6 The older man allowed the younger to address him familiarly as Father', and to call himself his adopted son, though the latter title is probably not to be understood in a strict sense, for Walton, by his will, left him nothing but a mourning ring. It was rather the appropriate expression of Cotton's reverent affection for one whose character could not but evoke such a feeling. On several occasions Cotton addressed poems to his friend, including an undated invitation to Beresford Hall. The fishing-house on the Dove, mentioned on p. 276, which bore over the door the combined initials of the friends, was built by Cotton in 1674. Within it, on the doors of the buffet, were painted their portraits, with a serving boy in attendance. In a letter to Walton, written on March 10, 1676, Cotton reminds him that some years before he had given him leave to write an appendix to his Angler, on the taking of trout. These directions, which he forwards, had appeared', he writes, 'in something a neater dress, but that I was surprised with the sudden news of a sudden new edition of your Compleat Angler ; so that, having but a little more than ten days' time to turn me in, and rub up my memory (for, in truth, I have not, in all this long time, [done so,] though I have often thought on't, and almost as often resolved to go presently about it), I was forced, upon the instant, to scribble what I here present you: which I have also endeavoured to accommodate to your own method. And, if mine be clear enough for the honest Brothers of the Angle readily to understand, (which is the only thing I aim at,) then I have my end; and shall need to make no further apology; a writing of this kind not requiring if I were master of any such thing, any eloquence to set it off, or recommend it.' It appears from this letter that Cotton's little treatise 1 was written in haste, and that his aim was severely practical, viz. to write a plain, unadorned manual for the trout-fisher. He eschewed such ornament as had given a literary flavour to Walton's treatise, except in so far as he accommodated his method to that of his predecessor by adopting the dialogue form and introducing a little introductory banter and occasional conversation. There are here no lyrics, no quaint folk-lore, scarcely any devout reflections or descriptions of nature; in short, the second part is, except to the angler, comparatively bald and dry. But if it is less literary and human than the first part, it marks a distinct advance towards the modern standard of a manual. R. B. Marston, an authority on angling, observes: 'Cotton was an accomplished angler in the highest branches of the art; his instructions are so clear and practical that it is quite certain he wrote from personal experience, and in this respect his work is more original than some of the practical parts of Walton's. . . . Many of his instructions have been but little improved upon, even to the present day.'1 Indeed, Cotton's treatise belongs to an age of narrowing imagination and of increasing specialization and efficiency, essentially an age of prose; while Walton's is a belated monument of the old, romantic, leisurely England that had passed away in the Puritan Revolution, that old England in which it was still possible to invest an angler's manual with a wayward air of delicate poetry, the perennial fragrance of which will preserve the book from oblivion. A. B. GOUGH. 1 Walton and some earlier Writers on Fish, 1894, p. 153. PART. I. BEING A DISCOURSE O F Rivers, Fish-ponds, Fish & Fishing. Written by IZAAK WALTON. The Fifth Edition, much corrected and enlarged. London, Printed for R. Marriot, and are to be Sold by To the Right worshipful SIR, My most honoured Friend. I HAVE made so ill use of your former favours, as by them to be encouraged to entreat that they may be enlarged to the patronage and protection of this Book and I have put on a modest confidence, that I shall not be denied, because it is a discourse of Fish and Fishing, which you know so well, and both love and practise so much. You are assured (though there be ignorant men of another belief) that Angling is an Art; and you know that Art better than others; and that this is truth is demonstrated by the fruits of that pleasant labour which you enjoy, when you purpose to give rest to your mind, and divest yourself of your more serious business, and (which is often) dedicate a day or two to this recreation. At which time, if common Anglers should attend you, and be eye-witnesses of the success, not of your fortune but your skill, it would doubtless beget in them an emulation to be like you, and that emulation might beget an industrious diligence to be so; but I know it is not attainable by common capacities. And there be now many men of great wisdom, B ? |