PREFACE
"Don't give up if you don't catch fish; the unsuccessful trip should whet your appetite to try again."—Grover Cleveland.
A preface is either an excuse or an explanation, or both. The Brook Trout needs no excuse, and it is fully explained in the general text of this volume. Nor does the Angler, be he Determined or otherwise, need any excuse, because "our Saviour chose simple fishermen ... St. Peter, St. John, St. Andrew, and St. James, whom he inspired, and He never reproved these for their employment or calling" (Izaak Walton, The Compleat Angler, 1653). And the Angler—the man—needs no explanation, though it seems ever necessary to define the word.
Webster, himself a profound Angler, must have been unconscious of his gentle bearing, for his definition of "angle" is simply: "to fish," and every Angler knows that merely to fish—to go forth indifferent of correct (humane) tackle, the legal season, and ethical methods in the pursuit—is not the way of the Angler.
I like the explanation of the word by Genio C. Scott: "Angling, a special kind of fishing."
The inspired landscape genius and the kalsominer who shellacs the artist's studio are both painters; so, the gentle Angler with perfect tackle and the mere hand-line fish taker are both fishermen.
The Angler is the highest order of fisherman, and while all Anglers are fishermen there are many fishermen who are not Anglers.
"Anglo-Saxon," writing in the New York Press. October 14, 1915, uses the term "gentleman Anglers." He should have said "gentleman fishermen" (Anglers), because all Anglers are gentlemen, regardless of their business calling, appearance, personality, companionship, etc. When a man, fisherman or no fisherman, develops into an Angler he must first become gentle in order to be of the gentle art. "Angling is the gentle art" (Walton). "The gentle art of angling" (Cotton).
"If true Anglers," says Genio C. Scott, "you are sure to be gentle."