it is generally taken at the end
of a straight line, and therefore the trout
is more likely to hook himself. Come, try
again.

J. There 's a fish rising a few yards
lower down. I '11 throw for him. I have
him ! quick ! — the landing-net.

S. You need not trouble yourself:
your friend is small, and not fit for the
creel.

J. I thought him at first a fine fish.

FIRST DAY. 21

He took the fly greedily, and made a great
fuss.

S. Just so, — which is almost a certain
sign of his extreme youth. You did not
find your first fish do so : he scarcely
showed himself at the onset. I love to
feel my rod bend with the sudden sullen
downward plunge of a trout, for that
generally assures me that my fish is of a
fair size, while a small one dashes at the
prize as a spoilt child snatches the apple
you offer him. I have sometimes lost a
very heavy fish, which has gone down in
this sullen manner, without showing him-
self at all, and after a few minutes suc-
ceeded in getting clear off. Salmon will
sometimes serve you so, and you have no
resource left but to pelt them up.

J. 1 like the look of your rod better
than my own : give me leave to exchange
with you for a short time.

S. Yours is somewhat too pliant for my

22 SPRING-TIDE.

hand, but it is a well-made rod, and as
fine as brass rings and varnish can make
it. This smartness dazzles the eyes of our
clowns, who sometimes say the rods are
" a nashun zite too vine var the vish," —
don't they, Simon ?

Simon. Eez, zur, um do. Vishes be
martal timersome, and dwont like anything
as glisters too much. Jack Ockell wud
zometimes be out early in the marnin, and
just as a 'd get to the river zide, up 'd
come owld Varmer Smith wi1 his white
smock vrock on, and put Jack in a girt
pelt, coz \id stand clost by the zide an
bin to watch un. " Od drattle't!" Jack
u'd cry, " if you be gwain" to stand there,
I med as well drow my hat at um, that 's
ael ! " and then the varmer 'd gwo away
laughin, and zay Jack was a curious wos-
bird to be zhure !

S. — [Aside to J".] My friend, you see,
is coming out ; and, if you can bear with

FIRST DAY. 23

him, you will hear some queer stories
presently.

J. To be sure I will ; but I find some
difficulty in understanding him.

S. I '11 supply the gloss.

J. Thank you : I am quite ready for
my lessons in the language of Alfred and
Beda. — There's a fish rising under that
bank. Pshaw ! — I cannot reach him. I
cannot cast so far by a full yard.

S. Let me try. There ! — I have him.

J. Phew ! what a length of line ! and
what a fine fish ! He fights nobly, but
you have him well in hand.

S. I hold with Mr. Penn there, who
says your success will often depend greatly
upon the manner in which you first com-
mence your acquaintance with a fish, which,
if you give him time to put his helm up,
may cause you much trouble. Now, Simon,
out with him. Humph ! — about two
pounds.

SPRING-TIDE.

J. A beautiful fish. I wish I could
cast a line with your skill.

S. You will soon do that. I am a poor
hand, compared with many whom I have
me£ ; but the race is not to the swift, nor
the battle to the strong ; and a habit of
observation as to the haunts of fish will
often compensate for some want of skill.
Still, to be able to cast a long and light
line to a great distance, is an unquestion-
able advantage. It is amusing to see a
green fisherman whipping away at a fish
that lies just out of his reach, till by and
by a rustic-looking personage appears by
his side, bearing a rod whose staff is like
a weaver's beam, and, with a " I thenks
/ can put it auver bin," swash goes the
aforesaid staff, out goes the line some
twenty- five yards or so, and in a twink-
ling a big trout is plunging at the end
of it.

J. I am surprised to find so many fish

FIRST DAY. 25

here in a stream so much exposed. I sup-
pose Simon helps to watch it.

Simon. Eez, zur, I helps a bit now and
then. Us tuk oon chap laast zummer, and a
purty nigh drownded oon on us, but us
got un out at laast, and tuk un in to the
public, when a axed lave to dry 's zelf,
and tuk ael 's duds off ; but I '11 be
whipped if a didn't bo wit out o' winder
as naked as a worm, and tuk acrass the
yields, and got right awoy, a poaching
wosbird !

S. They can do less harm here than
in smaller and shallower streams, except
by poisoning.

Simon. Ye yeard, I s'pwose, how Tom
Ockell pwizined Squire Dun's vish, zur.

S. No ; how was that ?

Simon. Whoy, a was never quite clane
in ael 's life ; zo one vine night laast mid-
summer, a perswaded hizzelf to get into the
Bruk, and the next marnin, — to be zhure !

26 SPRING-TIDE.

— there was a vine caddie ! A M pwizoned
ael the vish, a was so cusnashun dirty !

J. There is a choice epithet which your
friend has used more than once, and which
I don't remember meeting with before.
Pray what does he mean by a wosbird ?

S. It has been supposed by many to
be a term synonymous with bastard, but I
am half inclined to the opinion of a friend,
who suggests that the first syllable is com-
posed of the Anglo-Saxon " wo," wrong,
evil, misfortune, or mischief: a " wosbird "
is therefore equivalent to a bird of evil, or
bird of mischief, and in this sense it is ap-
plied by those who use it. I don't believe
it is used at all in the north of England,
and it may therefore be considered a rem-
nant of the West Saxon dialect, to which,
like many other words, it appears to be
peculiar ; while some are common among
the rural population throughout the coun-
try, from the Isle of Wight to the Tyne.

FIRST DAY. 27

Thus the pure Anglo-Saxon " ael," for alt,
is still found from north to south ; but in
the counties south of the Avon it is less
frequent, and only heard among those who
adhere to and use the " owld taak," as
they term it. But if you encourage me
in these etymological reveries, you '11 lose
some fine fish, and this is a morning which
the angler ought not to neglect. Let us
go and look after Simon^s " two or dree
girt uns down yander." A good trout
generally lies under the roots of that pol-
lard-willow : I took one there last season
which weighed nearly four pounds, and I
warrant you another is, by this time, wait-
ing his turn, though I cannot promise that
he will be as big or as well fed.

J. I shall be content with one of half
that weight.

S. I remember, some years since, when
near this spot, running to the rescue of an
elderly gentleman, who had hooked and

28 SPRING-TIDE.

was playing a fine trout, when suddenly
the fish's guardian angel appeared in the
shape of a wasp, which careered at the nose
of piscator so menacingly, that, but for my
timely assistance, the veteran angler would
have come off second best. — [Exeunt.

SECOND DAY.

Go, let the diving Negro seek

For gems hid in some forlorn creek :

We all pearls scorn,

Save what the dewy morn
Congeals upon each little spire of grass,
Which careless shepherds beat down as they pass ;

And gold ne'er here appears,

Save what the yellow Ceres bears.

SIR HENRY WOOTTON.

Das Wasser rauscht, das Wasser schwoll ;

Ein Fischer sass daran,
Sah nach dem Angel ruhevoll,

Kuril bis an 's Herz hinan.

GOETHE.

SECOND DAY,

SENEX, JULIAN, SIMON PARADICE.

Julian. WELL, though not wedded to
seclusion, I confess there are many charms
in a Country life ; but much depends on
association.

Sewex. He only whose early days were
spent amidst rural scenes can truly love
the Country. Yet, as I stroll through
these meadows, I feel, though lovely to
look upon, they are, to my eyes, less
beautiful than they were. The cowslip
and the harebell blossom still ; trees that
were young when I was a boy are still
growing, and looking green ; the lark carols

32 SPRING-TIDE.

as blithely as ever ; the grasshopper vaults
as high, and chirps as gaily ; and the
thrush sings from the hawthorn that feeds
him in the winter. While Nature each
season renews her livery, man has but
one Spring ; and through the long vista
of declining years regards the happy hours
of youth as the first sinner looked back
on Paradise.

Still glides the stream, and shall not cease to glide ;
The Form remains, the Function never dies ;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise —
We men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish.

J. I wonder what our friend Simon
thinks of the country ?

S. You can ask him. I '11 wager he
would prefer his own native meadows to
the streets of London, notwithstanding the
legends once current hereabouts that they
are paved with gold. Believe me, the
countryman looks anxiously for the return
of the swallow and the cuckoo. Doesn^t

SECOND DAY. 33

he, Simon ? What is it they sing of the
cuckoo in our country ?

Simon. The cuckoo 's a vine bird

A zengs as a vlies,
A brengs us good tidins,

And tells us no lies ;
A zucks th' smael birds' eggs,

To make his voice clear,
And the mwore a cries " Cuckoo ! "

The zummer draaws near.

Now, vor my paart, I dwont pertickler
like the wosbird. A ''s too vond o1 other
people's whoams ; and, as to a's voice,
a all us zims to I to ha" ziunmut in 's
keeker. If a 'd yeat a feaw scare o"*
snails, as the blackbirds and dreshes do,
instead o1 smael birds1 eggs, a M vind 7s
zengin' mended 'oondervul, I 'm zhure.
But it 's pleazant time when the cuckooes
about — that 's zartin. The whate be chit-
tin'' ; the ma wing graass looks vrum ; the
elmin trees ha** got ael their leaves on,
and the young rucks are makin1 a cad-
die.

34 SPRING-TIDE.

S. What other verse is it they have
about the cuckoo ?

Simon. The Cuckoo comes in April,
Stays the month o' May,
Zengs a zong at Midzummer,
And then a gwoes away.

S. Ay, that 's it. The bird chooses
the three most delicious months of the
year ; and, though his name has become a
by- word among us, his advent glads the
heart of man, notwithstanding his " note
of fear." The small birds, however, give
him a dusting occasionally, either out of
revenge for the petty larceny he commits
on them, or for his resemblance to the
hawk, with whom they sometimes venture
too far, as with the owl, and suffer for
their temerity. Yet, long live the cuckoo ! —

" Time may come when never more

The wilderness shall hear the lion roar ;
But, long as cock shall crow from household perch
To rouse the dawn, soft gales shall speed thy wing,
And thy erratic voice be faithful to the Spring."

SECOND DAY. 35

J. You spoke of the thrush loving the
hawthorn. There are several of those
beautiful trees in this neighbourhood. One
often sees them on the hills and downs,
standing alone, their beautiful foliage exhi-
biting in strong contrast their gnarled and
weather-beaten trunks. It is truly a most
picturesque tree. Can you tell why they
are so frequently seen thus detached ?

S. " A bird of the air shall tell of the
matter." Many of them are of very great
age. I can fancy the thrush, the ouzel, or
the wood-pigeon, scared by the fowler in
ancient times, dropping a berry here and
there, which took root, to the amazement
of the wandering swineherd. The Anglo-
Saxons regarded this tree with superstitious
veneration ; and in some parts of Ireland, to
this day, if you talked of cutting one down,
you would create a terrible hubbub in the
neighbourhood. I am hardly free from the
imputation of tree-worship, so much de-

36 SPKING-TIDE.

nounced by the Anglo-Saxon laws, and have
an especial regard for the hawthorn, beau-
tiful at this season while it teems with
its delicious perfume, and cheerful to look
upon, studded with countless ripening ber-
ries, when hoar winter nips both man and
beast, and makes your hearthstone plea-
santer than the meadows.

J. I have no doubt many of these trees
are of a great age, coeval perhaps with the
oldest oaks and yews in the kingdom. Old
records tell us of several of the latter two ;
but the hawthorn perhaps lost — if not its
beauty — its dignity under the Norman rule.
Speaking of the age of trees, did you ever
notice the old saying that an oak is five
hundred years growing, five hundred years
in a state of maturity, and another five
hundred decaying ? You will find it among
the quaint list of " Demaundes joyous,"
printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1511.

S. From what we have confirmed, as to

SECOND DAY. 37

the age of the oak, there seems some truth
in this saying of our forefathers. The
oldest men in this neighbourhood, and some
have reached eighty years, say they re-
member trees which are " not a mossle
chainged " since they were breeched. But
much has been written on ancient trees
known to have been standing before the
Conquest. Yonder is an elm, which was
a lusty tree when the Parliament men chased
the fugitive Royalists across these mea-
dows.

" Sure thou didst flourish once, and many springs,
Many bright mornings, much dew, many showers

Pass'd o'er thy head ; many light hearts and wings,
Which now are dead, lodged in thy living towers."

Yes, this field was once stoutly contested
for nearly a whole day.

J. Heaven grant that such quiet scenes
may never again be the theatre of such
fearful doings ! History usually gives us
but the outline of events, and many an

38 SPRING-TIDE.

episode of blood and pillage in those strife-
ful clays is lost to remembrance.

S. We may guess the fate of many a
happy and innocent family at that period,
abandoned to the rage and lust of an in-
furiate and licentious soldiery, whose charac-
ters may be inferred when we read of the
devices borne by their officers. One Mid-
dleton, a Parliament man, had for his
device an armed figure killing a bishop,
with the motto, " Exosus Deo et sanc-
tis,:' and underneath "root and branch."
Langrish, another captain, bore a death's
head, with a bishop^s mitre, and " Mori
potius quam papatus." Nothing, however,
can exceed the impiety and indecency of
some of the Royalist captains, who adopted
devices and mottoes which can neither be
described nor written down. But come,
Simon waits for us below the bridge ; let
us see what sport we are to have this
fine morning.

SECOND DAY. 39

" Hark, how through the peopled air

The husy murmur glows !
The insect youth are on the wing,
Eager to taste the honeyed spring,
And float amid the liquid noon ;
Some lightly o'er the current skim,
Some show their gaily gilded trim,
Quick glancing to the sun."

Ha ! the May-fly, too, is rising ; the
angler will not leave the river with an
empty pannier to-day.

J. When this fly is on the water, the
fish will take no other, I have heard.

S. Ask those who told you so if they
ever tried. But we will soon put it to
the test. The mention of that dogma re-
minds me that last season, in the month
of April, with a cold north-west wind,
which curled the surface of the water well,
I took, in a part of this stream, within the
space of half-a-mile, sixteen brace of fine
trouts, and most of them with the artifi-
cial May-fly, though of course not one of
these creatures had made its appearance.

40 SPRING-TIDE.

I have been equally successful with the
May-fly's " counterfeit presentment " in
streams where that insect is never
seen. The fact is, that when the trout
is really inclined to feed, there are few
things thrown lightly on the surface, or
slowly drawn through the water, which
he will not take.

J. I have often observed fish rise and
take the leaves which on a windy day are
blown into the river. This seems to favour
your opinion.

S. True, but you will find the trouts
repeatedly reject them. I do not think
them so obtuse as to seize everything as
food which may fall near them ; but doubt-
less, experience, or perhaps instinct, prompts
them to examine everything that comes in
their way. Thus the hairy caterpillar, when
feeding on a leaf, may, like the clown saw-
ing the sign-board on which he is perched,
eat away until he is precipitated into the

SECOND DAY. 41

water. In this manner, though hardly dis-
cernible by us, fish perhaps often devour
any reptile or insect that may be launched
on the floating leaf, which is sent adrift
again as soon as it is cleared of the creatures
sailing upon it. I have had wonderful sport
in the months of August and September,
the fish rising at almost every fly cast near
them, while the leaves were falling occa-
sionally, in consequence of a breeze. Now
then, on with a May-fly for " stretcher,"
and use a hackle for the " bob." Well
Simon, have you marked a good trout?

Simon. Eez, zur ; there 's a featish good
un, just under thuck bank yander, if Measter
Julian can crape alang by them pales, and
kip out o1 zite.

J. 1 11 try, Simon. I see him rising.
Now see me give him " the line of in-
vitation.'1 There ! — ha ! he ns gone !

S. Yes ; there he goes up stream like
a rocket. He saw the shadow of your

42 SPRING-TIDE.

rod. He is an old and cunning fish, and
is not to be easily caught.

Simon. The best woy to catch he is to
drow a leetle bit aboove, and let the v]y
zail auver bin.

J. That last word of our friend's puzzles
me a little ; is it a corruption of him or
it?

S. It is no corruption, but the pure Sax-
on pronoun hj/n ; though, strange to say,
the editors of our provincial glossaries have
not remarked it, — a proof, one may easily
perceive, that they have but a very slight
acquaintance with the dialects they have
undertaken to illustrate. The compilers of
some of these works are greatly deceived
if they suppose any English dialect is to
be illustrated by merely turning over the
leaves of an Anglo-Saxon dictionary. Others
err as much in concluding, that, as a cer-
tain provincial word is not to be discovered
in these vocabularies, it is necessarily not

SECOND DAY. 43

of Anglo-Saxon origin, and, having searched
all the ancient northern tongues for deri-
vations, boldly assume it was imported !

J. But, is not this word sometimes
pronounced like un?

S. It is ; and the same change was,
doubtless, remarked by the scribes in Anglo-
Saxon times ; hence the variation which
we find in their orthography, even in the
same page.

J. Then there is the word " thuck,"
which I do not remember to have noticed
before, though I have frequently remarked
" thick."

S. The first word "thuck" is now not
so frequently heard, and is only used by
those who adhere to the " owld taak," as
they style it. " Thick " is the natural
corruption of " thilk," which you will find
repeatedly in Chaucer, and "thuck" is an
equally natural corruption of " thulk," which
you will discover repeatedly in Robert of

44 SPRING-TIDE.

Gloster's Chronicle, and in the MS. of Piers
Ploughman, edited by Whitaker ; so, you
see, my friend here is only talking a lan-
guage which the scholar and the gentleman
once used.

Simon. Won't 'e try a leetle bit lawer
down, zur. Ize zartin zhure ye '11 vind a
girt un or two in the mill-tail, if zo be
Measter Julian 'oud like to try a minney.

S. What say you to Simon's suggestion ;
Shall we walk to the mill-tail and try a
minnow ?

J. With all my heart. Come along;
and, as we walk there, tell me what you
have to say on u Ize " which I often hear
in this neighbourhood.

S. Ha, there you almost bring me to a
non plus^ and I fear you will get, in this
instance, conjecture only, the hobby-horse
of etymologists, in the place of illustration.
The use of " Ize," or " Ise," is not so
easily explained. I have little doubt that

SECOND DAY. 45

it dates from the twelfth century ; but I
don't remember meeting with it earlier
than in Chaucer, in whose inimitable
" Canterbury Tales" / is is used for I am
both by the Clerk and by the Miller. I
cannot tell whether the illustrious old poet
meant this for a provincial form of speech ;
but it is very likely to have been so. The
introduction of Norman French produced
many hybrid words, and it probably led
to " Ize." The use of the w for v is not
confined to the cockneys, as some suppose :
it is common in the county of Kent ; but
there you often find " / are" for / am, as
the vulgar Breton says Je sommes ! The
u English of Kent," so much vaunted in old
days, was doubtless a language to which
Norman French was adapted, whereby it
was made more cockney, and less truly
English, than the dialects of the " Shires,"
as the country people of that county to
this hour call the other parts of England.

46 SPRING-TIDE.

J. I notice that they use " on " or rather,
" an," instead of " of^ almost invariably.

S. There is a precedent for that from
the earliest times, and it was in use down
to the seventeenth century. What says
the song,

" Complain my lute, complain on him.

In the headings of the chapters of u Reynard
the Pox " you find how the different ani-
mals complained on him ; and Dame Juliana
Berners, recounting the terms used by
sportsmen in her day, when describing
the ages of the deer, says,

" And ye speke of the Bueke, the fyrst yere he is
A Fawne soukynge on his dam say as I you wys."

You laugh at my illustrations ; but I
think you will find that I have authority
for what I have advanced.

J. In sober earnestness, I feel inter-
ested in them ; and henceforward shall

SECOND DAY. 47

endeavour to become better acquainted
with the language of your humble neigh-
bours.

S. I am glad to hear your confession
that I have not pleaded vainly in behalf
of my smock-frocked friends and their
dialect, which, though I am no philolo-
gist, I hope I have shown is entitled to
some consideration, if only on the score
of its antiquity. And now, let us try for
one of Simon's trouts, for here is the mill-
tail. Ho ! Simon ! my spinning-rod, and
a minnow for Mr. Julian. Why, what 's
the fellow about.

J. He 's making a detour to avoid the
millers bees, who seem disposed to re-
sent his entering their fee-simple without
leave.

Simon. 'Begs yer pardon, zur ; but they
there wosbirds zimd rayther cam and mis-
chievul. When I went oon woy they
wanted to gwo there too. Una zeemed

48 SPRING-TIDE.

minded to ha" a turn wf I as they did wi"
Jack Ockle.

S. Why, when was that, Simon ?

Simon. Laast zummer, zur. Jack ''ad
cot a girt beg trout just agin thuck
pwoast, and a run backerds to kip ''s line
tight, right bang auver oone o1 they hives.
Massey haugh ! what a buzzin' and vizzin*
there was, to be zhure ! out urn coomed
like vengeance, and pitched into Jack as
if they was mad. The miller zeed it ael,
but cou'diVt come anighst un. Jack roared
like a town-bull, and drowed down his
rod, and jumped bang into the river to
zave hizzelf ; but the leetle wosbirds watch-
ed uri till a coomed up, and went at un
agen. Very lucky varn it coomed on to
rain very hard, and a craawled out purty
nigh dead, wi' his yead and vace covered
wi' stinges, zo that a cou'd only zee ''s
woy whoam out o1 the earner o*1 oon eye.
Poor owld Molly couMn't thenk what galley

SECOND DAY. 49

craw 'twas as coomed whoam to her.
" Who in the "ouruld be you ? " zays Molly.
" Why, I '11 be whipped if ?t aint our
Jack ! " and awoy a hobbled up street to
vetch Measter Smith, the cow-doctor. 'Twas
a lang time avoor a looked like hizzelf
agen,

S. A pretty episode in the life of an
angler, and worthy to be recorded with the
story I told you yesterday. Now then,
Julian, pitch your minnow into that eddy,
and if you should peradventure hook a fish,
be warned by the fate of Jack Ockle, and
don't run down a bee-hive in your ecstasy.
You have him ! steady ! — he 's a fine fellow,
and will fight for it ; keep him clear of
that post, — that 's well — wind up. No !
another plunge, and another ! don't pull
him against the stream, or he 's lost. Get
below, and gently tow him down towards
that slope. Give me the landing-net.
There he is ! — a fine fish indeed ; a good

50 SPRING-TIDE.

three-pouhder, if I mistake not. Carry him
into the miller's wife, and ascertain his
weight, Simon. And now let me tell you
a story of the voracity and daring of some
of these larger fish, which, when not in-
clined to feed, you may tempt in vain, but
at other times will suffer themselves to be
caught by the veriest bungler. An elderly
gentleman fishing at Rickmansworth, on
the river Colne in Hertfordshire, in the
Summer of 1815, having laboured all day
with the fly, and contributed but little to
his pannier, before quitting the water-side
bethought him of having a venture with a
snail, which he substituted for his artificial
temptations. In a short time he struck a
very heavy fish, which, after playing for
a while, he at length brought to the sur-
face of the water, though not sufficiently
near enough to make sure of him. The
fish was a large one ; and, the captor's
attendant having quitted the ground and

SECOND DAY. 51

gone to a neighbouring cottage, he was left
without a landing-net. There was, conse-
quently, no alternative but "playing him
till tired," — an antiquated practice now-a-
days, and never resorted to but in despe-
rate cases, like the present. The creature
at length appeared to be exhausted, and
was towed to the bank; but the angler,
in trying to lift him out of the water, tore
the hook from his mouth, and the prize
slowly sunk to the bottom. The stream
was at that spot deep and clear, but not
swift ; arid the angler had the mortifica-
tion of seeing his trout lying gasping al-
most within his reach. Perplexed and
baffled, he put on another snail ; but
without hope. By this time the fish had
recovered, and began to move out into the
middle of the stream. The snail was
placed before him, and, wonderful to relate,
he darted at it, gorged it, and struck off
up the stream. This time the angler was

52 SPRING-TIDE.

more successful ; and after a struggle of
some minutes, during which his attendant
returned, the fish was landed, and found to
weigh five pounds. This is a well-authen-
ticated fact ; and it is the more remark-
able, as the fish must have seen his captor
at their first encounter. But here 's Si-
mon with our fish. Well, what does he
weigh ?

Simon. Dree pound two ounces and a
haaf, zur. A 's a 'oondervul vine un, to
be zhure. A "s got a back like a peg. I
bonders how many scare o1 minnies it 's
tuck to vafun.

S. I think we may try for another in
this mill-tail. Let me fit you with a fresh
minnow. Cast over to the opposite bank,
and draw it towards you. There — you
had a run !

J. Yes ; he has taken my minnow,
and got off.

S. Try again. Another minnow, Simon.

SECOND DAY. 53

J. Here 's another !

S. Steady. Ha ! he 's gone ! you lost
that fish by pulling him against the stream ;
and, if I mistake not, a portion of your
tackle to boot.

J. Yes ; confound him ! he has taken
my hooks, and about a yard of foot-line.
I feel as much ashamed of this as a
Spartan would have been at the loss of
his shield.

S. Don't fret about it. This is one
of the chances of the angler; but, let me
tell you, it is always most hazardous to
pull a fish against the stream. It should
ever be your especial care, the moment
he is hooked, to get below him as promptly
as possible. Let us proceed further up the
river, and perchance we may, as we return,
happen on this very fish. That this is not
altogether impossible I will show you, as we
walk along, in a story told me by an old
angler some time since ; though you may

SPRING-TIDE.

not recover your hooks in the same way.
This gentleman was fishing for trout with
a minnow, when, either from the inadvert-
ence of which you were guilty, or some
fault of his tackle, it was carried away
by a lusty trout. Having refitted with a
fly, he proceeded down the stream, and
met with good sport. Returning by the
pool where he had lost his tackle, he re-
solved to have another venture, and had
scarcely made his cast, when he had the
good fortune to hook a thumping fish.
He was greatly surprised, however, to find
that his acquaintance, after a few plunges,
came to the surface of the water, reeling
and dead -beaten. Having landed him, as-
tonishment succeeded to surprise, when he
discovered that, instead of hooking the
fish, he had caught the dissevered tackle
hanging from its mouth. During his ab-
sence the trout had evidently become
exhausted by endeavours to free himself

SECOND DAY. 55

from the hooks which he had carried away
in the first assault.

Here is a part of the stream where I
have generally had good sport. We 11
try it as far as that hawthorn-tree yonder,
and then we 11 see what Simon has in my
second pannier in the way of luncheon,
which we can eat beneath its shade, like
true anglers, with the sauce of a good ap-
petite. There, I think, if you can manage
to cast your fly under those alder-bushes,
you may raise a good trout ; but, if you do,
take care of that patch of weeds hard by.

J. I have him ! he 's a thumping fish :
he took the fly slowly, and, you see, is
gone to the bottom.

S. If I mistake not, you have hooked
a chub. Wind up a yard or two, and
walk down stream with him. Yes ; I
guessed rightly. The landing-net, Simon,
— there he is. He has taken your hackle,
I see, as I predicted.

56 SPRING-TIDE.

J. You have a quick eye for a
fish. How did you know it was not a
trout ?

S. By the quiet manner in which he
took the fly, and by his dull, leaden
plunge. Though a large trout is not so
brisk generally as a smaller one, he will
give you infinitely more trouble than the
chub.

Simon. A \s martal timerzome vish, zur:
but still um likes a good vat bait, too ;
'specially a dumbledore.

S. Yes, Simon is quite right ; and
therefore, when you do fish for chub, use
a good large, hairy palmer, or an imi-
tation of the humble-bee or dumbledore,
as they call it hereabouts. I have seen
some in the fishing-tackle shops in London,
dressed to perfection. And now I shall
cross the ford here, and give you the meet-
ing at the old hawthorn-tree, near which
there is a foot-bridge. You will find some

SECOND DAY. 57

good fish just where the bank rises — au
revoir. Simon will accompany you.

[Exeunt.

The Hawthorn Tree. — SENEX, JULIAN,
SIMON PARADICE, meeting.

S, Well, what sport ? Your pannier,
I hope, is heavier than when I left you.

J. Turn them out, Simon. I have not
been idle, you see.

S. Faith, you have not. Six fine trouts,
and another chub. Like Corax, the rhe-
torician, I begin to fear I have bred a
scholar who excels his master. I have
killed only a brace ; but they are fine ones.

J. They are indeed, and full fairly
worth my six ; but I am delighted with
my morning's work, which has given me
an appetite, I warrant you.

S. Let us sit down. Hand me the
basket, Simon. What has good Mistress
Gerard provided for us ? A cold fowl.

58 SPRING-TIDE.

and a neat's tongue. We might fare
worse.

J. Ay, and have a worse appetite.

S. Though mine is generally good, I
have wished sometimes for the digestion of
a ploughman. " O dura messorum ilia ! "
says Horace, who probably knew what a
weak stomach was. I have often seen
Simon here eat a couple of cucumbers, each
more than a foot long, as mere adjuncts to
a noontide meal. Eh, Simon ?

Simon. Eez, zur, um beant much when
a body's lear. Our grammer used to zay
yettin' too much was wus than drenkin' too
much, — " the spit kills mwore than th'
spigot."

S. A very good saying too. Note,
Julian, that Simon does not quote his gram-
mar for this adage, but his grandmother ;
the word not being this time derived from
the Anglo-Saxon, but from the Norman-
French, grandmere. While on the subject

SECOND DAY. 59

of eating, let me tell you a story of our
parish schoolmistress, who some time since,
when the children were kindly presented
with a cake, became suddenly indignant
at the youthful gormandizing, and cried
out, " Well, I never did see children eat
at such a rate ! where *& your manners ?
Put the rest in your handkerchers ! "

J. Thank you, both for your illustration
of grammer, and for your anecdote ; but,
pray, what does Simon mean by lear ?

S. That 's a word which ought to be
drafted into our next new dictionary.
" Lear " expresses the state of stomach for
which " hungry " is not sufficiently descrip-
tive ; and as it is a good Anglo-Saxon
word, I recommend it to the notice of our
lexicographers. The Germans have it ; but
with them I believe it merely stands for
empty. Its use is not confined to this
part of the country.

J. It is " an excellent good word," as

60 SPRING-TIDE.

Ancient Pistol phrases it. My own stomach
readily supplies the gloss — I feel lear. Let
us fall to, at once.

S. I know of nothing more beneficial
to digestion than a day's fly-fishing. You
will often eat your snack in this way with
a better relish than a dinner at a wealthy
friend's, who has laboured to bring every
dainty in season before you. Even this
food, however, is luxurious compared with
the hard and simple fare of hundreds around
us.

J. In all parts of the world the pro-
ducers feed upon the refuse ! — " Sic vos
non vobis ! " #c.

S. Universally : in those countries of the
continent which furnish corn in such infinite
abundance, the peasantry are fed on bread
which the English clown — coarse as his
food is at times — would find difficult to eat.
I was lately shown some bread — the com-
mon food of the peasantry of Auvergne —

SECOND DAY. 61

which they keep for more than twelve
months, and which must be well soaked
before it can be eaten. The bread of our
ancestors must have been of this descrip-
tion, especially in early times. I have often
noticed that the teeth in skulls taken from
Anglo-Saxon tumuli, are much worn, as if
by masticating hard food. But this gossip-
ing of an old man must tire you.

J. Nay, nay : I thought you knew me
better. Though I cannot enter entirely
into all your feelings, I am a lover of gossip
and of the picturesque ; and, if a man will
not talk unprofitably, he will find me a
patient listener. There is no scandal in
your discourse ; and therefore I derive both
pleasure and profit from it.

S. They are not all pearls that fall from
the wisest lips ; but, if I do not always
discourse wisely, I shall not offend your
ears with evil reports. No : —

62 SPRING-TIDE.

" Better than such discourse doth silence long,
Long, barren silence, square with my desire ;
To sit without emotion, hope, or aim,
In the loved presence of my cottage-fire,
And listen to the flapping of the flame, ,
Or kettle whispering its faint undersong."

Come, let us be moving again. There
be yet "lusty trouts" on the feed.

[Exeunt.

THIRD DAY.

Be full, ye courts ! be great who will !
Search for Peace with all your skill :
Open wide the lofty door,
Seek her on the marble floor :
In vain ye search the domes of Care !
Grass and flowers Quiet treads,
On the meads and mountain heads
Along with Pleasure close allied,
Ever by each other's side.

DYER.

THIRD DAY,

SENEX, JULIAN, SIMON PARADICE.
Time — The peep of day.

Julian. What a lovely morning ! we
are up before the Sun.

Senex. He will rise in ten minutes, if
the calendar tell truly. I am glad we are
stirring so early, for sunrise at this season
should tempt every man from his bed.
What says Dan Chaucer ? —

" For May wol have no slogardie a-night,
The seson priketh every gentil herte,
And maketh him out of his slepe to sterte,
And sayth ' Arise, and do thin observance.' "

The notes of birds alone break the hushy
stillness that reigns around us. The lark,

66 SPRING-TIDE.

the throstle, the ouzel, and the whole tribe
of songsters have commenced their hosan-
nahs. Every insect is on the move, the
grasshopper bestirs himself, and the spider
looks out on his dew-bespangled tracery.
The morning-star is fading before the ap-
proach of day. The owl, weary of night-
prowling, hurries away to his retreat in
the old barn ; and the magpie in yonder
elm, with his pert chatter, provokes the
jay in the thicket : —

" The jay, the rook, the daw,

And each harsh pipe (discordant heard alone)
Aid the full concert, while the stock-dove breathes
A melancholy murmur through the whole."

J. What a strange nest the magpie
builds ! I remember, when a boy, try-
ing to rob one and scratching my hands
sadly.

S. It is certainly a curious piece of
bird-architecture, and shows the superior
cunning of the pie to the rook and the

THIRD DAY. 67

crow. Piers Ploughman has something to
say of its structure : —

" I had wonder at whom,
And wher the pye lerned
To ligge the stikkes
In which she leyeth and bredeth.
There nys wrighte, as I wene,
Sholde werche hir nestes to paye ;
If any mason made a molde thereto,
Muche wonder it were."

The pie is a beautiful and cheerful bird :
and though man resents severely his little
larcenies, he yet loves to build near a
homestead despite of ill-usage.

J. The country people are at enmity,
I believe, with all carrion-birds, and the
pie is one of the most mischievous of this
class.

S. All birds are occasionally mis-
chievous, but the good which many of
them perform more than counterbalances
the evil. Remember, I am no stickler
for all the prejudice and superstition of
my humble neighbours, who are often

68 SPRING-TIDE.

blindly wrong. There is some reason for
their hostility to the crow and the pie ;
but the war of extermination which they
carry on against many of the feathered
race, can only be excused on the ground
of ignorance and their attachment to old
notions and prejudices, from which the
better educated of the last century were
not free. For instance, you will find
them hereabouts destroy that beautiful
and sagacious bird the starling, because
they believe it kills the young pigeons.
Now, the starling is an insectivorous bird,
which must devour myriads of destruc-
tive creatures every season. They must
be welcome visitors to flocks of sheep,
about which we generally see them con-
gregated, sometimes running on their backs
and freeing them from the foul, ugly, and
annoying tick which so often troubles that
animal. Another bird, which is an espe-
cial favourite with me, is much persecuted

THIRD DAY. 69

by the country people, namely, the tit-
mouse ; and yet a pair of these little
creatures, if undisturbed, will almost keep
a fair-sized garden free from insects and
reptiles. A friend of mine, who lives in
the neighbourhood of London, occupies
one of a row of houses, the gardens of
which, as usual, adjoin each other. His
neighbour, a door or two off, an idle
fellow, often amuses himself by shooting
the small birds, and last year he kept up
this manly pastime so vigorously, that not
even a sparrow could show itself on his
premises. Summer came, and with it
swarms of that destructive reptile the
small green caterpillar^ which literally ate
up everything in the garden of the cockney
sportsman. Not so with my friend's gar-
den, the fruit in which was unusually fine
and abundant, — a circumstance which he
attributes entirely to the fact of a pair of
the smaller species of titmouse having made

70 SPRING-TIDE.

their nest in a hole in the garden- wall
and bred up a family, which they ap-
peared to feed entirely on this very rep-
tile, bringing in thirty or forty in an hour
to the nest, to the great glee of their little
ones, who testified their delight at every
arrival by audible chirpings.

J. I have often thought tliat an occa-
sional rigorous winter and the preying of
the larger species were sufficient to check
the too great increase of small birds. Not
only does intense cold destroy numbers of
the feathered race, but> according to a
friend of mine who has an estate in Scot-
land, hunger converts the graminivorous
bird into a bird of prey at such times. In
one hard winter, a few years since, the
rooks attacked and killed all the wood-
pigeons in his plantations.

S. I do not doubt it, though I have
never witnessed such an onslaught here.
The wood-pigeon must be a feeble oppo-

THIRD DAY. 7 1

nent of the rook, whose hard bill will
make more impression on the frost-bound
earth on a winter's morning than you can
make with a knife. He is formidable,
too, on account of his numbers. But see,
as we ascend the hill, the sun rises to
meet us, and chanticleer, from the old
grange yonder, proclaims his approach.
Hark ! how the shrill reveille is repeated
around, — a note of warning to the village
clown, who turns heavily on his pallet and
lapses into another nap ere he rises for
the day's toil. The lark starts from his
bed, and, shaking the dew from his wing,
pours out a flood of melody as he ascends
into the yet misty air. Are not these sights
and scenes that should make a man love
the country, even though at other seasons,

" When blood is nipt and ways be foul,"
and the swoln streams deluge the mea-
dows, he turns to and prefers the comforts
of his fireside ?

72 SPRING-TIDE.

J. I confess they are. I am almost
moved- to indulge in a rhapsody myself.

S. You smile at this doting of an old
man on the scenes of his youth.

J. Nay, you wrong me. I smiled, but
not in derision. Dull indeed must he be
who could look unmoved on such a scene
as this. Yonder is the river, its pale
stream brightening into gold. I see the
moor-hen moving upon it unconscious of
our approach. Shall we have a fine day ?

S. A good day for the angler, but not
for a pic-nic. I think there will be rain:
the sun shines out too brightly at its
rising, and, if I mistake not, those clouds
rising in the south will bring wet with
them. There was rain last night, as you
will see by the state of this field we are
now entering. It is very slippery on this
path. What was that story you were
telling me about young Joe Chivers, Si-
mon ?

THIRD DAY. 73

Simon. Haw, about's zlippin back, zur?
Why young Joe went to school WL owld
Tommy Stretch, zo one day a never coomed
till amwoast night. What 's th' razon you
be here at this time ? zays Tommy. Joe
hackered wi' vear — 'Begs yer pardon, zays
he, 'twas zo uncommon zlippy, ev'ry step
I tuk vorrad I went two backerds. Ye
young wosbird, zays Tommy, if ye'd done
that, ye woudn't be here at all, zo I '11
gie 't to 'e unmarcivul— that 's what I wool
vor tellin zich lies. Oh dwont 'e ! dwont 'e !
zays Joey : I '11 tell 'e how 'twere. I gied
up gettin here at all, zo I turned back to
gwo to mother's and I zlipped back here,
so dwont 'e wallop I. — Did 'e ever hear
the stwory o' Joe's vather on th' bridge
yander ? A rum owld customer was owld
Joe.

S. Well, tell us the story, Simon.

Simon. Why one marnin, many years
ago, owld Joe was lukin' auver the bridge,

74 SPRING-TIDE.

a watchin' the vishes, when a genelman
vrom Lminun coomed by. I zay, vather,
zays the strainger, what d'ye caal this out
here bruk ? Th' owld bwoy was a leetle
bit dunch, and a didn't year'n very plain.
D'zay ? says he. How d'ye caal this
bruk ? zays the strainger agen. Haw, —
caal un, zays owld Joe ; um dwont caal
un at ael um dwont : a allus cooms this
woy wi'hout callin1 ! Zo the cockney went
off in a girt pelt and towld un to gwo
and hang 's self.

S. [Aside to */.] I believe that story
was known long before old Joe was born,
but the paternity of many better ones might
with as much justice be questioned. Here's
the river. Let us put to, and try our luck at
this spot ; I have often had good sport here.

J. I am ready— Where shall we begin ?

S. Try a cast under that patch of
weeds, where the shadow is deepest.

J. I have a fish, and a mettlesome one,

THIRD DAY. 75

too, but I find I am getting the better of
him — he shows now. Pshaw! he is but
small after all, but he tugged like a fish
of a couple of pounds.

S. Doubtless he did, for, see, you have
hooked him foul, near the ventral fin, which
makes all the difference in the world, and
gives a fish full power to plunge in all di-
rections. Come, clear your line, and take
another cast a little lower down. A good
fish generally lies near that sluice. Well
done, you have him — don't let him take
you too far — that 's right ; now you have
turned him, and he begins to grow weary.
The net, Simon. So, that was well per-
formed ; he "s a fine fellow, and if we
kill a few more such, you will forgive my
calling you so early.

J. Nay, I am delighted at your having
helped me to throw off sloth, and tempted
me abroad. It is a reproach to a man to
lie a-bed at such a season. The river

76 SPRING-TIDE.

appears deep here, and less exposed to
poachers.

S. Yes. The fish are safe in this spot
and the river is well staked. The mention
of poaching reminds me of an event which
happened in the north of England about
twenty years since. On the 15th of June,
1827, the two brothers of a man named
Winter, a notorious poacher, came to the
Steward of the late Sir Philip Musgrave at
Edenhall, to request that a boat might be
lent them that they might search in the
river for their brother, who had been a
short time missing. His landing-net having
been found floating down the stream, it
was supposed that he was drowned. The
Steward accompanied the men to the river
Eamont, which they dragged in different
places with a net, and, after some hours1
toil, they succeeded in drawing out the
body from a deep pool in the river, under
some rocks called the Giant's Cave ; and,

THIRD DAY.

singular enough, at the same haul they
caught one of the largest trouts ever found
in that river, weighing nearly seven pounds.
The men seemed more anxious to secure
the fish than the body of their drowned
brother ; but the gamekeeper, being one of
the dragging party, took the prize up to
the Hall. A Coroner's Inquest was duly
held on the body, and a verdict found
" Accidentally Drowned." The country
people laid the homicide on the fish, which,
they said, had dragged the poacher from
a slippery stone into the pool as a judge-
ment for stealing ! And this was the moral
for about three years afterwards, when an
old Irishman nicknamed Sandy, an idle
character, who supported himself by any
chance employment, eked out by a little
poaching, was taken dangerously ill. Find-
ing himself on his death-bed, he declared
he could not die easy unless he made a
clean breast and confessed a great crime

78 SPRING-TIDE.

that he had been guilty of. He then stated
that a few nights before the discovery of
Winter's body, he was going to fish in
the pool under the Giant's Cave, and being
on the top of the rocks he looked down
and saw Winter there busily fishing. He
halloed to him to go away from that spot,
as it was his part of the river, and Winter
had no right to be there. Winter refused
to go, and replied he had as much right
to be there as Sandy; upon which the
latter threw a large stone on the poacher
below, and knocked him down into the
river. He then ran away, and when he
afterwards heard of Winter being disco-
vered drowned, he kept the occurrence a
secret until he found himself dying.

J. A curious story, truly : it might
furnish matter for a melodrama. I believe
the trout in the Eamont do not usually
exceed three to the pound ?

S. No : the gentleman who communi-

THIRD DAY. 79

cated to me the above particulars, informed
me that he never saw one more than four
pounds weight, excepting that taken with
the body of the drowned poacher. By-
the-by, Simon, what has become of old
lies ? — he was the most wary poacher in
these parts — the keepers could never come
up with him.

Simon. Haw, a \s very bad, zur ; a "*s
got the rheumatiz in 's jmtes, and caant
craal out ov's bed^ A was a terrable chap
var a hur (hare) to be zhure when a was
younger. Our measter had a man veaw
hurs under the linchards, and the tenant's
dogs used to caddie ''urn vinely, and cot
zum on \im — zo a zays to 'um ael, zays
he — if you dwon't hang them grayhounds
o1 yourn, 1 11 turn you out o' yer varms,
that 's what I wool. Mwost on 'um did
as they was ardered, but Jerry Sage (queer
owld chap he were zhurely) — zays to I, dang
it, Zimon, if I ha' anything to do wi kill-

80 SPRING-TIDE.

in* th1 owld dog, and when measter went
to 'un to bleaw ''un up vinely var kippin5 on
bin — Jerry zays to X c Ax yer pardun, zur,
zhure enough I havn't hang\l 'un, but a
bean^t a grayhound now. Bean't a gray-
hound ? why, what do 'e mane ? Why,
zur, when us yeard o1 yer arder, us takes a
pair o' zhears and cuts his ears and tayl
off and made a maastif an hin, and caals
'un Lion.''

S. There 's a story for you in a choice
Anglo-Saxon dialect : I 11 supply the gloss
at some other time. What think you of
the scenery hereabouts ?

J. It is certainly charming, and appears
to advantage in the morning sun.

S. This spot is a favourite one with
me.

" Here Nature in her unaffected dress,
Plaited with valleys and embossed with hills,
Enchased with silver streams, and fringed with

woods,
Sits lovely in her native russet."

THIRD DAY. 81

Fewer traces of human innovation are to
be found here than in most rural dis-
tricts. I love these sequestered nooks,
where a man may rest, and calling home
his thoughts, commune with himself and
be still.

" Dear Solitude, the soul's best friend,
That man acquainted with himself dost make,
And all his Maker's wonders to intend,
With thee I here converse at will,
And would be glad to do so still,
For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake."

And now I shall leave you for a short
time, and fish up this little tributary stream.
I will rejoin you at the old pollard- willow
which you see by the brook's side yonder.

[Exeunt.

The old pollard-willow. SENEX, JULIAN,
SIMON PARADICE, meeting.

S. Well, what sport?
J. Excellent. I have three brace; but
there is a fish rising yonder far beyond

82 SPRING-TIDE.

my reach. I have tried in vain to throw
to him.

S. I don't doubt it, I could not throw
so far myself, but a little wading will some-
times make up for such deficiency. The
water is not above mid- thigh, and though
I prefer generally a dry skin to a wet one,
I don't like to be defied in any weather
— much less on such a mild day as this. It
is shallow water where that fish is rising.
[He wades.] There ! I have your friend.

/. You have, and he 's a fine fish. Give
me the landing-net, Simon.

S. Steady: he is somewhat headstrong,
and is not to be got out so readily. Wait
till I first land myself, for this is a fish of
mettle. There, now I am fairly ashore
again I can gently bring him to the bank :
— out with him !

J. What a lovely trout ! he looks like
a piece of beautiful enamelled work, studded
with rubies, and his colours seem heightened

Page 82.

THIRD DAY. 83

by the bright greensward on which he lies.
What is his weight ?

S. About two pounds; but he is un-
usually well fed, and no doubt has kept
that shallow against all comers for some
time past — lying in wait during the day
for any fly that may sail over him, and at
night supping on the shoals of minnows
which abound in some parts of this stream.
I am acquainted with a small stream which,
towards autumn, is much contracted by the
growth of weeds, causing the formation of
pools, in each of which a large trout lies in
wait for everything that comes down. I
have seldom thrown into one of these pools
without hooking its tenant, and his place
is invariably taken by the fish next in
size. For this kind of fishing, however,
you require a stiff fly-rod, a short line,
and one fly only, unless you care not
for being " hitched ** at every throw.
You must strike instantly, and not suffer

84 SPRING-TIDE.

the fish to have an inch of line, or he is
gone.

J. I have heard, that in the smaller
streams in Scotland, the biggest fish take
up their stations in the pools, devour their
own progeny one by one, and then, like
famished wolves, snatch at almost anything
that may be offered them, to their inevitable
destruction.

$. A large trout is little inferior to the
pike in voracity ; but he is not so indiscri-
minate, nor so rash : the pike dashes at
anything, animate or inanimate, that comes
near him. I have heard of more than one
instance of his seizing the plummet of the
angler while trying the depth of the stream ;
and a friend of mine, while bottom-fishing
some years since, caught a perch that, while
landing, was seized by a pike, which how-
ever managed to get free again.

J. I have known instances of their
seizing a hooked fish. This disposition of

THIRD DAY. 85

the pike to prey upon the hooked or help-
less fish, is favourable to the troller.

S. No doubt it is, if a fish is in any
way crippled, or spawning : it must then
be an easy prey to its ferocious enemies.
A very ludicrous instance of the voracity
of the pike was related to me a short time
since. A gentleman, in Northamptonshire,
was seated quietly in a summer-house by
the margin of a large pond, watching the
water-fowl feeding upon it. Suddenly the
geese and ducks rose from the water and
took flight with loud cries, one old goose
making more noise than the, rest. A large
pike had seized her foot, and in her flight
she had dragged the old tyrant clean out
of the water and shaken herself free from
his grasp.

Simon. I do b'lieve nothing comes amiss
to um. Last zummer, zome o"* the bwoys
was a rat him tin1 up by the bridge, and
the dogs started a girt rat, and off a went

86 SPRING-TIDE.

acrass the bruk, when, jist as a"d got to
th' middle, up cum'd a pur o' jaaws as big
as a gray-hound's, and down went the rat
in a minnit ! Owld lies once cot a pike,
and when a aupened hin a found a girt rat,
dree callow wablins, part of a good-sized
vish, and two other thengs as um couldn't
quite make out.

S. Ay, I remember that fish being caught
and cut open. The " dree callow wablins "
were the three unfledged nestlings of a yel-
low-hammer, and the wonder was how the
creature had obtained them. The country-
people, knowing that the yellow-hammer
is a careless builder, and chooses a very low
situation for its nest, supposed the pike had
invaded it and kidnapped the young brood ;
but it is not improbable that some ruthless
urchins had been a bird's nesting, and plun-
dered a nest of its callow inmates, which
they afterwards threw into the river, where
they were, of course, soon appropriated.

THIRD DAY. 87

And now, let us sit down and repair this
rod of mine, which, in the last bout, showed
symptoms of weakness that should be looked
to in time. Let me see,— yes, here it is.

J. What — do you use your knife ?

S. Yes ; it is best to do so at once and
splice the parts, which may be easily effected
with a length of waxed silk. I am always
prepared for such a contingency, and would
advise you to follow my example ; for, to
break your rod at a distance from home and
not have the means of repairing the damage,
is a mischance which argues against the
providence of the angler. See, by carefully
adapting the severed parts, I bind them
together thus, and the rod is as serviceable
as ever.

J. I shall endeavour to profit by your
advice and teaching. You are right in
your prognostic of a wet day. The sun is
already deprived of half its lustre, and
there is a rainbow yonder, which is the

88 SPRING-TIDE.

herald of wet, I believe, when seen in the
morning. What says Simon ?

Simon. Eez, zur — it 's allus a zign o"*
wet then : as we zays in this country —

" The rainbow in th' marnin'
Gies the shepherd warnin'

To car' his girt cwoat on his hack ;

But,

The rainbow at night
Is the shepherd's delight,
For then no girt cwoat wull he lack."

J. How lovely the landscape looks
beneath that splendid arc, while the birds
seem to sing with tenfold vehemence as it
brightens. The thrushes song, in yonder
hawthorn bush, is delightfully sweet.

S. Yes, he has already breakfasted on
the snails which this humid morning has
tempted to venture forth. The angler does
not find a meal so readily, and I must pre-
sently entreat the hospitality of an honest
miller, who has before now given me both
food and shelter.

THIRD DAY. 89

Simon. The dreshes gwo a gogglin' afore
it 's light. When I was a bwoy, I used to
find they was allus afore a body, get up
when ye would.

J. I am a little at fault again. Pray,
what does Simon mean by " gwoin "* a gog-

S. A goggle is a snail's shell. The
word, though in a corrupt form, is one of
the few in provincial use derived from the
Norman-French — coquille. To go a gog-
gling is to go a picking up snail's shells — a
favourite pastime of country urchins. Simon
alludes to the habits of the thrushes and
blackbirds, who prey upon land snails, first
cracking the shell by seizing it in their
beaks and dashing it against a stone. In
this way they destroy thousands of the most
brilliant-coloured shells, which are always
brighter than those the creature has va-
cated.

J. Yes, I am told that some of the

90 SPRING-TIDE.

dealers in foreign shells, in London, have a
trick of varnishing what they call a " dead
shell," so as to make it appear like one from
which the snail has been extracted.

S. Well, then you will easily see why
Simon complains that he was always fore-
stalled by the thrushes and blackbirds, when
he went " a goggling." You can seldom
traverse a green lane at this season with-
out disturbing some of these birds thus
engaged, who testify their displeasure at
your approach and fly off with a saucy sort
of scream. And here let me again allude
to the good offices rendered by some birds
to man. The number of slugs and snails
destroyed by them in a wet season, must,
in some places, save the crops from utter
annihilation. I have often, within the limits
of a single acre of turnips, flushed more
than a score of thrushes which had been
drawn thither in search of snails and slugs.
Notwithstanding this, it is well known that

THIRD DAY. 91

many birds are destructive to fruit-trees
in bud as well as to ripe crops.

J. I believe it is White, in his delight-
ful " History of Selborne," who remarks
that the thrush, the blackbird, the wood-
lark and the willow-wren, become silent
about Midsummer, and take up their song
again in September. He seems to think
that birds are then inclined to sing because
the temperature of spring and autumn is
about equal.

S. His inference is a very natural one.
The robin is a very good illustration of
this, for he sings again in the autumn, even
when the lime-tree — his favourite haunt —
is denuded of its leaves. The wren's note
is often heard in winter time if it be not
frosty, and I have many times heard both
the lark and the thrush singing delightfully
on a warm day in January. These birds
are moved to sing by various sounds — you
will often find them swelling their little

92 SPRING-TIDE.

throats, pent up in cages, in the noisiest
thoroughfares in London. I remember a
lark at an oyster-shop, which, when a resi-
dent in the metropolis, I was once in the
habit of passing, in one of the squalid-look-
ing courts in the purlieus of Drury Lane,
which used to sing till near midnight — the
gas-light its bright sun in that murky and
impure region, and the little patch of grass
on which it stood and sang, an apology for
its native meadows ; no bad type of thou-
sands of the young and healthy who quit
the country to toil and perish in a hugely
overgrown and overgrowing city !

J. If I loved you less, I should envy
you this return to and enjoyment of the
scenes and habits of your youth.

S. It appears to me to be the natural
feeling of the healthy-minded in advancing
age. How many affecting instances are
on record of persons returning, after a life
of almost perpetual wandering, to seek a

THIRD DAY. 93

last refuge in the place of their birth and
childhood. Shakspere quitted the company
of all that were witty and learned, leaving
the dissolute companions of his earlier days
to strut and fret their hour, to die in his
native town ; and does he not picture to us
old debauched Sir John, in his last moments,
" babbling o' green fields ? "

/. True, true: if you run on thus, I
shall forswear the town, and betake me
to a country life.

S. Don't misunderstand me. I do not say
that London is without its attractions ; — its
antiquity — its noble river — its localities,
consecrated by a thousand recollections and
associations, render it one of the most inte-
resting cities on earth. Its history is less
bloody than that of Paris and other cities
of the Continent ; and, although it has often
been the theatre of violence and cruelty,
it has not witnessed the scenes which have
rendered Venice for ever infamous ; but a

94 SPRING-TIDE.

couple of months in London, in the winter,
are sufficient for a man who really loves
the country. See, the storm is coming
over us. If you would avoid a wet skin,
you had better cross the bridge, and seek
shelter in the miller's house, which you will
find at the end of the lane. I shall fish
during the shower.

J. As my coat is a light one, I shall
take your hint, and run on to the miller's ;
but, first, tell me the name of the bird run-
ning up that tree yonder.

S. That bird is the wryneck, the herald
of the cuckoo in the spring, as the redwing
is of the woodcock in winter. You know
the rhyme : —

" The wryneck comes to stir our laughter,
And the cuckoo follows after."

We have a great variety of birds in this
district, and it is not surprising that they
should love such a neighbourhood. I can
easily imagine why birds haunt such scenes

THIRD DAY. 95

as these ; but I confess I have occasionally
been somewhat at a loss to account for our
finding them in wild districts, where a patch
of verdure is not seen for miles. I remem-
ber, when in Ireland some years ago, strol-
ling out very early one beautiful summer's
morning in the neighbourhood of Glenties,
in the wilds of Donegal, and hearing at
one and the same time the cuckoo among
the hills, the corncrake in the scanty patches
of long coarse grass, the skylark in the air,
and the chattering of three magpies in a
clump of small lime-trees — the only trees
within miles of the spot, and certainly the
only ones within sight — at the rear of a
house near the town. In this wild and
barren region, each of these creatures must
have found its proper food. It is not sur-
prising to see the gull, the hawk, the kite,
and the hooded-crow in such desolate tracts ;
but it is difficult to learn how the smaller
birds subsist, and protect their young from

96 SPRING-TIDE.

birds of prey in places utterly destitute of
shelter. Ha ! the storm is upon you. You
had better run to the miller's, while I fish
up to the mill-head, for I have always taken
fine fish during a shower. [Exeunt.

FOURTH DAY.

Often, to our comfort, we shall find
The sharded beetle in a safer hold
Than is the full-winged eagle. Oh, this life
Is nobler than attending for a check ;
Richer than doing nothing for a bauble ;
Prouder than rustling in unpaid-for silk.
Such gain the cap of him, that makes them fine,
Yet keeps his book uncrossed ; — no life like ours.

SHAKSPERE.

Siisse heilige Natur,
Lass mich gehn an deiner Spur,
Leite mich an deiner Hand,
Wie ein Kind am Gangel-band.

STOLBERG.

FOURTH DAY,

The river-side. Enter SEN EX and JULIAN
followed by SIMON PARADICE, bearing
two heavily laden panniers.

Time — Sunset.

Senex. Well, what think you of our
day's sport ?

Julian. Excellent : your success is won-
derful, while I am half inclined to think
that something more than bungler's luck
has attended me. What swarms of insects
fill the air ! The trouts are gorged with
the May-fly, and yet they are still rising
and feeding greedily.

S. Yes ; and even after sun- down you

100 SPRING-TIDE.

will hear them in the darkness, chasing and
devouring the minnows on the shallows.

J. Is it not strange that creatures which
subsist upon their own species should prey
so constantly on minute insects ? It is to
me inexplicable.

S. The fondness of the trout, and in-
deed of several other kinds of fish, for
this diversion, may be compared to that of
many birds and beasts, which relish nothing
so much as the prey they have captured
by their own agility or cunning. The supe-
rior animal, man, in his primitive state, is
thus characterized, and in his civilized con-
dition differs but little from the savage in
this respect. A Scotch friend of mine one
day asked his keeper if he could tell
him why so large a fish as the salmon de-
lighted in capturing flies. " God Almighty
kens, sir," replied the man, " except its
curiosity."

The mention of this anecdote reminds me

FOURTH DAY. 101

of an excellent storj7 which a friend told
me of a Scotch angler whom he met at
an inn at the town of Inverary, and who
invited him to the river-side to witness the
capture of a salmon. The invitation was
accepted, and the parties repaired to a
favourite pool not far from the inn, where
the angler, almost at the first cast, had the
good fortune to hook a fish. "Eh, sir ! "
he exclaimed, surprised and elated with his
success, "it's a sawmon peel!" The fish
made a vigorous resistance, but, after ten
minutes'' play, — during which his captor,
frantic with excitement, ran into the water
nearly up to his chin, to the great amaze-
ment of his companion, — it appeared on the
surface apparently exhausted, and the angler
towed him to the bank. " Now, sir," said
he, " if ye '11 be so good as to hold him
still, and hand me the gaff, 1 11 settle him."
My friend seized the rod and held the cap-
tive fish, while the angler struck at it with

102 SPRING-TIDE.

the gaff, but oh ! misfortune dire, at the
first blow he missed his prey, severed the
foot-line, and the freed fish no longer feel-
ing the tension, made a dash with its tail
and rushed up the stream ! With a yell
of rage and despair, the captor threw away
his gaff and fell on his face, exclaiming,
" Eh, what a fool ! what a fool I am ! Eh !
was ever such a misfortune ! I was a born
fool surely to lose him ! Eh, what a fool
I am ! " " It "s pretty clear you are,""
thought my friend, who, though a bit of an
angler, is anything but an enthusiast ; then
addressing the unfortunate, " Why, sir, you
surely are not making all this insane fuss
for the loss of a fish : one would think by
the vehemence of your lamentation you were
in alarm for your soul" The angler, still
grovelling on the ground, roused a little by
this remonstrance, his mind entirely en-
grossed with the subject, heard but the last
word. " Heh ! what, sir ! " he exclaimed

FOURTH DAY. 103

angrily, u a sole, sir ! a sole ! a sawmon
peel ns worth twenty soles ! "

J. I hope some day to capture a sal-
mon ; I hear it is a mettlesome fish, and
affords fine sport.

S. Truly, and there are some who say
that the capture of a salmon will give you
a distaste for trout-fishing, or " trouting,"
as the Scotch term it ; but, though a noble
sport, it is, after all, a coarser kind of
angling. Still, the rush of a salmon, when
you have struck him, is tremendous. To
hear the whirr of your reel, as he dashes
up stream, running out fifty yards of your
line, and then throwing repeated summersets,
nearly as high as your head, would excite
the most stolid angler that ever cast a fly.

J. I have no doubt of the sport exciting
me. You must have perceived that the
hooking of a small trout excites me so
much that I am in danger of losing him
by my precipitancy.

104 SPRING-TIDE.

S. A fault to which the young angler
is, I find, too prone. A very slight turn
of the wrist is sufficient to fix the suicide ;
then get a taut line as quick as possible.
Remember, however, that in doing so you
are not to pull your fish out of the water.
I have seen old and practised anglers — men
who could cast a fly with consummate skill
— sometimes lose their fish by this rough
treatment. Bear it constantly in mind, that
unless you hook a trout through bone or
cartilage, you are not sure of him until he
lies panting on the greensward at your feet.
The soft spongy membrane which lines the
mouth of this fish, is so little tenacious and
pulpy, that it is no marvel he so often
breaks your hold ; so that, if you have
not fixed the hook in a tougher part he has
a chance of freeing himself.

J. True ; I shall endeavour to profit
by this teaching, for which vour practical
knowledge so well qualifies you. I shall

FOURTH DAY. 105

love the country, and its quiet scenes withal,
much the more for these rambles by the
river-side. What a lovely sunset !

S. " Sweet even-tide,

When ruddy Phoebus gins to welke in west."

J. I confess that the air of these soli-
tudes is more bracing and soul-expanding
than the murky atmosphere of London ;
but I cannot forbear thinking that Winter
must reign here in all his rigour, and then
the meadows are no longer lovely.

S. And then new scenes await you ;
the whole aspect of Nature is changed.
The songsters of the grove are silent., but
migratory birds abound. The snipe and
the woodcock seek the marshes and the
brook ; the fieldfare congregates on the hill
side and mingles its note with that of the
redwing ; yes,

" When all around the wind does blow,

And coughing drowns the parson's saw,
When birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marian's nose looks red and raw,"

106 SPKING-TIDE.

there is still something to interest and de-
light those who love a country life. Ay,
even then, I can sing with Heyrick : —

" Sweet country life, to such unknown
Whose lives are others', not their own ! "

J. In fishing for trout in those rivers in
which salmon are found, is there not some
danger of your tackle being broken by fish
of the latter description ?

S. Yes, and there are some ludicrous
instances on record ; but there is much
more power in a trout rod and trout tackle,
from the hands of a good maker, than many
anglers suppose. I heard a short time
since a well-authenticated anecdote of a
gentleman who, while trout-fishing in the
river Teign, in Devonshire, hooked with a
small dun-fly a magnificent salmon, which
he played for upwards of an hour without
exhausting the fish, being out alone, and
destitute of help. At length a countryman
approached, and the angler, perceiving that

FOURTH DAY. 107

he bore a hedge-bill, offered him half-a-
crown to go into the stream and kill the
fish, but the fellow, for some unknown
reason, refused the offer, and went on his
way. There was no alternative, therefore,
but playing the fish for nearly an hour
longer, when the angler had the satisfaction
of seeing it turn up completely exhausted.
The prize was secured, and found to weigh
eighteen pounds !

J. Do you always advocate the use of
a landing-net ?

S. There is something to be said pro and
con as to its use. If the banks of the stream
in which you are fishing are steep, there
can be no doubt of its usefulness ; but if
the shore is sloping, I do not hesitate to
say that you will kill your fish in much
less time without it, especially if you are
alone. If your attendant is not really ex-
pert in the use of the landing-net, he is
worse than useless. I have on several occa-

1 08 SPRING-TIDE.

sions killed large trouts, and have attributed
my success to the circumstance of my being
alone. When alone, you may sometimes
nearly exhaust your fish before you bring him
very close to you, — a manifest advantage,
as any one will confess who has witnessed
the last convulsive struggle of a trout when
the landing-net is brought near him ; — nay,
I have often known him to escape by the
over eagerness of the lander.

Simon. Eez, zur, urn wants a leetle
patience a^ter a's hooked, if "a happens to
be a big un. Nothin' like patience, as owld
Rachael Cark used to zay; — a body med
do anything wi' patience, but 'a never could
persuade her owld man zo, 'specially when
'a baked his breeches, poor owld zowl an
hin !

S. What 's that Simon ? We must
hear that story.

Simon. Whoy, one night, poor owld Job
Cark coomed off the downs drough wet to

FOURTH DAY. 109

his very skin, and 'a went straight off to
bed. Rachael her 'ad been a bakin' in the
daay time, and 'a put Job's leathern breeches
in the oven to dry um. In the marnin',
avore 'twas light, Job began to veel about
vor his thengs, and missed the breeches.
44 Where be the breeches ?" zays he ;
" where be my breeches, Rachael ! " " Awh,
in the oven." Away went Job a'ter um,
but in a minnit 'a zengs out, " Massey haw !
what in th' oruld ha' you done, Rachael !
they be ael cockled up like a skin o' parch-
ment ! Oh Lard, oh lard, what zhall I do !
Was ever a man zo plagued as I be ? "
" Patience, Job, patience," zays the owld
body, " have a leetle patience. Remember
your namezake, how Tie was caddled."
ct Ha ! that 's very true," zays Job ; 'a had
a nation deal to put up wi', that 's zartin,
but his wife never baked his breeches ! "

S. A capital story, which should be
incorporated with the next edition of the

110 SPRING-TIDE.

" Miseries of Human Life/' Some thirty
years ago leather breeches were worn gene-
rally by the farmers, who, at market, when
reckoning up their accounts, took a pin from
their sleeve, and scratched the accounts on
their nether garments, worn as sleek and
shining as an old oak table.

J. How the air swarms writh insects !
The swallows must be gorged with them,
yet they still prolong the chase.

S. They will soon give it up to the bat
and the night-hawk. You may hear the
latter in the twilight of yonder thicket
already, in fall cry after the moths which
the evening is tempting forth. By the by,
we are approaching the spot where an old
acquaintance of mine lies. I'll try him
with the cinnamon moth, a tempting morsel
to a large trout at this time of the day ;
but I must be wary, for he is one of the
cunningest fish in this stream, and has
actually broken away from two or three

FOURTH DAY. Ill

anglers of my acquaintance. He lies under
the branches of that great elm tree, and
the difficulty is to approach without his
seeing you. Keep back awhile and I '11
try him. Ha ! I saw him rise at a fly
which was passing over him. Now, line
and rod be obedient, and he 's mine. There !
I told you so ; he has taken the lure and
gone down to his haunt. Steady, Simon,
don't come too near. I feel him, and see,
he runs up stream ; but 1 11 turn him, and
bring him down again.

J. What a plunge ! Shade of Cotton,
I hope your tackle is strong, or you 11 lose
him ! Another summerset ! He '11 get off,
surely !

S. Never fear. I have him clear of
the weeds, and am now pretty sure of my
prize: yet he still fights nobly and con-
tends for life and liberty with the vigour
of his tribe. Don't approach yet, you will
only add to his consternation, and make

112 SPRING-TIDE.

him renew his efforts to get loose. Wait
till I get a shorter line. There, you see
he grows faint ; he rolls heavily on his
side ; his fins seem to beat the tide ; he is
spent, and you may now lift him out, Julian,
but take care of my line.

J. What a noble trout ! he is upwards
of a foot and a half long. What do you
estimate his weight to be ?

S. About four pounds. He is a well-
fed fish, with a back like a hog, and of a
beautiful colour. Put him into Mr. Julian's
pannier, Simon, and come on to "The
Angler's Rest," where we 11 have a tankard
of spiced ale, a beverage which, as Father
Walton would have said, is only to be
drunk by honest men and anglers.

[Exeunt.

Page 113.

FOURTH DAY. 113

The parlour of the u Angler's Rest" SENEX,
JULIAN. Enter hostess with the loving cup.

Senex. There, take a draught of what our
hostess has brewed for us, and tell me,
what you think of it.

Julian. [After a long protracted "pull"
at the tankard.] Ha ! this is indeed a drink
for a prince. You must tell me the secret
of its confection.

S. That you shall know presently ; but
say, is it not an excellent draught for a
thirsty and somewhat wearied man.

J. Not only meat and drink, but clothes,
lodging, and washing to boot, as Paddy has
it. Most cool and delicious ; — but I long
to know the secret of its brewing, for mine
hostess was very quick in preparing it.

S. It is made thus : take two glasses
of wine, one of port and one of sherry, two
table-spoonfuls of moist sugar, a quarter of
a nutmeg, and a sprinkle of ginger, fill up

114 SPRING-TIDE.

with a pint of mild ale over a piece of well
baked (but not burnt) toast. These are the
proportions ; and if you will make it with
a quart of ale, you of course double the
quantity of wine, See. Any wine will answer
the purpose, but if of two kinds, the better.
It should stand a quarter of an hour before
it is drunk, that the flavour of the sop may
be duly imparted to it.

Hostess. I hope it 's made to your liking,
sir?

S. So good that we must have the tan-
kard replenished, Mrs. Slater. [Hostess
curtseys, and retires with the empty tan-
kard.] The widow's late husband could
cast a line well, and knew where to look
for a trout as well as any angler in this
part of the country. He was a famous
man, too, for a pike, and helped much to
clear the water of that voracious fish. That
pike which you see in the glass-case over
the mantelpiece, was captured by him

FOURTH DAT. 115

about five years since. It weighed eighteen
pounds. The whole village was in an uproar ;
old and young turned out to stare at the
water-wolf, and many a good wife who had
indulged in uncharitable suspicions of her
neighbours, as to the disappearance of her
young ducks and geese, saw who was more
likely to have been the culprit.

J. Yes, I suppose the disappearance of
goslings and ducklings may often be thus
accounted for. [Re-enter hostess with the
replenished tankard, which she places on
the table ; noise of singing without.]

H. It had better stand a few minutes,
sir. I hope the singing outside doesn't
disturb you ?

S. Not at all, not at all. [Exit hostess.]
By the by, Julian, this will be a good op-
portunity for you to hear one of our coun-
try ditties. There 's a fellow singing with
the power of twenty parish clerks. [Look-
ing out of the window.] Ho, Simon !

116 SPRING-TIDE.

Simon. [ Without.} Zur !

S. Ask one of your friends there to
give us a song, and tell Mrs. Slater to
give them half a gallon of beer for
me.

Simon. Eez, zur ; what 'oud 'e plaze to
ha' ? " The Harnet and the Bittle," or
" Bowld Robin Hood;' or " Owld Grum-
bleton!"

S. Oh, " Old Grumbleton,"by all means;
there 's a fine moral in it, Julian, and I beg
you to give ear to it. " Ovvld Grumbleton,"
Simon.

Simon. Eez, zur. I '11 ask Dannell Jar-
vis : he Ve a got the best voice o' ael on um,
and zengs the loudest.

S. Now, I pray you give heed to this
ditty, Julian. There is something in it
which I trust you will lay to heart.

J. I am all ears.

FOURTH DAY. 117

OLD GRUMBLETON.

Owld Grumbleton was a terrible Turk,

As I 've yeard people zay,
And 'a zwore in an hour a 'd do mwore work

Than his wife wou'd do in a day :
" Wi' ael my heart," zays the good owld dame,

te I 'm agreeable, anyhow ;
Zo thee sha't bide at whoame to-day,

And I '11 gwo driv' the plough.

" But thee must veed the brindled zow,

And the leetle pegs in th' sty,
And thee must milk the tiny cow,

Or Tiney her '11 gwo dry ;
And thee must mind the hank o' yarn

As I spun yesterday ;
And thee must watch the speckled hen,

Or her '11 gwo lay astray :
And thee must zee to the dairy pans,

Or the crame '11 be spwoilt therein ;
And thee must mind to turn the malt

That 's dryin' in the kiln."

The owld 'oman tuk the whip in her hand,
And trudged to drive the plough ;

The owld man tuk the milking-pail,
And tackled un to the cow :

118 SPRING-TIDE.

But Tiney winced, and Tiney hunched.

And Tiney cocked her nose,
And Tiney kicked the pail down,

And the milk run auver his hose.
And 'tis « Oh, Tiney ! " and « Wo ! Tiney ! '

And " Drat th' cow, bide still !
If I milks zich a maggotty runt agen,

'T will be zore agin my will ! "

And he vorgot the hank o' yarn,

And the puppy-dog stole it away ;
And he vorgot the speckled hen.

And zo her layd astray :
A went to veed the hungry pegs

A-grunting in the sty,
A run his nose agin a pwoast,

And amwoast knocked out his eye :
" A vine joke, my yead's broke !

A plague on the pegs and sty !
If they gets no vittles till Doomsday,

They '11 never be zarved by I."

A left the crame to stand in the churm,

And turnin' hizzelf about,
Lar' a massey haw ! there stood the zow

A zlushin' in her snout !
A stoop'd to pick a swingein' stick,

To gie th? owld zow her hire ;
Her run between his legs in a vright,

And drowed un into the vire.

FOURTH DAY. 119

" Oh drat thee now, vor a plaguy zow,

A zurpriziiri zow bist thee ;
Thy snout it doos mwore harm in an hour

Than I can mend in dree ! "

In coomed th' owld 'oman a wringin' her hands,

And thus in haste her spoke ;
" The vore hos lays on his back in the pond,

And the plough and stilts be broke ;
And 'tis ' O Dobbin ! my poor Dobbin ! '

And What an owld vool was I !
If I wears the breeches vor arr'n' agen,

I wishes as I med die! ''

Owld Grumbleton zwore by the zun and the moon,

And ael the green laves on the tree,
If his wife 'ou'd but take to her gear agen

Her shou'd never be caddled by he,
And 'tis " Oh zay no mwore, pray,

Vor I hates to be called a vool ;
But bustle to-night, and put ael thengs right,

And I ?11 gie thee lave to rule ! "

S. There, what do you think of that ?

J. Excellent ! a commentary on the trite
proverb, " Cuique in sua arte credendum
est" I shall, as you advise, lay it to heart,
in the event of my falling into the snare of
Hymen some day. Your instructions in the

120 SPRING-TIDE.

West Saxon dialect have enabled me to
comprehend the song, and I must beg you
to obtain me a copy of it.

S. I '11 take care that you have it.

Simon. [Without] Will 'e plaze to ha'
another, zur.

S. No, not to-night, Simon ; we must
be trudging homeward : it is growing dark.
Look to your panniers. Give Mrs. Slater
a brace of trouts, and follow us directly.
Come along, Julian.

[Exeunt.

Twilight. The Meadows. SENEX, JULIAN ;
SIMON bringing up the rear.

Julian. The air smells sweetly now the
sun is down.

Senex. " The smell of a field which the
Lord has blessed." The daisy and other
flowers which turn to the sun, are closed, but
the fragrant climbing plants in the hedge-

FOURTH DAY. 121

rows, teem with their perfume and drink the
evening clews. The trouts and swallows
have given up their hunting to the night-
hawk and the bat, and thousands of beau-
tiful insects fall before these new devourers.
The wood-tick's note has commenced, and
timid glow-worms venture forth to hold
tryst upon the humid greensward. See,
the rising moon is tinging the few light
fleecy clouds swept by the gentle south wind
along the horizon. Such a night had the
blind poet in his mind's eye when he com-
posed those beautiful lines : —

" Now came still evening on, and twilight grey
Had in her sober livery all things clad :
Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird,
They to their grassy couch, these to their nests
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ;
She all night long her amorous descant sung ;
Silence was pleased : now glowed the firmament
With living sapphires ; Hesperus, that led
The starry host, rode brightest ; till the Moon,
Rising in clouded majesty at length,
Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light ;
And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw."

122 SPRING-TIDE.

But see, what with chatting and reciting
we have beguiled the time and made our
walk a short one ; old Fitz's deep voice wel-
comes us, and we shall eat our supper with
a relish which hunger alone can impart.

FIFTH DAY.

Thrice happy he, who, by some shady grove,

Far from the clamorous world, doth live his own ;

Though solitary, who is not alone,

But doth converse with that Eternal Love.

Oh, how more sweet is bird's harmonious moan,

Or the hoarse sobbings of the widow'd dove,

Than those smooth whisp'rings near a prince's throne,

Which good make doubtful, do the ill approve !

0, how more sweet is zephyr's wholesome breath,

And sighs, embalmed, which new-born flowers unfold,

Than that applause vain honour doth bequeath.

DRUMMOND.

FIFTH DAY.

The River-side. SENEX and JULIAN seated
at their luncheon beneath a hawthorn bush.
SIMON counts the Jish they have taken.

Senex. Well, Simon, how many ?

Simon. There 's five brace o" yourn,
zur, and dree brace and a haalf o" good
mis o** Measter Julian's.

S. Pretty good work, considering the
brightness of the day.

Julian. You promised to discuss the
relative advantage of fishing up or down
stream.

S. I have heard anglers contend for
either, but it appears to me to depend upon

126 SPRING-TIDE.

circumstances. I think it of little use to
fish up stream, unless the trout are taking
the fly greedily. In that case the advan-
tage is obvious, as shown by Mr. Penn, a
practical angler, whose book you should
possess yourself of. But if the fish are
sluggish and not rising, you will find your
throwing up stream fruitless.

J. If they are not rising I fancy it will
be but dull sport.

S. Not so ; I have sometimes taken
fine fish when even the smallest trout would
not rise. For instance, when the May-fly
is ascending the stalks of the flags, and
not yet rising in the air, the artificial
May-fly under water, is a deadly lure.
I have found this repeatedly, and taken
some of the largest fish in the stream,
who have seized the fly under water,
when they would not regard it on the
surface.

J. I have observed that to-day my

FIFTH DAY. 127

fish took the fly after it had sunk beneath
the surface. It appears to me that there
is almost as much art in managing your
fly when in the water as in casting it
upon the surface.

S. Assuredly ; I have known some
anglers who never made a good cast, yet
succeed, because they are careful after the
fly has sunk ; being mindful not to drag
the lure roughly through the water when
preparing for a fresh throw. It is well
known 5 too, that a trout in a swift running
stream will often follow and seize the fly
just as it arrives at the bank, so that unless
you can see the fish, you are often in igno-
rance whether he is after what you offer
him ; — but give me a horn of ale, and try
a piece of that gammon, which you will
find excellent.

J. Notwithstanding the heat I have the
appetite of a ploughman. Oh, ye sons
of luxury and dissipation, who are now

128 SPRING-TIDE.

discussing a maudlin breakfast in town,
come hither !

S. See ! as the heat increases, the May-
fly and the dragon-fly ascend the flags and
hoist sail : poor feeble trembling things,
vibrating their flaccid wings, and looking
forth upon a new world, while their cere-
ments crackle in the sun and drop from
their fragile bodies — a type of the souFs
appearance after its final conflict with the
grim enemy ! Look how some, more lusty
than their fellows, soar into the air and
commence their wanton mazes. The alder-
fly too, encouraged by the warmth, spreads
his dusky membraneous wings, and joins in
the insect revel.

J. I see also some insects shaped like
the May-fly, but infinitely smaller.

S. They are the " duns," which continue
from early spring down to the close of the
season, though the colour of their bodies
varies. These flies are well imitated and

FIFTH DAY. 129

prove a good lure when the fish are shy and
the water very clear and low.

J. How infinitely our sport is to be
preferred before " bottom fishing."

S. For my part I cannot now tolerate
fishing with a float, and yet I confess that
that kind of angling, when the barbel are
on the feed, in very deep and clear water,
such as the Thames at Twickenham or Rich-
mond, is far from despicable sport, and may
afford great delight to those who cannot
fish with the fly. A good perch, too, is a
powerful and resolute fish, a free biter, and
rarely tries your patience.

J. I never hear of perch-fishing without
thinking of a contrivance of a cockney-
angler who used to fish in one of the canals
in the neighbourhood of London. The old
fellow having marked a good swim of perch,
forthwith prepared a large glass bottle, which
he filled with water, and then introduced
a handful of live Thames shrimps. The

ISO SPRING-TIDE.

bottle being carefully stopped, was then let
down by a string to the bottom of the canal,
and was soon surrounded by all the perch
in the neighbourhood, who finding they
could not assail the imprisoned shrimps,
swam round and round the outside, rubbing
their snouts against the glass, like hungry
gamins at the steamy windows of a cook's
shop. While thus engaged, the angler let
down a shrimp on a hook by the side of
the glass, and you may be sure he was not
long without a bite.

S. An excellent contrivance, and cer-

*

tainly much to be preferred to the many
abominations composed for " ground bait,"
and used by some people in bottom fishing.
These preparations appear to be devised
chiefly that they may rival in filthiness the
recipes of the old pharmacopoeias, in which
every imaginable nastiness may be found.
But see, there is a breeze springing up
which curls the water. On with a " soldier

FIFTH DAY. 131

palmer," or a "golden palmer," if you
would rather, and I promise you rare
sport.

J. I adopt your advice, and have a
soldier palmer for " stretcher," and a golden
palmer for " bob.v

S. Well chosen, and now follow me,
and I warrant you we shall have sport.
Come along, Simon. [Exeunt.

Another part of the river. SENEX, JULIAN,
SIMON PARADICE.

Senex. Here lie some of the best trouts
in the river when the weather is warm.
The breeze so ruffles the surface that they
cannot perceive you, or they would fly up
the stream. Now, cast your fly just over
that stone.

Julian. There ! — ha ! I missed him ! —
he 's a large fish.

S. Try again : you are not likely to have
frightened him while this wind is blowing.

1 32 SPRING-TIDE.

You have him ! Up with your rod, and
shorten line. Quick, or he '11 gain that patch
of weeds. So, that's right, — he's yours;
lead him gently to the side and exhaust
him. Give me the landing-net, Simon.
No ! another plunge, and another.

J. Shall I give him a little line ? I
hope my tackle will hold him. My line
twangs like a bow-string !

S. Not an inch, but give the top of
your rod free play. He grows weak now
and turns on his side : I can land him.
There ! a fine fish, twenty inches at least !
See, by pressing him I make him disgorge
three minnows, and yet he clutched at
your fly greedily.

J. I thought it was the practice, with
so large a fish, to give out more line.

S. It may be pwith some anglers, but
I have taken larger fish, and never returned
an inch of line after I had wound up. I
have always thought that the hazard is

FIFTH DAY. 133

greater when the line is the least slack than
when short ; — taking care, however, never
to pull your fish, which may be hooked
slightly, in which case you infallibly lose
him. Come, clear your line and try again.
Another ! — shorten line, and keep him clear
of that stone. Well done ! you have him
now at advantage. He grows weak — bring
him to the side — there ! What think you
of this spot ?

J. Beautiful ! I never saw a sweeter
stream in the south of England. What a
shoal of minnows in the pool behind that
great stone.

S. They are there to avoid the trouts
which are now on the shallows. A friend,
on whose veracity I can implicitly rely,
told me, that some years since, he was one
day fishing in Hertfordshire, when, as he
sat by the river-side changing his flies,
he beheld a concourse of these beautiful
little fishes apparently in deep council.

134 SPRING-TIDE.

They formed a very perfect circle of about
three feet in diameter, each fish having
his head turned inwards. They remained
thus grouped and perfectly immovable, ex-
cept their fins, but if any strange minnow
ventured near them, two or three of the
body moved out of the circle and chased
it away, returning and falling in again with
the greatest precision. How such creatures
can commune with each other I leave for
the consideration of the naturalist; — they,
indeed, have a neither speech nor language,"
and yet truly there must exist the most
perfect intelligence among them.

J. It is, after all, not more wonderful
than the instinct with which Providence
has endowed many creatures of inferior
organization. Fishes, I believe, are desti-
tute of natural affection.

S. To all appearance they are, but then
we know so little of their habits. They
appear, too, to be insensible to pain, or at

FIFTH DAY. 135

least to be less affected by it than most
creatures.

J. I have heard many anecdotes of their
voracity, and of their insensibility to cor-
poral suffering after being hooked ; their
struggles then, which so horrify humane
people, would appear to be rather the effect
of their efforts to get away than the writh-
ing under torture.

S. You will find it difficult to persuade
many people of that, and I have no incli-
nation to debate the matter, but I am well
acquainted with an angler who once unin-
tentionally caught a fish, and a trout too,
with its own eye !

J. Pardon my incredulity, but I was
not prepared for such a fact as that !

S. I do not ask you to believe it, but
I have perfect confidence in the veracity
of my friend, who assured me that having
hooked the fish foul, and torn out its eye,
he threw again, and the same trout seized

136

SPRING-TIDE.

it and was captured. It is well known
that a small trout is a tempting bait for
a large one ; and this is notoriously the case
with pike, who prefer their own young
to any other fish. Smelts, too, are most
readily taken with pieces of their own kind.
Taking into account the comparative in-
sensibility to pain of these creatures, with
the habit of fish in preying upon their own
species, the adventure of my friend appears
the less incredible. But what are you
watching so attentively ?

J. I was observing the robin on that
withered branch yonder : he has been re-
garding our doings apparently with great
attention for the last ten minutes, and seems
to look on with more than brute intel-
ligence.

S. It is a characteristic of that interest-
ing bird which has made him such a fa-
vourite with us country folk. Walk down
your garden, and take a seat in your summer-

FIFTH DAY. 137

house, and, in less than five minutes, Robin
pops his head in at the door and peers at
you inquisitively. Ramble into the thickest
wood or coppice, and seat yourself on some
moss-covered bank, and the redbreast con-
fronts you directly. Scarcely has the gar-
dener turned a spadeful of earth when this
" familiar peast to man " comes a-leasing
for the worms thus laid bare, perching so
close that he might be taken with the hand.
He who wrote the favourite ballad of <; The
Babes in the Wood," was fully aware of
the habits of this pert and familiar bird.
Yes, Robin has often shared the simple meal
of the anchorite and the furtive repast of
the hunter and the outlawed man, when
the wild wood afforded the only refuge from
tyranny and oppression.

J. And yet I believe he has a bad cha-
racter, quarrelling and fighting with his kind,
and even with the members of his own
household, on the most trifling occasions ?

138 SPRING-TIDE.

S. I cannot deny it : his pugnacity is
notorious, and it is well known that he
often cuffs his parents or his brothers soundly
— a very unamiable trait on which poets
have charitably been silent. A friend of
mine sometimes amuses himself by setting
two robins to fight, which he effects in this
manner. Perceiving a single robin in his
garden he soon brings a second to the spot
by tapping sharply with the edge of one
shilling on the surface of another, and thus
imitating the abrupt, pert, petulant note of
the bird itself. The note of defiance is
quickly responded to, and a battle invariably
ensues. Still Robin will continue a favourite
with the countryman, and the couplet

" The robin redbreast and the wren
Are God Almighty's cock and hen,"

be recited as long as the dialect I have
attempted to illustrate shall be known and
spoken.

FIFTH DAY. 139

J. What could have been the origin of
that strange rhyme ?

S. I am somewhat puzzled to know why
the wren is thus coupled with the robin,
unless it be that the tiny songster, like the
redbreast, haunts gardens and homesteads,
where its shrill pipe may be heard even in
winter time if the weather be not frosty.
Perhaps the peculiar cock of the wren's tail
might have suggested the conceit of a dimi-
nutive hen, it being very unlike that of other
small birds, and more resembling the tail
of a gallinaceous fowl. The wren never
enters houses like the robin, and does not,
therefore, claim the protection which the
latter still obtains, though I fear the harm-
less superstition is already assailed by the
stride of " education." Pope, in his day,
had some misgivings on this head, for he
says: — '

" The robin redbreast, till of late, had rest,
And children sacred held a martin's nest."

140 SPRING-TIDE.

«7. What could have given rise to the
story of the robin covering the dead bodies
of human creatures?

S. It may be traced, perhaps, to the
popular ballad, but it is possible that the
simple rhyme embalms an ancient super-
stition. In an old play the wren is made
to join in this pious office : —

" Call for the robin redbreast and the wren
Since o'er shady groves they hover,
And with leaves and flow'rs do cover
The friendless bodies of unburied men."

The fondness of the robin for his summer
haunts is well described in these lines : —

" Some redbreasts love amid the deepest groves
Retired to pass the summer days. Their song
Among the birchen bougns, with sweetest fall
Is warbled, pausing, then resumed more sweet,
More sad, that to an ear grown fanciful,
The babes, the wood, the men, rise in review,
And robin still repeats the tragic line."

— But it is in the winter that robin's fami-
liarity increases. When the wind whistles
sharply through the leafless thicket, and the

FIFTH DAY. 141

snow covers the frost-bound earth, the red-
breast boldly enters the house and finds
no enemy but the cat ; fearlessly perching
at length on your very chair back, and
almost living within doors. He loves, too,
a draught of milk, and often invades the
dairy, where he sometimes tumbles into
the leads and is drowned.

J. Some time since, the congregation in
the cathedral church of Canterbury were
daily visited by a robin, one of a pair which
had taken up their abode in some carved
capital of the sacred pile. I was once or
twice witness of this myself The little
creature, as soon as the tones of the organ
were heard, descended, and actually perch-
ing on the choristers'* desks, peered in their
faces, and joined its shrill note with theirs.
The sight at first provoked a smile, but
after a time, as the service proceeded, and
the alto of the feathered intruder mingled
with the voices of the choristers, and re-

142 SPRING-TIDE.

sounded audibly above the loudest notes
of the organ, the scene became inexpressibly
affecting.

S. Another proof of the familiarity of
this bird, which will ever be a favourite
with man.

Simon. I thenks there 's a good trout or
two in owld Speck's meadow, zur. Will 'e
try?

S. Ay, we 11 go thither at once, Simon.
Did you tell Speck that I wish to see
him ?

Simon. Eez, zur.

S. What did he say ?

Simon. Haw ! a laafed and zed as how
a'd come, but 'twas o' no use ; — ye couldn't
get any more rent out o' he ; — 'twas like
puttin' a crupper on a twoad.

S. Why so, Simon ?

Simon. 'Cos a twoad 'ant got no tayl,
zur ! I do thenk a's the stingiest owld
wosbird in the 'orld. Last winter a was

FIFTH DAY. ]43

buildm' a cow-hus, and because a wouldn't
buy hair to mix wi' the marter, a shaved
his donkey so close that the poor beayst
was pretty nigh killed wi' the cawld !

S. There's a lesson in thrift for you,
Julian ! Come, let us go and try the stream
in my tenant's meadow. [Exeunt.

Another part of the stream. SENEX,
JULIAN, SIMON PARADICE.

Senex. There, cast your fly just under
that high bank opposite.

Julian. Ha ! I missed him !

S. Yes, and by your own precipitancy.
The fish is greedy enough, but you did not
give him time.

J. I have read that you should be
prepared to strike the moment he rises.

S. And rightly so, if you were fishing
in the rapid streams of Derbyshire or West-
moreland, where, if you do not strike in-
stanter, the fish winds your foot-line round

144 SPRING-TIDE.

some great stone, and frees himself ere you
can count two ; but in these south country
streams, which run sluggishly, you should
not strike until the fish has turned himself.
A good fish will invariably hook himself on
your simply raising the point of your rod,
and this I always do, so that I am in
less danger of losing him by tearing out
my hold in " striking." Of course you
will lose no time in getting your rod erect,
or in u giving the fish the but," as it is
significantly termed, when he proves met-
tlesome. Try again . There 's a rise under
that alder bush.

J. I have him, and perceive you are
right : I did not raise the rod until I
counted three, when the tension of my
line told me that he was well hooked.
Out with him, Simon.

Simon. A's a good pound and a haaf,
zur.

S. Let us proceed a little higher up

FIFTH DAY. 145

the stream, where the current is stronger;
the fish that haunt the rapids are twice
as good as those in stiller water, and infi-
nitely more vigorous.

J. You must be well acquainted with
these streams.

S. Yes, and with many others in this
part of England : —

• fondly I pursued,

Even when a child, the streams — unheard, unseen.

******
.Nor have I tracked their course for scanty gains ;
They taught me random cares and truant joys,
That shield from mischief and preserve from stains
Vague minds."

— I often find myself musing at particular
spots which I was wont to haunt in my child-
hood with nothing to disturb my reveries,
but the joyous note of the fly-hunting wagtail
as it bounds from patch to patch of bright
weeds, or the startled cry of the moor-hen,
or the kingfisher skimming along the sedgy
bank of the stream, and in its turn flushing

146 SPRING-TIDE.

the solitary snipe which hurries away to
some more secure retreat. Out on the
man, I say, who finds all his. pleasure in
destroying ! The river-side rambling of the
fly-fisher affords more real enjoyment to
a contemplative mind than all other sports
of the field.

J. You are right ; though other sports
have their interest and their excitement,
none yields such a quiet pleasure as ours ;
none furnishes such opportunities for the
study of Nature. I have seen to-day a
dozen nooks which I would fain transfer
to my sketch-book.

S. Very pleasant are such memorials of
a fishing ramble ; but we still want the
accessories, — the voices of birds, the hum
of insects, the ripple of the pebbly stream,
and the sound most grateful to the an-
gler's ear, the plash of the greedy trout as
he launches at the struggling fly borne on
the eddying current ; while high over head,

FIFTH DAY. 147

a speck in the blue ether, the lark is carol-
ing blithely, and in the neighbouring fields
are heard the ploughboy^s whistle, the jangle
of the traces, and the crack of the carter's
whip, startling the feathered foragers from
the fresh turned clods : — these are beyond
the most cunning limner's art.

J. Still, as we contemplate a well-exe-
cuted sketch, the mind supplies the ac-
cessories you have enumerated with such
gusto.

S. I think you will find a trout near
the roots of that pollard oak, but take care
of the thorn that overhangs the water.

J. It 's a dangerous cast : — 1 11 cede it
to you.

S. Very well then ; stand aside. Ha !
I have hooked a couple !

J. I 'm glad they are in your hands,
for I should have found one of them suffi-
cient. How they plunge in different direc-
tions like a couple of hounds in the leash,

148 SPRING-TIDE.

as if they were conscious that they had
you at disadvantage.

S. They begin now, however, to show
symptoms of distress, but they are not landed
yet. — Bring the net, Simon. No, they are
not yet subdued.

Simon. Oon on um zims mwore cam
than t'other ; — but it 's ael up wi'm
now.

S. Out with 'em ! Poor rogues, they
fought well for their freedom.

J. Do you often kill such a brace at
once ?

S. No, not such a brace as this ; but,
when trout are feeding greedily, it is no
very uncommon event to find both your
flies seized at the same time ; though one
of them is generally taken by a small
fish.

J. On these occasions our chief hope is
in good tackle.

S. I am no advocate for very light

FIFTH DAY. 149

tackle, although, at times this is a matter
of the first importance, — because of possible
contingencies. A friend of mine, some years
since, while fly-fishing in the Foy in Corn-
wall, hooked a heavy fish in a rapid stream,
and played it for some seconds, in much
doubt as to what he had hold of. At last,
to his great surprise, he discovered it \vas
an eel which he had harpooned in the tail.
After a struggle of some minutes, with the
assistance of his companion, he landed his
prize, weighing upwards of two pounds.

J. A troublesome acquaintance at the
end of a fly-rod.

S. Troublesome at the end of any
rod, but especially so in a swift stream.
— Are there any pike in Speck's pond,
Simon ?

Simon. Eez, zur, a veaw. Th' owld
genelman vound a strange vish there oon
marnin' laast Michaelmas.

S. What was that?

1 50 SPRING-TIDE.

Simon. Haw, a zeed a visli under the
water as zimd to ha** two tayls, oon at each
ind an hin, a cou'dn't mak't out no how,
zo, as the theng was quite dead, they got
un out wi a rake, and then um vound
'twas a pike o" zix pounds that had tried
to zwallur a carp o1 dree pounds, and the
carp had stuck in his droat and choked
un. I zeed um bwoth jist as they was
tuk out.

J. I have heard two or three similar
stories, but in each instance the pike had
swallowed one of its own species. I be-
lieve they are often choked in this way.
I have somewhere heard or read of a large
pike swallowing the head of a swan, and in
like manner falling a victim to his rashness.

S. About twenty years back a dead
pike was taken ont of a pond in the ad-
joining parish, which, in attempting to swal-
low a moor-hen, had choked itself. I can
believe anything of the voracity of this fish,

FIFTH DAY. 151

who is truly the wolf of the waters, and,
if not kept under, will soon devastate a
trout stream.

J. The privations which fish must some-
times endure doubtless make the pike oc-
casionally very rash in his craving for
food.

S. Yes, I believe with Simon, that when
pressed by hunger nothing comes amiss
to them. — But in the next field is the
source of the stream. We can go through
this gap. Let us approach softly, for a
large fish often lies under the hollow roots
of that thorn tree. Give me my spinning
rod, Simon. — There ! I told you so ! Down
he goes sulkily, — a good three pounds, if
I ever had a fish in hand. Now he rises
to the top, and vents his indignation by a
violent shake or two, but it ^s of little use
striving against such tackle. Lift him out,
Simon. — After all, it "s coarse fishing with
the minnow, and only justifiable in places

152

SPRING-TIDE.

such as these, when the fly cannot be used
without the risk of being hitched. — Aut
musca aut nihil is ray motto, and I rarely
resort to other means.

J. What a charming spot !

jS. I thought you would be pleased
with it. Let us sit down beneath the
shade of this bush, and, as you love the
picturesque, indulge your fancy awhile.

" Salve, Fons ignote ortu, sacer, alme, perennis,
Vitree, glauce, profunde, sonore, illimis, opace ! "

Here the Masters of the World may have
celebrated their Fontinalia : here, perhaps,
the altar was raised

and the most poetical of all the rites of
polytheism were celebrated by men ignorant

Page .53.

FIFTH DAY. 153

of Him " who turned the hard rock into
a standing water, and the flint stone into
a springing well : " here, in after-ages, when
priestcraft was all potent, the sick man re-
sorted and drank of the stream, which a new
faith had hallowed and adopted.

J. I can imagine all. These luxuriant
thorns, whose branches shade it from the
sun, and whose roots are nourished by the
spring, are of great age.

S. Yes, I remember them these thirty-
five years and more, and they appear un-
altered : it is very difficult to ascertain the
age of such trees. These are my especial
favourites, for, as I have before observed,
they are beautiful even in winter. I do
not marvel that they were cherished by
our Saxon forefathers, or that in these
days, when land is cleared of underwood,
immunity is granted to " hollies and
thorns."

J. I remember that Asser, in his Life

154 SPRING-TIDE.

of the Great Alfred, tells us how, in the
memorable battle of Ashendun, the fight
raged fiercest around one of these solitary
thorn trees — unica spinosa arbor.

8. Yes, and such a tree may have shel-
tered the Royal fugitive when, parted from
his friends and adherents, he traversed the
most unfrequented tracts, hoping and trust-
ing that a brighter hour awaited his de-
sponding countrymen.

J. I confess, the scenes of the last five
days have wrought a great change in me ;
— I could almost find it in my heart to
take to a country life.

S. If such thoughts possess you now,
you will find them gaining firmer hold of
you in advancing life. When otherwise dis-
posed, I often found myself, amidst the din of
the busiest thoroughfares of London, repeat-
ing the lines of Marvel:

" Climb at court for me who will
Tottering favour's pinnacle ; —

FIFTH DAY. 155

All I wish is to lie still,

Settled in some secret nest.

In calm leisure let me rest,

And, far off the public stage,

Pass away my silent age.

Thus, when without noise, unknown,

I have lived out all my span,

I shall die without a groan

An old honest countryman."

I hold with the ancient, " Vita rustica sine
dubitatione, proximo, et quasi consanguinea
sapiential — It was this which, in old times,
led the wisest and the best to abandon the
busy world, its strifes and jealousies, to
enjoy the "dry morsel and quiet."

" Tranquillity, thou better name
Than all the family of Fame ! "

But do not misunderstand me ; I abhor the
misanthrope who lives for himself alone ; and,
if I thought that by leading a country life,
I was denied the opportunity of being useful
to my fellow-man, I would abandon my
favourite haunts, and betake me to busier
scenes. Come, I will now lead you to a

156 SPRING-TIDE.

little tributary stream which washes the roots
of the old pollard-willows in yonder pad-
dock.

J. I am ready, and cannot follow a
better teacher ; — lead on. [Exeunt.

SIXTH DAY.

Wenn ich so auf mein Leben schau,
Erwagend, wie's doch sei gekommen,
Das Waldesgriin und Himmelsblau,
Und Morgenroth und Abendthau
Mir mehr als Rang und Mammon frommen.

FR. KIND.

SIXTH DAY,

A Green Lane leading to the meadows. SENEX,
JULIAN. SIMON PARADICE following.

Senex. I HAVE brought you a roundabout
way this morning for the purpose of calling
on the worthy people we have just left ; but
it is a pleasant walk, and you will not find
it irksome,

Julian. Nay, I am delighted both with
the neighbourhood and with your friends,
who appear to be superior to the majority
of their class.

S. Their class, like many others in
human society, is marked by various shades
of difference. With many educated people

160 SPRING-TIDE.

the farmer is considered a boor ; and so,
indeed, he often is, but there are some, and
not a few, singular exceptions. I am some-
times reminded of the shrewd remark of
Fuller — "The good yeoman is a gentleman
in ore whom the next generation may see
refined ; and is the wax, capable of a gentle
impression when the prince shall stamp it."
Many of these men have better and less
dubious pedigrees than thousands of those
who affect to despise them. You may test
this at the College of Arms, any day you
please, by examining the genealogy of a
respectable yeoman family. In such men
we have the Saxon blood with the least
possible alloy ; and it is no uncommon thing
to find them occupying the soil which their
forefathers have tilled from the days of the
Confessor. Good breeding is not always
inherent, while it may be found among some
in the humblest walks of life.

J. Yes, I can readily believe that good

SIXTH DAY. 161

breeding has existed in all ages, even when
manners were rude, and coarse and grossly
obscene jests won favour at the Courts of
Kings ; — and yet I am puzzled to know
how Modesty veiled her head, or stopped her
ears, when within sight or hearing of the
filthy buffooneries of the Middle Ages. The
bare recital of the terms of some of our
ancient tenures would be an outrage upon
common decency now-a-days.

S. " To the pure all things are pure."
In later times, when the royal palace of
Whitehall was a sty of impurity, men, and
women too, passed in and out without con-
tamination,— shocked at what they saw and
heard, abhorring and pitying, but unpolluted.
That good breeding and gentle deportment
were not unknown in the Middle Ages we
learn from that faithful chronicler of man-
ners Geoffrey Chaucer : his Knight had led
the hard and stormy life of a soldier, had
fought in fifteen pitched battles, and had

M

1 62 SPRING-TIDE.

thrice overthrown his enemy in the lists,
yet

" though that he was worthy he was wise,

And of his port as meke as is a mayde."

Then what a charming picture of a true
gentlewoman of those days is his Prioress: —

" At mete was she wel ytaught withalle
She lette no morsel from hire lippes falle,
Ne wette hire flngres in hire sauce depe
Wel coude she carie a morsel, and wel kepe,
Thatte no droppe ne fell upon hire brest.
In curtesie was set ful muche hire lest.
Hire over lippe wiped she so clene,
That in hire cuppe was no ferthing sene
Of grese, when she dronken hadde hire draught."

This delicacy at meals is the more con-
spicuous when it is remembered that in those
days the ladies had to convey their food to
their mouths on the points of their knives !

The morning I fear, though dense, is too
calm for fishing : we require a breeze for that
part of the stream to which we are going.

J. Never mind, I am enjoying this
delightful walk: the last night's rain has

SIXTH DAY. 163

made every thing look fresh and vivified.
What a peculiar odour pervades the air.

S. It is the trees in this elder hedge.

J. I was not aware that the scent of
the elder was so powerful.

S. Nor are the rustics hereabouts now
aware why their forefathers planted the
elder round their gardens. In Scotland,
north of the Grampians, I believe it is well
known to be noxious to vermin of the snail
and caterpillar kind, and therefore they
water their gardens with water in which
the leaves of this tree have been steeped.
The practice was doubtless once common
in England ; and thus, in Piers Plough-
man, Judas is said to have hanged himself,
on an elder, it being doubtless considered
fitter than all the trees of the forest for
such a delinquent :

" Judas he japed
With Jewen silver
And sithen on an eller
Hanged himself."

164 SPRING-TIDE.

The elder was much venerated by our
Anglo-Saxon (or Old English, as Camden
more properly styles them) forefathers. The
canons of Edgar enumerate and denounce
the practice of several kinds of spells, and
among them those with " elders and other
trees.*" The elder is however, in our days,
prized for certain virtues, and its vinegar is
an excellent element in sauce for any kind
of freshwater fish. I will give you the
recipe for its use before you leave me.

J. Your illustrations tempt me much
to take up the subject of provincialisms;
though I fear, from my want of practical
knowledge, I shall make but little progress ;
yet to know something more of our ancient
tongue is within the reach of every educated
man.

S. You will find such reading give a
zest to your day's ramble in the country.
It is only the half-educated who affect to
despise the language of the village clown.

SIXTH DAY. 165

J. I already perceive that although to
a polished ear their speech is uncouth, it is
often significant and expressive.

S. Some of their phrases are to this
hour pure Saxon. There is one especially
which may be constantly heard even in
the streets of London. I allude to the car-
ter's command to his team, " ga ute ! nn

J. I have heard it often.

S. And so must thousands, daily, with-
out suspecting that Alfred and Beda could
not have uttered purer Saxon !

J. Indeed ! What is its literal signi-
fication ?

S. Go out, or go outwards ! that is,
move away from the driver. In the Anglo-
Saxon Gospels our Lord's command to La-
zarus in the tomb, is in these very words —
" Lazarus, ga ute !" Again, at plough, they
say to the team, when, after turning, the
horses have fallen into the right line
" thereright," a word which occurs very

166 SPRING-TIDE.

often in the Anglo Saxon version of the
Gospels, and which in ours is always re-
presented by the word "straightway." If
they speak of a scanty crop of corn they
say " a bad rip there," and we find in A. S.
"micel rip and feawa wyrta" (Matt. ix.
37) : four out of the five words of this
sentence are still retained by our rural popu-
lation. They use the phrase u most in deal "
for " generally, or for the most part," which
is also the Anglo Saxon form "maest dael."
But I am wearying you with these proofs of
the antiquity of the language spoken by
my rustic neighbours.

J. By no means, I perceive, that you
have taken possession of tenable ground,
and I promise you that by the time we meet
again I will know more of the language you
quote from.

S. There are also many words which
by the rustics are pronounced as their fore-
fathers and ours evidently pronounced them ;

SIXTH DAY. 167

take for example " climb," a word in which
the vowel is sounded like i in him. Spenser
thus uses it, and, at a later period, George
Withers, a Hampshire man, pronounced it
in like manner, as we may suppose by the
lines : —

" He 's a fool that basely dallies

Where each peasant mates with him ;
Shall I haunt the thronged valleys,
When there 's noble hills to climb ! "

But the subject cannot be discussed in a
walk like this. See, the hills are clearing,
and the haze of morning is dispersing.

" Ye mists and exhalations that now rise
From hill or steamy lake, dusky or grey,
Till the sun paints your fleecy skirts with gold,
In honour to the world's great Author rise.
Whether to deck with clouds the uncoloured sky,
Or wet the thirsty earth with falling showers ;
Rising or falling, still advance His praise."

People may descant in raptures on those
sunny climes where a single cloud is some-
times not seen for weeks together, but give
me, with all its occasional discomforts, the

168 SPRING-TIDE.

atmosphere of my own land. I love to see
the flying showers which so often visit us
at this season of the year, and watch the
fantastic shapes and motions of the ever-
changing clouds heightening the effect of
Nature"^ panorama.

J. But do you notj at times, find the
hours pass heavily in your retreat ?

S. Never : when the weather absolutely
defies me to walk abroad, I have abundance
of occupation within doors ; good companions
who have cheered me in hours of sadness
and monitors even for the grey head. Like
Horace, I once sighed : —

" 0 Rus, quando ego te aspiciam ?"

but not that I might doze away my life
in dreamy apathy and uselessness, — I was
always an enemy to —

" The ministre and the norice unto vices
Which that men clepe in English idelnesse;"

nor that I might altogether shun the society

SIXTH DAY. 169

of my fellow-men. It has been well remarked
that solitude reigns supreme in the greatest
cities, " for a crowd is not company, and
faces are but a gallery of pictures, and talk
but a tinkling cymbal where there is no
love."

J. This love of a country life is after
all, I believe, inherent, and scarcely to be
acquired.

S. Perhaps you are right ; in my case
it is so, for my father loved the country as
I do, and like me was an angler. An old
farmer, one of my neighbours, says, u Talk o"*
music, there 's nothing like two flails and a
cuckoo !" Now, though I am not quite of
the same mind, I confess, that sounds like
those are to me sweet music.

" Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds,
Exhilarate the spirit, and restore
The tone of languid Nature."

The notes which come from barn and mill
have a peculiar charm for my ear. Yes, even

170 SPRING-TIDE.

when a boy, long ere I had the strength to cast
a fly,

" I loved the brimming wave that swam

Through quiet meadows round the mill,
The sleepy pool above the dam.

The pool beneath it never still,
The meal sacks on the whitened floor,

The dark round of the dripping wheel,
The very air about the door

Made misty with the floating meal."

But here is our village Church. Is not this
a quiet spot, — good anchorage for a storm-
tossed spirit ?

J. Such nooks are only to be seen in
England : I know of nothing to compare
with them.

S. This is one of my most favourite
spots. When a younger man I once caught
myself, while lounging here, uttering thoughts
which ran somewhat in this strain : —

When I am dead let me not buried lie
Where the world's hubbub sounds continually ;
No funeral pomp, no marble tomb I crave,
A simple slab alone shall mark my grave ;
Robin's sweet note my only dirge shall be,
My epitaph the good man's memory.

Page 171.

SIXTH DAY. 171

J. In the grave all rest alike, but still
our fancy lingers on such scenes as these,
and I doubt if ever they are effaced from
our memories.

S. Never : yet they who lie here were
" men of like passions with ourselves."
Love, jealousy, malice, avarice, ay even
ambition, once disquieted the clay on
which we tread. But there are some who
died in well-grounded hope, who will appear
at the resurrection of the just, — who lived
in charity with all, and died leaving behind
them the odour of a good name. It is pain-
ful to contrast their lives with those of the
debauched and vicious whom death has also
levelled. There is the memorial of one
whose epitaph may be found in the late
Vicar's register — " potator prodigus !" The
worthy old man, — a priest whom Chaucer
or Herbert might have loved, — was a faith-
ful chronicler of the virtues and the vices of
his flock. I never see that grave without

172 SPRING-TIDE.

thinking of the quaint, but somewhat coarse
rhyming admonition which the rustics sing
to the note of the blackbird : —

a Barnaby, Barnaby take for a warning,
Be no more dry, nor drunk of a morning ;
Barnaby, Barnaby lies in his grave,
All the churchyard doth stink of a knave ! "

It always recurs to my memory when the
Spring returns and the ousePs note is heard
loudest in brake and bush. There, too,
is the memorial of one with whom I have
often fished these streams ; — one who,
though young, was yet not unprepared, the
hope and pride of his fond parents.—" How,
now, foolish rheum ! " — regret is vain and
profitless : —

" Whom the gods love die young," was said of yore,
And many deaths do they escape by this :

The death of friends, and that which slays even more —
The death of friendship, love, youth, all that is,

Except mere breath ; and since the silent shore
Awaits at last even those whom longest miss

The old archer's shafts, perhaps the early grave,

Which men weep over may be meant to save !"

SIXTH DAY. 173

Come let me show you the inside of
this pretty Church.

The interior of the Church. SENEX and
JULIAN.

Julian. This font is curious. What
is the meaning of those quaint armed
figures ?

Senex. Antiquaries suppose them to repre-
sent the struggle between the good and the
evil principle ; but it is sometimes difficult
to interpret the symbolism of the period
to which this font belongs.

J. There is the fish, which is, I believe,
the early Christian symbol. When was this
first used ?

S. There can be, I think, little doubt
of its having been adopted in the earliest
days of Christianity. The Greek word
IX0Y2, as you know, signifies a fish, and
I have sometimes seen these letters en-

174 SPRING-TIDE.

graved on the figure of a fish on ancient
gems.

J. They are the initials of the words
'LyffotJc Xf/0TO£ Qzov T/0£ 2a/r^>. When
could this have been devised ?

S. Doubtless in the days of fierce per-
secution, when its significance was not com-
prehended by the Pagan masters of the
world, — perhaps earlier than the Antonines.
We have the best assurance that it was
known in the reign of Severus. If you turn
to Tertullian's discourse on baptism you will
find at the very commencement a passage
in which the word ifj$V9 is used in a way
which shows that the writer must have
been well aware of its application by the
Christians of his day.

J. This church contains the usual hete-
rogeneous array of monuments ! There is
one which must have cost a small fortune.
Hope and Charity gathered around the bed
of a dying woman, the first holding in her

SIXTH DAY. 175

taper fingers the anchor of a frigate ! Then
the inscription, — hyper-florid eulogy ! oh trite
puerility ! How applicable is the measured
sarcasm of the poet :

" Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ?
Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flattery sooth the dull cold ear of Death ?"

One is reminded, too, of the sneer of the
essayist : " What a blessing it must have
been to have lived in the lady's time !"

S. I could almost find it in my heart
to chime in with you, and am only restrained
by the sanctity of the place, and the thought
that human weakness is as manifest in it
as the bad taste which dictated such a
memorial. I regret to find that a curious
sepulchral brass has disappeared, for I
wished you to see it. These things have
suffered from other spoilers besides those
of the days of Cavalier and Roundhead, on
whom all the mischief is unjustly laid, much

176 SPRING-TIDE.

as they are to blame. The actual crimi-
nals are more frequently a set of people
who assume and prostitute the honoured
name of Antiquary, but who in reality are
mere relic-mongers and relic-hoarders.

J. Do you really believe that to be the
case in this instance, and that one of these
gentry has paid your Church a visit ?

S. I have little doubt of it : if the brass
has not been removed by his hands, he has
perhaps bribed the sexton to do it, which
makes his crime the greater.

J. I believe there are instances of the
wilful destruction and mutilation of monu-
ments, and parish registers, with a view to
remove evidence which might be produced
in our Law Courts.

S. It is too true. I am acquainted with
a case in another county, which for auda-
cious wickedness is without parallel. But
let us turn from a theme so degrading to
human nature. How dulled is the pride

SIXTH DAY. 177

of old houses in these faded and defaced
escutcheons ! Gules has lost its florid hue.
Azure no longer looks ethereal. Sable has
rusted like an old and laid up blade. Or
glitters in patches only, a fit type of the
tinsel of this life — " bracteata felicitas !"
There is something inexpressibly solemn
in the contemplation of " this pomp and
circumstance " on the very margin of the
grave. What will it avail in the great
account, when plumes and shaven crowns,
the warrior and the monk, the simple
ploughman and the sage, the high-born
beauty and the lowly country wench, shall
be regarded without distinction ; — when
heraldry shall cover no foul spot, and
that red hand, that right red hand, —
the boast and ornament of many a proud
escutcheon, — shall be held tremblingly
up to plead before the judge of all the
world !

[SIMON enters.]

N

178 SPRING-TIDE.

Simon. Haw, if ye plaze, zur, it 's o' no
use gwain to the river this marnin" : Measter
Species began to cut the weeds.

S. How do you know that ?

Simon. Dannell Jarvis has jist gone by
and zays he 's a gwain to help un.

J. Will not this put an end to our
sport ?

S. It certainly will, and we may as well
return at once. It would, however, have
become Master Speck better if he had ac-
quainted me with his intention, for I should
have been much annoyed if this had been
your first instead of your last day ; but
your true Angler is proof against disappoint-
ments and uncertainties, and I hope you
will not suffer this to vex you.

J. Not at all ; it comes, perhaps, oppor-
tunely, since it may help to wean me for
a little time from a sport of which I may
grow too fond. You know, too, that I must
return to town to-day.

SIXTH DAY. 1?9

S. I do, and therefore I do not press
you to stay longer, holding to the maxim,

Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest,

though I hope soon to see you again. We
can return by a much shorter way across
these meadows. [They quit the Church.]
Remember, when you have leisure, to pay
your friend, the old Angler, another visit,
and in the interval make yourself acquainted
with that primitive tongue on which our
modern English is based.

J. You may rest assured of my doing
so, and of my coming again the very first
week in which I can slip my neck from the
collar.

S. Do so when you can, and you will
find a hearty welcome. May we meet at
this season many years yet to come ! I
watch you at your sport, and hope at every
cast, when my strength fails and my sight
grows dim ; and if at length I should be

180 SPRING-TIDE.

unable to accompany you to the water-
side, I will look for your return at night-
fall, and hear you recount your success.

J. May that time be yet far distant !

S* But it must come at last. When
it does, let me be prepared. Thank God,
I can contemplate the approach of that state
serenely. Even should sight be obscured,
I shall yet look forward to the approach of
Spring, and be awakened by the matin song
of the swallow on my chimney, and hear

• the yellow banded bees

Through half-opened lattices
Coming in the scented breeze.

Should hearing also fail, I can still feel the
gales of Spring, while the glorious sun will
not disdain to shine upon my grey hairs.
But should this, too, be denied me, I will
not repine ; for, to use the words of one
whose works you must have read — " to be
true and speak my soul, when I survey the
occurrences of my life, and call into account

SIXTH DAY. 181

the finger of God, I can perceive nothing
but an abyss and mass of mercies, either in
general to mankind, or in particular to
myself."

Pray, therefore, for me, my friend, that
my senility may not be altogether a dreary
void ; that some of my faculties may to the
last be left me. Come, then, each Spring,
and see the old man ; lead him to the spot
he loved best when sight was not denied
him ; and there, while you are engaged in
the sport he once loved so much, let him
sit and murmur with the poet: —

" Thank God for memory ! This is the green dell ; —
I hear the rill with music's ripples flowing ;

The scents of flowers recall my childhood well ;
I feel the sun of new-born summer glowing,

And, in my spirit's view I see the stream,

And the bright fish that through the water gleam,

" Thank God for music ! for the pleasant voices
Of boughs and winds and waters as they meet ;

For every bird that in the wood rejoices ;
For every note in Nature's concert sweet ; —

To me the lark's clear carolling on high

Reveals the whole wide, blue, bright summer's sky.

182 SPRING-TIDE.

" Thank God for hope ! that after life's short night,
Cheered by fair dreams and memories, I shall rise

To fields with never-failing verdure bright ;
Unfailing fountains, pure, unclouded skies ;

And see the world which will not pass away,

In the full sunshine of perpetual day!"

[Exeunt from the churchyard.

NOTES.

NOTES,

Page 38.

Devices of Leaders and Captains in the Civil Wars. —
One Roundhead Captain bore for his device a rope
depending from a gallows, and the motto " Win and
wear it ! " Withers, the poet, displayed a sword and
a pen, with " Pro Rege et Grege." Captain Tyrrell, a
Buckinghamshire gentleman, figured an armed horse-
man, riding at full speed into a great fire, and the motto
" Sans craindre" See a long list of similar conceits in
the Supplement to "The Art of making Devices."
London. 4to. 1665.

Page 39.

The May-fly. — Though called the May-fly, every
fly -fisher knows that this insect rarely rises in this
country till June. In the middle of the latter month it
is often seen still at the bottom of streams in the larva
state ; its appearance greatly depends upon the season.
The " Dun," a May-fly in miniature, seems more

186 NOTES.

hardy, and may now and then be observed, on averyjlne
day, as early as the month of March. Their counter-
feit, of different tints, may be had, most beautifully
made, of many of the London tackle-makers.

Page 79.

Linchards, i. e., precipitous slips of land on the hill
side, left untouched by the plough. Anglo-Saxon,
Hlinc, a bank or mound, and Scearib, a piece or portion.
The word Hlinc occurs repeatedly in A. S. Charters,
in which the boundaries of the grant are set out ; thus :
jjonon uri ojieji. beori hlinc. of J?am hlince to }>a' beori^e
to ^Eljiriefeer lanbrcajie : i.e., thence up over the deer-
linch ; from the linch to the hill at Alfred's share of
land, &c.

Page 84.

The Pike. — " Dr. Warwick, a visitor, detailed some
remarkable instances of instinct, or of intelligence, in
animals, which had come under his personal obser-
vation.

" When he resided at Dunham, the seat of the Earl of
Stamford and Warrington, he was walking one evening
in the park, and came to a pond, where fish intended
for the table were temporarily kept. He took particular
notice of a fine pike, of about six pounds weight, which,
when it observed him, darted hastily away. In so
doing, it struck its head against a tenterhook in a post
(of which there were several in the pond, placed to

NOTES. 187

prevent poaching), and as it afterwards appeared, frac-
tured its skull, and turned the optic nerve on one side.
The agony evinced by the animal appeared most hor-
rible. It rushed to the bottom, and, boring its head
into the mud, whirled itself round with such velocity
that it was almost lost to the sight for a short interval.
It then plunged about the pond, and at length threw
itself completely out of the water on the bank. He
(the Doctor) went and examined it, and found that a
very small portion of the brain was protruding from
the fracture in the skull. He carefully replaced this,
and, with a small silver tooth-pick, raised the indented
portion of the skull. The fish remained still for a
short time, and he then put it into the pond again.
It appeared at first a good deal relieved, but in a few
minutes it again darted and plunged about until it
threw itself out of the water a second time. A second
time Dr. Warwick did what he could to relieve it, and
again put it into the water. It continued for several
times to throw itself out of the pond ; and, with the
assistance of the keeper, the doctor at length made a
kind of pillow for the fish, which was then left in the
pond to its fate. Upon making his appearance at the
pond on the following morning, the pike came towards
him to the edge of the pond, and actually laid its head
upon his foot. The doctor thought this very extraordi-
nary, but he examined the fish's skull, and found it
going on all right. He then walked backwards and
forwards along the edge of the pond for some time, and
the fish continued to swim up and down, turning when-

188 NOTES.

ever he turned ; but being blind on the wounded side
of its skull, it always appeared agitated when it had
that side towards the bank as it could not then see its
benefactor. On the next day he took some young
friends down to see the fish, which came to him as
usual ; and at length he actually taught the pike to
come to him at his whistle and feed out of his hands.
With other persons it continued as shy as fish usually
are. He (Dr. Warwick) thought this a most remark-
able instance of gratitude in a fish for a benefit re-
ceived ; and, as it always came at his whistle, it proved
also, what he had previously, with other naturalists,
disbelieved, that fishes are sensible to sound." — Pro-
ceedings of the Literary and Philosophical Society of
Liverpool, No. IV., p. 76. — We give this extraordi-
nary account as we found it, merely remarking that if
the pike tribe is generally endowed with such wonder-
ful sagacity, the knowledge of the fact would go far to
banish the cruel description of angling practised in the
taking of this fish. It certainly does not appear that the
pike preys on anything in sheer wantonness, like the
Salmonidse, and other fish, which often overwhelm and
play with floating insects in sport. As to the hearing
of fishes, as maintained by Dr. Warwick, we doubt the
fact, and would refer the reader to a chapter on this
subject in Mr. Ronalds's beautiful book, " The Fly-
fisher's Entomology ;" nevertheless, we bear constantly
in mind the maxim of Christopher North, that when
near the river-side it is not advisable " to blow your
nose like a bagman, nor tramp up and down the bank

NOTES. 189

like a paving-machine," fishes being, as every angler
must have observed, very sensible of vibration.

Page 116.

Old Grumbleton. — There are several versions of this
story extant, but the reader will doubtless prefer that
we have given instead of the following : —

Owld Grumbler he did vow and zwear

By the lafe that grows on the tree,
That he could do mwore work in one day

Than his wife could do in dree.

Then Grumbler he a vresh bargain would make

That it should be zo now,
That he would be housewife at whoame,

And her zhould gwo to plough.

Then Jane her a vresh bargain would make
That the hens zhould not lay away,

And he zhould reel the spinnin yearn
That her spun yesterday.

Then Jane her tuk the whip in hand,

And away wi' Jack to plough,
And Grumbler tuk the milkin pail,

And away to milk th' owld cow.

190 NOTES.

Owld Colley hunched, and owld Colley vlinched,
And Colley bleowed drough her nose, .

And owld Colley kicked owld Grumbler's zhins
Till the blood rund out ov' his zhoes.

The Grumbler zet the milkin pail down,

And turned hiz zelf about ;
And there stood th' owld zow in the butter churm,

Wi' her two vore vit and sznout.

Then Grumbler tuk th' vire zhovel,

And zwore he 'd pay her hire ;
The owld zow rund 'tween Grumbler's legs,

And d rowed un into th' vire.

Then Grumbler he a grumblin lay,

While the hens did lay away ;
And he vorgot to reel the yearn

As Jane spun yesterday.

Then Grumbler he a grumblin lay,

Till Jane coomed whoame vrom plough ;

And there did stand the milkin pail,
And likewise the owld zow.

Then Grumbler he a vresh bargain 'ould make,

That it should be zo now,
That Jane zhould be housewife at whoame,

And he would gwo to plough.

NOTES. 191

A Wiltshire friend says that he has heard in his hoy-
hood 'a different version from this, of which he remem-
bers but the following lines : —

"Mine's a bad bargain," quoth Grumble,

As the day did pass away ;
" I hav'n't a made my butter and cheese,

Nar gied the pegs their whey !"

Page 163.

The Elder Tree. — " This tree was held in great
veneration by our forefathers," says Grimm ; " when
they had occasion to lop it they repeated this prayer :
1 Frau Ellhorn gib mir was von deinem holz, dan will
ieh dir von meinem auch was geben wann es wachst im
walde.' — Lady Elder, give me some of thy wood, then
will I also give thee some of mine, when it grows in the
forest. This was generally repeated with head unco-
vered, and with folded hands." " In Hildesheim, when
any one dies, the gravedigger goes in silence to an
elder-tree, and cuts a wand to measure the corpse by ;
the man who takes it to the grave does the like, and
holds this wand instead of the usual whip." " Elder
planted before the stall-door preserves the cattle from
magic." — Grimm, Deut. Myth. p. 375, and Anhang,
p. ciii. — See the Glossary to the Ancient Laws and In-
stitutes of England, edited by Benjamin Thorpe, voce
Eller. London. 1840.

192 NOTES.

Page 164.

Dutch Sauce for Salmon and all Freshwater Fish. —
Ingredients : 2 yolks of eggs, a quarter of a pint of
cream, 2<| table -spoonsful of elder vinegar; half a table-
spoonful of anchovy, 1^ ounce of butter ; one Cayenne
spoonful of Cayenne pepper. Make good melted
butter (potato flour is best), whip the yolk and cream
well and add them to it, and let it thicken ; then add
the condiments and take care it does not boil after ', or it
will curdle. The best way is to make an extempore
bain maree by putting the saucepan into a larger one
of boiling water, which keeps the right heat, and will
neither prevent the thickening, nor curdle it with the
acid. The consistency, colour, and appearance should
be that of rich boiled custard.

LONDON:

Printed by S. & J. BENTLET and HENRY FLEY,
Bangor House, Shoe Lane.

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