The eel, swift-gliding thro' the wat'ry plain,
Devours the fry, and smaller finny train,

And smelts, and gudgeons, seek the shore in vain.
In bulk with years while other fishes rise,
Why gudgeons, loach, and smelts are small in size,
And still the old continue dwarfs, relate
The rise, ye Muses, of the minim state.
Where, with a tardy current, near the sea,
The Po in slow meanders takes its way,
A band of children on the borders stood,
Engag'd in play, and in the silver flood
Threw stones, which, sliding on the wat'ry plain,
Now seem to sink and now emerge again.
Beneath the stream the sisters of the sea

Then list'ning sat to Clio's tales, whom she
Amused with amours of absent Ephiré.
When Ægle first the dashing pebbles heard,
She at the surface of the stream appear'd,
Enjoin'd the boys to leave the river's side,
And added threats; they bold her threats defy'd,
And casting impious stones, in scorn they cry;
"Lo, thus to your complainings, we reply!"
Ægle affrighted soon return'd again,

And filling with her shrieks the wat'ry plain;
"Ye gods shall this audacious crew," she cries,
"Who me with taunting words and stones defies,
Escape unhurt? shall youth their crime excuse?
No age unpunish'd must the gods abuse!

Call then a monster from the neighb'ring main,
To wreak our vengeance on the impious train."
She said, and Ocean to the sisters gave

A dreadful form, which rose above the wave.
The boys beheld and trembled at the sight,
And try'd to fly, but fear arrests their flight;
Breathless they fell, their limbs the monster tore,
And in the river cast 'em from the shore;

}

}

Then

Then shook his head, and in the silver flood
Wip'd from his dropping jaws the streaming blood.
The nymphs the slaughter saw and heard the cries,
And feasted with revenge their eager eyes.
What female heart but may by youth be gain'd?
And beauty in the boys that still remain'd
Like a fair flow'r which yielding to the share
Reclines its drooping head, but still continues fair.
How credulous is Love!* they see the shore
O'erspread with bodies, all besmear'd with gore,
Yet hope by fear they fell, and signs of life explore;

Their

• Flecknoe, in the character of a young female enamorist, says, "it is with lovers as it is with anglers, who feed fishes till they are caught, but caught once, feed on them; so it will be long enough ere she bite at the bait, unless he has more to bait her with than fine words or lamentable complinients." Upon the subject of love the angler's muse seldom drags a simile from the tackle; or floats the lines in a stream of sorrow to bait a barbed hook with a gentle heart. Turbervile introduces an allusion to the art, where he writes in "disprayse of Women that allure and loue not."

"That troupe of honest dames

those Grisels all are gone; No Lucrece now is left aliue,

ne Cleopatra none. Those dayes are all ypast,

that date is fleeted by:

They myrrors were, dame Nature made

hir skilful hande to try.

Now course of kinde exchaungde

doth yeeld a woorser graine,

And women in these latter yeares

those modest matrones staine.

Deceit in their delight,

great fraude in friendly lookes:

They spoyle the fish for friendship's sake,

that houer on their hookes.

They buye the baite to deare

that so their freedome loze;

And they the more deceitfull are,

that so can craft and gloze."

The

Their hands the heart, no longer beating, try,
Or their fair fingers ope th' unwilling eye;
Another seeking whether yet the breath
Hangs on the lips, nor quite extinct by death,
Joins her's to their's, compassionately kind,
And leaves, unseen, a tender kiss behind.

But these their cares were vain, for death's cold hand,
Had clos'd the eyes of all the youthful band;
And now their weeping ghosts were seen to gain
The darksome realms of Pluto's dreary reign:
With pray'rs and tears stern Charon they implore,
To take and waft them to the Stygian shore;
And if or youth or beauty could prevail,
His breast had melted at their mournful tale.

The nymphs, with pity mov'd, the gods implor'd
That to their bodies life might be restor❜d;

The contrariety of love is also thus depicted in the sign Cancer, fourth book of Palengenius, translated by Barnaby Googe.

But when their pray'rs the gods no longer heard,
They draw 'em in the stream to be interr'd:
Soon as their lifeless limbs had touch'd the wave,
Another form they to the children gave:
Each hand contracted in a fin appears,
And the rough skin a scaly substance wears;
The form of a hook'd tail united, took
Their feet and legs; the tenant of the brook
To stem the adverse waves unceasing tries;
Resembling youth in manners and in size.
For these are always small: by turns we see
They sport and fret, now quarrel, now agree;
And still like what they were before remain,
Peevish in play, yet loath to leave the train.

Now to the caution of the Muse attend,
Your fish from nightly robbers to defend;
Boards at the bottom arm'd with spikes prepare,
To catch the net and disappoint the snare.
But those are most destructive, who, with food,
Throw poison mixt or lime into the flood;
Soon as infected, tortur'd with the pain,
The fish shoots swiftly thro' the wat'ry plain;
Or giddily in various circles swims,
And just the surface of the water skims,
To fan his lungs with draughts of vital air,
And cool the scorching heat that rages there.
But still the pois'nous drugs his breast torment;
And now his strength is gone, his vigour spent;
Now he sucks in his last remains of breath,
Supinely floating on the waves in death.
Ev'n the dire author of the mischief grieves,
When, for a paltry gain, he thus perceives
The lakes exhausted of their scaly breed,
And blames the arts from whence such ills proceed.

Now

Now that your stew-ponds may with ease afford
Supplies of fish, well-fatted for your board,
With a slight wall a narrow place enclose,
Where the full river from its channel flows;
The tinkling of the stream, or sav'ry bait,
Will tempt the fish to try the sweet deceit;
The wickers opening readily admit

The breed, but never their return permit:
Here to your captives plenteous dainties throw,
Which soon will thrive and fit for table grow.
Some few years past, as all good Christians feed
In spring-time only on the scaly breed;

• "Fishes are like their element, and place

*

Wherein they live, both cold and moist, a race
Of flegmatic creatures, yet they are meat
Which dry and choleric tempers may well eat;
And those who would look smug, or else snout-fair,
May take this liver-cooling dish for fare.

In fervid seasons, and in climates hot
Use them but if the Beare the helm hath got,
Or under Charles his seven-starr'd heavy wane,
From this dull nourishment let them refraine.-
Sweet river-fishes slimy, and gross diet,

Are glibbery, and make egression quiet,

More nourishing than sea-fish, and of these,

Those (which the current streams and gravel please,

And do abhorre annoyances of sinks,

Which spoil their channels with their loathsome stinks)

Are most delicious, such as pearch and trout;
Your mud-fish all incline you to the gout.
But those delighting in sweet scowres, refine
Their squamy sides, and clarifie their line."

Let

Gayton's Longevity.

"Another remedy against the dearth of things, especially victuals, is to restore the vse of fish to the ancient credit and estimation: and hereupon Bodine taketh occasion to commend our custome of England for obseruing fah dayes in the weeke. And for effecting of the like in Fraunce, he propoundeth

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