The last sort of dogs consisteth of the currish kind meet for many toys, of which the whappet or prick-eared cur is one. Some men call them warners, because they are good for nothing else but to bark and give warning when anybody doth stir or lie in wait about the house in the night season. Certes it is impossible to describe these curs in any order, because they have no one kind proper unto themselves, but are a confused company mixed of all the rest. The second sort of them are called turnspits, whose office is not unknown to any. And as these are only reserved for this purpose, so in many places our mastiffs (beside the use which tinkers have of them in carrying their heavy budgets) are made to draw water in great wheels out of deep wells, going much like unto those which are framed for our turnspits, as is to be seen at Roiston, where this feat is often practised. Besides these also we have sholts or curs daily brought out of Ireland, and made much of among us, because of their sauciness and quarrelling. Moreover they bite very sore, and love candles exceedingly, as do the men and women of their country: but I may say no more of them, because they are not bred with us. Yet this will I make report of by the way, for pastime’s sake, that when a great man of those parts came of late into one of our ships which went thither for fish, to see the form and fashion of the same, his wife apparelled in fine sables, abiding on the deck whilst her husband was under the hatches with the mariners, espied a pound or two of candles hanging on the mast, and being loath to stand there idle alone, she fell to and eat them up every one, supposing herself to have been at a jolly banquet, and shewing very pleasant gesture when her husband came up again unto her.
The last kind of toyish curs are named dancers, and those being of a mongrel sort also, are taught and exercised to dance in measure at the musical sound of an instrument, as at the just stroke of a drum, sweet accent of the citharne, and pleasant harmony of the harp, shewing many tricks by the gesture of their bodies: as to stand bolt upright, to lie flat on the ground, to turn round as a ring holding their tails in their teeth, to saw and beg for meat, to take a man’s cap from his head, and sundry such properties, which they learn of their idle roguish masters, whose instruments they are to gather gain, as old apes clothed in motley and coloured short-waisted jackets are for the like vagabonds, who seek no better living than that which they may get by fond pastime and idleness. I might here intreat of other dogs, as of those which are bred between a bitch and a wolf, also between a bitch and a fox, or a bear and a mastiff. But as we utterly want the first sort, except they be brought unto us: so it happeneth sometime that the other two are engendered and seen at home amongst us. But all the rest heretofore remembered in this chapter there is none more ugly and odious in sight, cruel and fierce in deed, nor untractable in hand, than that which is begotten between the bear and the bandog. For whatsoever he catcheth hold of he taketh it so fast that a man may sooner tear and rend his body in sunder than get open his mouth to separate his chaps. Certes he regardeth neither wolf, bear, nor lion, and therefore may well be compared with those two dogs which were sent to Alexander out of India (and procreated as it is thought between a mastiff and a male tiger, as be those also of Hircania), or to them that are bred in Archadia, where copulation is oft seen between lions and bitches, as the lion is in France (as I said) between she wolves and dogs, whereof let this suffice, sith the further tractation of them doth not concern my purpose, more than the confutation of Cardan’s talk, De subt., lib. 10, who saith that after many generations dogs do become wolves, and contrariwise, which if it were true, then could not England be without many wolves: but nature hath set a difference between them, not only in outward form, but also in inward disposition of their bones, whereof it is impossible that his assertion can be sound.
CHAPTER XVII.
OF FISH USUALLY TAKEN UPON OUR COASTS.
[1577, Book III., Chapter 10; 1587, Book III., Chapter 3.]
I have in my description of waters, as occasion hath served, treated of the names of some of the several fishes which are commonly to be found in our rivers. Nevertheless, as every water hath a sundry mixture, and therefore is not stored with every kind, so there is almost no house, even of the meanest boors, which hath not one or more ponds or holes made for reservation of water unstored with some of them, as with tench, carp, bream, roach, dace, eels, or such like as will live and breed together. Certes it is not possible for me to deliver the names of all such kinds of fishes as our rivers are found to bear; yet, lest I should seem injurious to the reader in not delivering as many of them as have been brought to my knowledge, I will not let to set them down as they do come to mind. Besides the salmon therefore, which are not to be taken from the middest of September to the middest of November, and are very plentiful in our greatest rivers, as their young store are not to be touched from mid April unto Midsummer, we gave the trout, barbel, graile, pout, cheven, pike, gudgeon, smelt, perch, menan, shrimps, crevises, lampreys, and such like, whose preservation is provided for by very sharp laws, not only in our rivers, but also in plashes or lakes and ponds, which otherwise would bring small profit to the owners, and do much harm by continual maintenance of idle persons, who would spend their whole time upon their banks, not coveting to labour with their hands nor follow any good trade. Of all these there are none more prejudicial to their neighbours that dwell in the same water than the pike and eel, which commonly devour such fish or fry and spawn as they may get and come by. Nevertheless the pike is friend unto the tench, as to his leech and surgeon. For when the fishmonger hath opened his side and laid out his rivet and fat unto the buyer, for the better utterance of his ware, and cannot make him away at that present, he layeth the same again into the proper place, and sewing up the wound, he restoreth him to the pond where tenches are, who never cease to suck and lick his grieved place, till they have restored him to health, and made him ready to come again to the stall, when his turn shall come about. I might here make report how the pike, carp, and some other of our river fishes are sold by inches of clean fish, from the eyes or gills to the crotch of the tails, but it is needless: also how the pike as he ageth receiveth divers names, as from a fry to a gilthead, from a gilthead to a pod, from a pod to a jack, from a jack to a pickerel, from a pickerel to a pike, and last of all to a luce; also that a salmon is the first year a gravellin, and commonly as big as a herring, the second a salmon peal, the third a pug, and the fourth a salmon: but this is in like sort unnecessary.
I might finally tell you how that in fenny rivers’ sides, if you cut a turf, and lay it with the grass downwards upon the earth in such sort as the water may touch it as it passeth by, you shall have a brood of eels. It would seem a wonder; and yet it is believed with no less assurance by some, that than a horse hair laid in a pail full of the like water will in a short time stir and become a living creature. But sith the certainty of these things is rather proved by few than the certainty of them known unto many, I let it pass at this time. Nevertheless this is generally observed in the maintenance of fry as well in rivers as in ponds, that in the time of spawn we use to throw in faggots made of willow and sallow (and now and then of bushes for want of the other), whereby such spawn as falleth into the same is preserved and kept from the pike, perch, eel, and other fish, of which the carp also will feed upon his own, and thereby hinder the store and increase of proper kind. Some use in every sixth or seventh year to lay their great ponds dry for all the summer time, to the end they may gather grass, and a thin swart for the fish to feed upon; and afterwards store them with breeders, after the water be let anew again into them. Finally, when they have spawned, they draw out the breeders, leaving not above four or six behind, even in the greatest ponds, by means whereof the rest do prosper the better: and this observation is most used in carp and bream. As for perch (a delicate fish), it prospereth everywhere, I mean so well in ponds as rivers, and also in moats and pits, as I do know by experience, though their bottoms be but clay. More would I write of our fresh fish, if any more were needful: wherefore I will now turn over unto such of the salt water as are taken upon our coasts. As our fowls therefore have their seasons, so likewise have all our sorts of sea fish: whereby it cometh to pass that none, or at least very few of them, are to be had at all times. Nevertheless the seas that environ our coasts are of all other most plentiful; for as by reason of their depth they are a great succour, so our low shores minister great plenty of food unto the fish that come thereto, no place being void or barren, either through want of food for them or the falls of filthy rivers, which naturally annoy them. In December therefore and January we commonly abound in herring and red fish, as rochet and gurnard. In February and March we feed on plaice, trouts, turbot, mussels, etc. In April and May, with mackerel and cockles. In June and July, with conger. In August and September, with haddock and herring: and the two months ensuing with the same, as also thornback and ray of all sorts: all which are the most usual, and wherewith our common sort are best of all refreshed.
For mine own part, I am greatly acquainted neither with the seasons, nor yet with the fish itself: and therefore, if I should take upon me to describe or speak of either of them absolutely, I should enterprise more than I am able to perform, and go in hand with a greater matter than I can well bring about. It shall suffice therefore to declare what sorts of fishes I have most often seen, to the end I may not altogether pass over this chapter without the rehearsal of something, although the whole sum of that which I have to say be nothing indeed, if the performance of a full discourse hereof be anything hardly required.