thread: the tail and fins were of a quill, which was shaven thin the eyes were of two little black beads: and the head was so shadowed, and all of it so curiously wrought, and so exactly dissembled, that it would beguile any sharpsighted Trout in a swift stream. And this minnow I will now shew you, (look, here it is,) and, if you like it, lend it you, to have two or three made by it; for they be easily carried about an angler, and be of excellent use: for note, that a large Trout will come as fiercely at a minnow as the highest-mettled hawk doth seize on a partridge, or a greyhound on a hare. I have been told that 160 minnows have been found in a Trout's belly: either the Trout had devoured so many, or the miller that gave it a friend of mine had forced them down his throat after he had taken him.

Now for Flies; which is the third bait wherewith Trouts are usually taken. You are to know, that there are so many sorts of flies as there be of fruits: I will name you but some of them; as the dun-fly, the stone-fly, the redfly, the moor-fly, the tawney-fly, the shell-fly, the cloudy or blackish-fly, the flag-fly, the vine-fly: there be of flies, caterpillars, and canker-flies, and bear-flies; and indeed too many either for me to name, or for you to remember. And their breeding is so various and wonderful, that I might easily amaze myself, and tire you in a relation

of them.

And, yet, I will exercise your promised patience by saying a little of the caterpillar, or the palmer-fly or worm; that by them you may guess what a work it were, in a discourse, but to run over those very many flies, worms, and little living creatures, with which the sun and summer adorn and beautify the river-banks and meadows, both for the recreation and contemplation of us anglers; pleasures which, I think, myself enjoy more than any other man that is not of my profession.

Pliny holds an opinion, that many have their birth, or

In his History

of Serpents.

being, from a dew that in the spring falls upon the leaves of trees; and that some kinds of them are from a dew left upon herbs or flowers; and others, from a dew left upon coleworts or cabbages: all which kinds of dews being thickened and condensed, are by the sun's generative heat, most of them, hatched, and in three days made living creatures:' and these of several shapes and colours; some being hard and tough, some smooth and are horned in their head, some in their tail, some have soft; some none; some have hair, some none: some have sixteen feet, some less, and some have none: but (as our Topsel hath with great diligence observed) those which have none, move upon the earth, or upon broad leaves, their motion being not unlike to the waves of the sea. Some of them he also observes to be bred of the eggs of other caterpillars, and that those in their time turn to be butterflies; and again, that their eggs turn the following year to be caterpillars. And some affirm, that every plant has its particular fly or caterpillar, which it breeds and feeds. I have seen, and may therefore affirm it, a green caterpillar, or worm, as big as a small peascod, which had fourteen legs; eight on the belly, four under the neck, and two near the tail. It was found on a hedge of privet; and was taken thence, and put into a large box, and a little branch or two of privet put to it, on which I saw it feed as sharply as a dog knaws a bone: it lived thus, five or six days, and thrived, and changed the colour two or three

(1) The doctrine of spontaneous or equivocal generation is now universally exploded; and all the phænomena that seem to support it are accounted for on other principles. See Derham's Phys. Theol. Chap. 15, and the authorities there cited. As also Mr. Ray's Wisdom of God manifested in the works of the Creation, 298, and Franc. Redi, De Gen. Insect.

(2) Whoever is desirous of knowing more of Caterpillars, and of the several flies produced by them, may consult Joannes Goedartius De Insectis, with the Appendix of Dr, Lister, Lond. 8vo. 1685.

times, but by some neglect in the keeper of it, it then died, and did not turn to a fly: but if it had lived, it had doubtless turned to one of those flies that some call Flies of prey, which those that walk by the rivers may, in Summer, see fasten on smaller flies, and, I think, make them their food. And 'tis observable, that as there be these Flies of Prey, which be very large; so there be others, very little, created, I think, only to feed them, and breed out of I know not what; whose life, they say, nature intended not to exceed an hour;1 and yet that life is thus made shorter by other flies, or by accident.

(1) That there are creatures "whose life nature intended not to exceed an hour," is, I believe, not so well agreed, as that there are some whose existence is determined in five or six. It is well known that the Ephemeron, that wonderful instance of the care and providence of God, lives but from six in the evening till about eleven at night; during which time it performs all the animal functions; for, in the beginning of its life, it sheds its coat; and that being done, and the poor little animal thereby rendered light and agile, it spends the rest of its short time in frisking over the waters: the female drops her eggs, which are impregnated by the male; these, being spread about, descend to the bottom by their own gravity, and are hatched by the warmth of the sun into little worms, which make themselves cases in the clay, and feed on the same without any need of parental care. Vide Ephem. Vita, translated by Dr. Tysson, from Swammerdam. See also Derham's Phys. Theol. 247.

And to the truth of the assertion, that these short-lived animals shed their coats, I myself am a witness; for, being a fishing one summer evening, at about seven o'clock, I suddenly observed my cloaths covered with a number of very small flies, of a whitish colour inclining to blue; they continued fixed while I observed those on my left arm wriggle their bodies about, till at length they disengaged themselves from their external coat, which they left, and flew away; but what greatly astonished me was, that three whisks which each of these creatures had at its tail, which were slenderer than the finest hair, and, but for their whiteness, would have been scarcely perceptible, were left as entire and unbroken as the less tender parts of the coat.

At the time when I was preparing for the press the first edition of this book, I met (in a book entitled The Art of Angling improved in all its parts, especially Fly-fishing, 12mo. Worcester, no date, by Richard Bowlker) with a relation similar to this; which the author says was communicated to him by a gentleman, an accurate observer of nature's productions; and giving credit to the assertion, I inserted it as an extract from his book; but I have since discovered that the same had been communicated to the Royal Society by Mr. Peter Collinson, a London tradesman, well known among botanists and collectors of natural curiosities, in a Letter to their secretary, which was read the 21st of January, 1744 5, and is printed in the Philosophical Transactions for the year 1746, Numb. 481, page 329.

The letter is miserably written; and, in respect of the style, so ungrammatical, and otherwise obscure, as to need such interpolations as are here inserted, to render it in any degree intelligible.