And now let's go and see what interest the trouts will pay us for letting our angle-rods lie so long and so quietly in the water for their use. Come, scholar, which will you take up?

VENATOR

Which you think fit, master.

PISCATOR

Why, you shall take up that; for I am certain, by viewing the line, it has a fish at it. Look you, scholar! well done! Come, now take up the other too. Well! now you may tell my brother Peter, at night, that you have caught a leash of trouts this day. And now let's move towards our lodging, and drink a draught of red-cow's milk as we go; and give pretty Maudlin and her honest mother a brace of trouts for their supper.

VENATOR

Master, I like your motion very well, and I think it is now about milking-time; and yonder they be at it.

PISCATOR

God speed you, good woman! I thank you both for our songs last night. I and my companion have had such fortune a-fishing this day,

that we resolve to give you and Maudlin a brace of trouts for supper; and we will now taste a draught of your red-cow's milk.

MILK-WOMAN

Marry, and that you shall, with all my heart; and I will be still your debtor when you come this way. If you will but speak the word, I will make you a good syllabub of new verjuice; and then you may sit down in a haycock, and eat it; and Maudlin shall sit by and sing you the good old song of the "Hunting in Chevy Chace," or some other good ballad, for she hath store of them. Maudlin, my honest Maudlin, hath a notable memory, and she thinks nothing too good for you, because you be such honest men.

We thank you;

VENATOR

and intend once in a month to call upon you again, and give you a little warning; and so, good-night. Good-night, Maudlin. And now, good master, let's lose no time, but tell me somewhat more of fishing; and if you please, first, something of fishing for a gudgeon.

PISCATOR

I will, honest scholar.

CHAPTER XV

Observations of the Gudgeon, the Ruffe,
and the Bleak, and how to Fish for them

THE gudgeon is reputed a fish of excellent

taste, and to be very wholesome. He is of a fine shape, of a silver colour, and beautified with black spots both on his body and tail. He breeds two or three times in the year, and always in summer. He is commended for a fish of excellent nourishment. The Germans call him groundling, by reason of his feeding on the ground; and he there feasts himself in sharp streams and on the gravel. He and the barbel both feed so, and do not hunt for flies at any time, as most other fishes do. He is an excellent fish to enter a young angler, being easy to be taken with a small red worm, on or very near to the ground. He is one of those leather-mouthed fish that has his teeth in his throat, and will hardly be lost off from the hook if he be once struck. They be usually scattered up and down every river in the shallows, in the heat of summer; but in autumn, when the weeds begin to grow sour and rot, and the weather colder, then they gather together,

and get into the deeper parts of the water, and are to be fished for there, with your hook always touching the ground, if you fish for him with a float or with a cork. But many will fish for the gudgeon by hand, with a running line upon the ground, without a cork, as a trout is fished for; and it is an excellent way, if you have a gentle rod, and as gentle a hand.

There is also another fish called a pope, and by some a ruffe; a fish that is not known to be in some rivers. He is much like the perch for his shape, and taken to be better than the perch, but will not grow to be bigger than a gudgeon. He is an excellent fish; no fish that swims is of a pleasanter taste. And he is also excellent to enter a young angler, for he is a greedy biter; and they will usually lie, abundance of them together, in one reserved place, where the water is deep and runs quietly; and an easy angler, if he has found where they lie, may catch forty or fifty, or sometimes twice so many, at a standing.

You must fish for him with a small red worm; and if you bait the ground with earth, it is excellent.

There is also a bleak, or fresh-water sprat, a fish that is ever in motion, and therefore called by some the river-swallow; for just as you shall observe the swallow to be, most evenings in summer, ever in motion, making short and quick turns when he flies to catch flies, in the air, by which he lives, so does the bleak at the top of the water. Ausonius would have him called bleak from his whitish colour; his back is of a pleasant sad or sea-water green, his belly white and shining as the mountain snow. And doubtless, though he have the fortune, which virtue has in poor people, to be neglected, yet the bleak ought to be much valued, though we want Allamot salt, and the skill that the Italians have, to turn them into anchovies. This fish may be caught with a Paternoster line: that is, six or eight very small hooks tied along the line, one half a foot above the other. I have seen five caught thus at one time, and the bait has been gentles, than which none is better.

Or this fish may be caught with a fine small artificial fly, which is to be of a very sad brown colour, and very small, and the hook answerable. There is no better sport than whipping for bleaks