mind was the habitation of piety, prudence, humility, peace, and cheerfulness, could delineate such a character as that of the principal interlocutor in this dialogue; and make him reason, contemplate, instruct, converse, jest, sing, and recite verses, with that sober pleasantry, that unlicentious hilarity, that Piscator does? and this, too, at a time when the whole kingdom was in arms, and confusion and desolation were carried to an extreme sufficient to have excited such a resentment against the authors of them, as might have soured the best temper, and rendered it, in no small degree, unfit for social inter

course.

If it should be objected, that what is here said may be equally true of an indolent man, or of a mind insensible to all outward accidents, and devoted to its own ease aud gratification; to this it may be answered, that the person here spoken of was not such a man. On the contrary, in sundry views of his character, he appears to have been endowed both with activity and industry; an industrious tradesman; industrious in collecting biographical memoirs and historical facts, and in rescuing from oblivion the memory and writings of many of his learned friends; and, surely, against the suspicion of insensibility he must stand acquitted, who ap pears to have had the strongest attachments, that could consist with Christian charity, both to opinions and men; to episcopacy, to the doctrines, discipline, and the liturgy of the established church h; and to those divines and others that favored the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of this country,

the subversion whereof it was his misfortune both to see and feel. Seeing, therefore, that amidst the public calamities, and in a state of exile from that city where the earliest and dearest of his connexions had been formed, he was thus capable of enjoying himself in the manner he appears to have done; patiently submitting to those evils which he could not prevent, we must pronounce him to have been an illustrious exemplar of the private and social virtues, and upon the whole a wise and good

man.

To these remarks, respecting the moral qualities of Walton, I add, that his mental endowments were so considerable as to merit notice. It is true, that his stock of learning, properly so called, was not great; yet were his attainments in literature far beyond what could be expected from a man bred to trade, and not to a learned profession; for let it be remembered, that, besides being well versed in the study of the holy Scriptures and the writings of the most eminent divines of his time, he appears to have been well acquainted with history, ecclesiastical, civil, and natural; to have acquired a very correct judgment in poetry; and by phrases of his own combination and invention, to have formed a style so natural, intelligible, and elegant, as to have had more admirers than successful imitators.

And although in the prosecution of his design to teach the contemplative man the art of angling, there is a plainness and simplicity of discourse, that indicates little more than bare instruction, yet is there intermingled with it wit and gentle reprehen

sion; and we may in some instances discover, that though he professes himself no friend to scoffing, he knew very well how to deal with scoffers, and to defend his art, as we see he does, against such as attempted to degrade it; and particularly against those two persons in the dialogue, Auceps and Venator, who affected to fear a long and watery discourse in defence of his art; the former of whom he puts to silence, and the other he converts and takes for his pupil.

What reception in general the book met with may be naturally inferred from the dates of the subsequent editions thereof; the second came abroad in 1655, the third in 1664, the fourth in 1688, and the fifth and last in 1676. It is pleasing to trace the several variations which the author, from time to time, made in these subsequent editions, as well by adding new facts and discoveries, as by enlarging on the more entertaining parts of the dialogue. And so far did he indulge himself in this method of improvement, that, besides that in the second edition, he has introduced a new interlocutor, to wit, Auceps, a falconer, and by that addition gives a new form to the dialogue; he from thence takes occasion to urge a variety of reasons in favor of his art, and to assert its preference as well to hawking as hunting. The third and fourth editions of his book have several entire new chapters; and the fifth, the last of the editions published in his lifetime, contains no less than eight chapters more than the first, and twenty pages more than the fourth.

f

Not having the advantage of a learned education, it may seem unaccountable that Walton so frequently cites authors that have written only in Latin, as Gesner, Cardan, Aldrovandus, Rondeletius, and even Albertus Magnus; but here it may be observed, that the voluminous history of animals, of which the first of these was author, is in effect translated into English by Mr. Edward Topsel, a learned divine, chaplain, as it seems, in the church of St. Botolph, Aldersgate, to Dr. Neile, dean of Westminster. The translation was published in 1658, and, containing in it numberless particulars concerning frogs, serpents, caterpillars, and other animals, though not of fish, extracted from the other writers abovenamed, and others with their names to the respective facts, it furnishes Walton with a great variety of intelligence, of which, in the later editions of his book, he has carefully availed himself. It was therefore through the medium of this translation alone, that he was enabled to cite the other authors mentioned above; vouching the authority of the original writers, in like manner as he elsewhere does Sir Francis Bacon, whenever occasion occurs to mention his Natural History, or any other of his works. Pliny was translated to his hand by Dr. Philemon Holland, as were also Janus Dubravius "De Piscinis et Piscium Naturâ," and Lebault's "Maison Rustique," so often referred to by him in the course of his work.

Nor did the reputation of "The Complete Angler" subsist only in the opinion of those for whose use it was more peculiarly calculated; but even the learn

ed, either from the known character of the author, or those internal evidences of judgment and veracity contained in it, considered it as a work of merit, and for various purposes referred to its authority. Dr. Thomas Fuller, in his "Worthies," whenever he has occasion to speak of fish, uses his very words. Dr. Plot, in his "History of Staffordshire," has, on the authority of our author, related two of the instances of the voracity of the Pike, mentioned Part I. Chapter 8; and confirmed them by two other signal ones, that had then iately fallen out in that county.

These are testimonies in favor of Walton's authority in matters respecting fish and fishing. And it will hardly be thought a diminution of that of Fuller, to say, that he was acquainted with, and a friend of, the person whom he thus implicitly commends; a fact which the relation of a conference between them sufficiently proves.

"The Complete Angler" having, in the space of twenty-three years, gone through four editions, Walton, in the year 1676, and in the eighty-third of his age, was preparing a fifth, with additions, for the press; when Mr. Cotton wrote a second part of that work. It seems Mr. Cotton submitted the manuscript to Walton's perusal, who returned it with his approbation, and a few marginal strictures: and in that year they came abroad together. Mr. Cotton's book had the title of "The Complete Angler; being Instructions how to angle for a Trout or Grayling, in a clear stream; Part II." and it has ever since been received as a Second Part of Walton's