Cor. Then lets meet here, for here are fresh sheets that smel of Lavender, and, I am sure, we cannot expect better meat and better usage.
Pet. 'Tis a match. Good night to every body.
Pisc. And so say I.
Viat. And so say I.
Pisc. Good morrow good Hostis, I see my brother Peter is in bed still; Come, give my Scholer and me a cup of Ale, and be sure you get us a good dish of meat against supper, for we shall come hither as hungry as Hawks. Come Scholer, lets be going.
Viat. Good Master, as we walk towards the water, wil you be pleased to make the way seeme shorter by telling me first the nature of the Trout, and then how to catch him.
Pisc. My honest Scholer, I wil do it freely: The Trout (for which I love to angle above any fish) may be justly said (as the ancient Poets say of Wine, and we English say of Venson) to be a generous fish, because he has his seasons, a fish that comes in, and goes out with the Stag or Buck: and you are to observe, that as there be some barren Does, that are good in Summer; so there be some barren Trouts, that are good in Winter; but there are not many that are so, for usually they be in their perfection in the month of May, and decline with the Buck: Now you are to take notice, that in several Countries, as in Germany and in other parts compar'd to ours, they differ much in their bigness, shape, and other wayes, and so do Trouts; 'tis wel known that in the Lake Lemon, the Lake of Geneva, there are Trouts taken, of three Cubits long, as is affirmed by Gesner, a Writer of good credit: and Mercator sayes, the Trouts that are taken in the Lake of Geneva, are a great part of the Merchandize of that famous City. And you are further to know, that there be certaine waters that breed Trouts remarkable, both for their number and smalness—I know a little Brook in Kent that breeds them to a number incredible, and you may take them twentie or fortie in an hour, but none greater then about the size of a Gudgion. There are also in divers Rivers, especially that relate to, or be near to the Sea, (as Winchester, or the Thames about Windsor) a little Trout called a Samlet or Skegger Trout (in both which places I have caught twentie or fortie at a standing) that will bite as fast and as freely as Minnows; these be by some taken to be young Salmons, but in those waters they never grow to bee bigger then a Herring.
There is also in Kent, neer to Canterbury, a Trout (called there a Fordig Trout) a Trout (that bears the name of the Town where 'tis usually caught) that is accounted rare meat, many of them near the bigness of a Salmon, but knowne by their different colour, and in their best season cut very white; and none have been known to be caught with an Angle, unless it were one that was caught by honest Sir George Hastings, an excellent Angler (and now with God) and he has told me, he thought that Trout bit not for hunger, but wantonness; and 'tis the rather to be believed, because both he then, and many others before him have been curious to search into their bellies what the food was by which they lived; and have found out nothing by which they might satisfie their curiositie.
Concerning which you are to take notice, that it is reported, there is a fish that hath not any mouth, but lives by taking breath by the porinss of her gils, and feeds and is nourish'd by no man knows what; and this may be believed of the Fordig Trout, which (as it is said of the Stork, that he knowes his season, so he) knows his times (I think almost his day) of coming into that River out of the Sea, where he lives (and it is like feeds) nine months of the year, and about three in the River of Fordig.