Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

patients of a journey to Silesia. The damp sheet system is no secret to the chambermaids at our provincial inns, and the metropolitan publicans and milkmen are far from blind to the virtues of cola water as a beverage. A fact that probably accounts for the peculiar healthiness of London compared with other capitals.

To be candid, we have besides a private prejudice against anything like a Grand Catholicon-not the Pope, but an universal remedy for all diseases, from elephantiasis down to pip. And we become particularly sceptical when we meet with a specific backed by such a testimonial as that of the Rev. John Wesley in favour of Water versus Hydrophobia.

"And this, I apprehend, accounts for its frequently curing the bite of a mad dog, especially if it be repeated for twenty-five or thirty days successively."-P. 81.

Of which we can only say, that on the production of certificates of three such cures, signed by a respectable turncock, we will let whoever likes it be worried by a mad pack of hounds, and then cure him by only showing him Aldgate-pump.

Moreover, we are aware of the aptitude of our cousins the Germans to go the whole way " and a bittock" in their theories. As Mr. Puff says of the theatrical people, "Give those fellows a good thing and they never know when to have done with it." Thus allowing the element to be wholesome, for ablution or as a beverage, they order you not only to swig, sit, stand, lie and soak in it, but actually to snuff it up your nose-what is a bridge without water ?—for a cold in the head !-P. 228.

It was our intention to have quoted a case of fever which was got under much as Mr. Braidwood would have quenched an inflammation in a house. But our limits forbid. In the mean time it has been our good fortune, since reading Claridge on Hydropathy, to see a sick drake avail himself of the "Cold Water Cure" at the dispensary in St. James's-park. First in

waddling in, he took a Fuss-Bad; then he took a Sitz-Bad, and then, turning his curly tail up into the air, he took a Kopf-Bad. Lastly, he rose almost upright on his latter end, and male such a triumphant flapping with his wings, that we really expected he was going to shout "Priessnitz for ever!" But no such thing. He only cried, "Quack! quack! quack!"

[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][ocr errors]
[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small]

"Let me live harmlessly, and near the brink

Of Trent or Avon have a dwelling place,

Where I may see my quill or cork down sink

With eager bite of Perch, or Bleak, or Dace."-J. DAVORS.

"I care not, I, to fish in seas,

Fresh rivers best my mind do please,

Whose sweet calm course I contemplate,

And seek in life to imitate."-PISCATOR'S SONG.

"The ladies, angling in the crystal lake,
Feast on the waters with the prey they take,

At once victorious with their lines and eyes,

They make the fishes and the men their prize."-WALLER

CHAPTER I.

MR. CHUBB was not, by habit and repute, a fisherman. Angling had never been practically his hobby. He was none of those enthusiasts in the gentle craft, who as soon as close time comes to an end, are sure to be seen in a punt at Hampton Deeps, under the arches of Kew Bridge, or on the banks of the New River, or the Lea, trolling for jack, ledgering for barbel, spinning for trout, roving for perch, dapping for chub, angling for gudgeon, or whipping for bleak. He had never fished but once in his life, on a chance holiday, and then caught but one bream, but that once sufficed to attach him to the pastime; it was so still, so quiet, so lonely; the very thing for a shy, bashful, nervous man, as taciturn as a post, as formal as a yew hedge, and as sedate as a Quaker. Nevertheless he did not fall in love with fishing, as some do, rashly and madly, but as became his character, discreetly and with deliberation. It was not a hasty passion, but a sober preference founded on esteem, and accordingly instead of plunging at once into the connexion, he merely resolved in his heart, that at some future time he would retire from the hosiery line, and take to one of gut, horsehair, or silk.

In pursuance of this scheme, whilst he steadily amassed the necessary competence, he quietly accumulated the other requisites; from time to time investing a few more hundreds in the Funds, and occasionally adding a fresh article to his tackle, or a new guide or treatise to his books on the art. Into these volumes, at his leisure, he dipped, gradually storing his mind with the piscatory rules, "line upon line, and precept upon precept," till in theory he was a respectable proficient. And in his Sunda y

walks, he commonly sought the banks of one or other of our Middlesex rivers, where glancing at sky and water, with a speculative eye, he would whisper to himself-"a fine day for the perch," or "a likely hole for a chub;" but from all actual practice he religiously abstained, carefully hoarding it up, like his money, at compound interest, for that delicious Otium-andWater, which, sooner or later, Hope promised he should enjoy.

In the meantime, during one of these suburban rambles, he observed, near Enfield Chase, a certain row of snug little villas, each with its own garden, and its own share of the New River, which flowed between the said pleasure-grounds on one side, and a series of private meadows on the other. The houses, indeed, were in pairs, two under one roof, but each garden was divided from the next one by an evergreen fence, tall and thick enough to screen the proprietor from neighbourly observation : whilst the absence of any public footpath along the fields equally secured the residents from popular curiosity. A great consideration with an angler, who, near the metropolis, is too liable to be accosted by some confounded hulking fellow with "What sport,- how do they bite?"—or annoyed by some pestilent little boy, who will intrude in his swim.

"Yes, that's the place for me," thought Mr. Chubb, especially alluding to a green lawn which extended to the water's edge-not forgetting a tall lignum vitæ tree, against which, seated in an ideal arm chair, he beheld his own Eidolon, in the very act of pulling out an imaginary fish, as big and bright as a fresh herring.

[ocr errors]

"Yes, that is the place for me," muttered Mr. Chubb; SO snug-so retired-so all to one's self! Nobody to overlook, nothing to interrupt one! No towing-path- no barges no thoroughfare Bless my soul! it's a perfect little

Paradise!"

And it was the place for him indeed-for some ten years

« AnteriorContinuar »