IZAAK WALTON’S COMPLETE(LY) DONE ANGLER.
Ghost of Piscator. Ghost of Viator.
Viator. Whither away, Master? A good morning to you! I have stretched my legs to catch the train to Tottenham and here I find you with rod and basket, as of old.
Piscator. Faith, Scholar, I have even been too long an angler with Nero, in the lake of darkness, and would fain take a chub, Tottenham way, and see mine old haunts.
Viator. Then have with you, Master; and I do mind me of pretty Maudlin that hereabouts would sing us, “Come, Shepherds, deck your heads!”
Piscator. Ay, Scholar, methinks Maudlin was the Siren that led thee to the River Lea more than all my wisdom. But here we are got to Tottenham, and to the waterside.
Viator. Oh, oh, Master, what place is this, and what smell cometh to my nostrils? See, see, Master, here be no chub, but two dead dogs and one departed cat!
Piscator. In sooth, Scholar, the country seemeth strange, and no man may live, nor fish neither, hard by such an open sewer. Can this be the Lea! Nay, Scholars, this is no place for honest anglers more. But hither walks Corydon. Let us ask him what makes this blackness in the water, and the smell that abides here, as they say frankincense and myrrh do cling, more sweetly, to the shores of the blessed Arabia. What ho, Corydon, what cheer?
Corydon.[54] Sir, the condition of the River Lea is something really fearful. From Tottenham downwards the water is a mere open sewer, emitting the most noxious exhalations. Boating and bathing have ceased, and the River is now only a danger to the neighbourhood.