CURRENT LITERATURE.
Notes on Fish and Fishing. By J. J. Manley, M.A. (Sampson Low and Co.)—Mr. Manley has the groat qualification, for a writer on angling, of largo tastes. Some authors aro so manifestly condescending, and even contemptuous, when they speak of anything but salmon and trout-fishing, that the ordinary reader is disgusted. For after all, trout-fishing is like a visit to Corinth,—non cuivis contingit. How can it bo otherwise, when there is no unproserved trout-fishing south of the Trent ? Mr. Manley has of course his likings. Salmon-fishing he very wisely leaves alone. It is too large a subject for his space. But he loves, it is clear, trout-fishing, and we should guess, especially trout- fishing in Devonshire. But in another important branch of the art of angling, Thames-fishing, he is equally at home. Indeed, he speaks of it with a certain enthusiasm which only those who know that river well can understand, and with which those who do know it will heartily sympathise. Mr. Manley does not profess, he says in his preface, to give " methodical instruction " to anglers, but lie supplies, notwithstanding, some valuable hints. When we come to the details of his book, we find ourselves with only too much to say. For we, too, have been in Arcadia. He speculates, for instance, on the decrease in the number of gudgeon, and thinks that it is a "puzzle" how to account for it. Yet surely, from what he knows of the history of the Thames during the last few years, he ought to be able to explain it. Of course, the decrease comes from the increase of the pike and perch, which are now protected by the removal of the nets and by the fence-months. An in- stance occurs at the moment. Twenty years ago, the writer, with one friend, without a fisherman, caught in a September day thirty-five dozen gudgeon, near Maple-Durham. But then the river was netted so close that he did not see a perch or a pike during a week's fishing. However, we must not allow ourselves, with a thousand volumes of theology, history, are, crying out for space, to gossip on delightful topics of this kind. Let us thank Mr. Manley for a charming volume, which only wants to be rid of a few little blemishes of careless- ness. We do not know whether Mr. Manley is a divine, but a layman's Scripture knowledge might have sufficed to prevent him from saying that it was the "money-loving prophet " who looked for a " recompense of reward." Ferae naturae is not the Latin equivalent for " wild animals," but wild animals are said to be ferae naturae,—i.e., of a wild nature. "Dulcidine "is possibly due to the printer, but the quotation,
" Veterunt multi ante agamamtiona,"
scarcely shows that fine feeling for the niceties of the Alcaio metre which Mr. Manley doubtless possessed in earlier days.
Previous page
