Then there was billiards; cards, too, but no dice;
Save in the clubs, no man of honour plays ;
Boats when 'twas water, skating when 'twas ice,
And the hard frost destroy'd the scenting days;
And angling, too, that solitary vice,

Whatever Izaac Walton sings or says:

The quaint, old cruel coxcomb, in his gullet

Should have a hook, and a small trout to pull it.

But audi alteram partem.

Dear old Father Walton must not be

attacked by a lordly sceptic undefended and without being allowed the privilege of response.

It is customary nowadays to regard "Old Izaak" as the author of a delightful and immortal book, redolent of wild flowers, gently flowing streams, sweet country air and pastoral delights-as one who "babbles of green fields" in a style the most charming and sympathetic; but at the same time certain modern angling experts affect to attach little or no importance to the "Compleat Angler" as a practical guide to the piscatorial art. The "National Encyclopædia" says: "The popularity of the 'Compleat Angler' has been preserved undiminished up to the present time, when it is read and loved, not certainly on account of its precepts and practical directions, which are now obsolete, but for its charming style and devout piety." In a work well known to anglers, 'Ephemera" takes the same text, preaching that Walton is quaint and fascinating, but his directions, save in a few instances, are antiquated and erroneous. Not so. Walton was no fly-fisher; his pupil and colleague, Charles Cotton, ably deals with that branch of the art; but the "Master," and father of fishermen, despite antiquated and cumbersome tackle, was as skilful in deluding and capturing coarse fish, in bottom-fishing, and as well qualified to discourse upon the methods of the same, as any brother of the angle now living.

The passage referred to by Lord Byron, in which Walton describes the method of utilising a frog as a live bait, securing him to the hook tenderly, "as though you loved him," need not be quoted here; but the following may well be transcribed as illustrating the style of an English classical writer: "But for the practical part, it is that that makes an angler; it is diligence and observation, and practice, and an ambition to be the best in the art, that must do it. I will tell you, scholar, I envy not him that eats better meat than I do, nor him that is richer, or that wears better clothes than I do; I envy nobody but him, and him only, that catches more fish than I do. And such a man is like to prove an angler."

Walton ever suggests Cotton. The well-borr junior was the adopted son of the old, respectable London tradesman; a great love united the two during life; and Cotton's work on fly-fishing is always bound together with Walton's "Compleat Angler." Throughout Cotton's treatise the gentlemanlike disposition of the author breathes. Note the following as indicative of that kindly, charitable, considerate spirit which animated the disciple of the Father of Anglers, and which is not often found absent in fishermen of the present day: "I am not so totally devoted to my own pleasure, but that I have also some regard for other men's." He was accomplished, handsome, and a prince and prophet among anglers; especially towards the fascinating art of fly-fishing did he incline, preferring it before that which is termed "bottom fishing." As Shakespeare says:

The pleasantest angling is to see the fish
Cut with her golden oars the silver stream
And greedily devour the treacherous bait.

Poor gifted Pope, the Twickenham hunchback, alludes to our subject:

Proud Nimrod first the bloody chase began,

A mighty hunter, and his prey was man.

Pope says "prey," but "quarry" would have been a more suitable word; however, one cannot expect Pope to be au fait with venatic technicalities.

Goldsmith, too, Dr. Johnson's "Goldie," who "wrote like an angel, though he talked like poor polly"-even Goldsmith, both in the undying poem yclept "The Deserted Village" and in one of the finest comedies ever penned, "She Stoops to Conquer," frequently touches very happily upon the subject of this paper, but space forbids quotation.

Referring more particularly to that spurious form of sport whose proper designation is gambling, Herbert says, very wisely

Play not for gain, but sport; who plays for more
Than he can lose with pleasure, stakes his heart,
Perhaps his wife's too, and whom she has borne.

Coming tardily, I fear, towards the termination of my article, I venture to "double back," as sporting writers would say, and call the attention of my readers to a few passages in the works of two of the greatest and earliest of English classical writers, by way of finally showing the intimate connection existing between sport and literature. Edmund Spenser, the author of the pure and lofty "Faerie Queene," elsewhere pens the following:

In wrestling nimble, and in running swift;
In shooting steady, and in swimming strong,
Well made to strike, to leap, to throw, to lift,
And all the sports that shepherds are among.

As for the characters in the Canterbury Tales, though, doubtless, that worthy man, the knight, and his son, the lusty young squire, were sportsmen, we are not directly so told; probably Chaucer intended it to be understood. All men of rank were sportsmen in those days. Be that as it may, as regards the knight and the squire, we are directly told that the franklin was a sport-loving man; he was evidently a successful deluder of fish, as also a snarer of game; for it is written :

Withouten bake mete never was his hous,
Of fish and flesh, and that so plenteous,
It snewed in his hous of mete and drink.
Ful many a fat partrich hadde he in mewe,
And many a breme and many a luce in stewe.

Keeping partridges mewed up until they should be required is not in accordance with modern notions regarding sport in England, though at this day quails are so treated; at certain seasons you will find them in little coops in every game-dealer's shop. As for "breme and luce" (that is, bream and pike) in the stew-pond, that is a matter of taste; and, of course, de gustibus non disputandum. Now, no country gentleman would eat a bream, though the mighty luce or pike is very toothsome, if properly stuffed, baked, and cooked.

Lastly, the restless spirit of adventure and the fascination of big game-shooting, whilst they have attracted sportsmen to South Africa, have conduced to the production of much literary matter, alike elegant and stirring. Eloquent pens have dealt with sport in the Dark Continent in its widest, wildest, and truest sense. As an example of the spirited treatment of the topic now under consideration, dealt with in a truly poetical and descriptive style, furnishing also a complete and accurate list of the "beasts of chase" to be encountered in the untrodden wilds of the glorious country in question, I would direct the reader's attention to Pringle's beautiful poem, entitled "Afar in the Desert," in which he will see, glowingly painted, the joys of a wild free life of genuine sport, and many curious and truthful statements referring to the kudu, hartebeest, and eland, the quagga, the "river-horse," and many other of the feræ naturæ given to man by a beneficent Providence, all of which animals he is doing his best to exterminate from the face of the earth.

CLIFFORD CORDLEY.

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PAGES ON PLAYS.

HE dramatic season is dead, is lapped in lead like the friends, all the friends, of King Pandion. To look back upon it is like looking back over a waste of volcanic ground pitted with extinct volcanoes. There is little in it to remember, very little to regret. Perhaps, on the whole, so dull, so vacuous, so valueless a dramatic season has not waxed and waned for long enough. It was not all a blank; it had its brightness, it had its beauty, but the brightness. and the beauty were exceptional, and monotonous ineffectuality was the order of the day.

The season brought with it few plays that called for serious consideration, it added little to the meagre list of contemporary plays that could by any amount of mental juggling be called works of art. It gave us two Shakespearean revivals, one refreshing riverside comedy, one entertaining comic opera, and some translations of Scandinavian drama which lent to the period the major part of whatever dramatic dignity, whatever original artistic interest it possessed. In the blackness of its noonday night those stars of the North did stick fiery off indeed, and it is scarcely surprising if those who longed for something living were prepared to hail them as little short of miraculous in their ability.

The cleverest comedy that the season has given us-indeed, the only clever comedy-is "Walker, London." It has been said, and truly said, that "Walker, London," is not, as a work of art, on a level with the successes in fiction of the author of "A Window in Thrums" and of "A Little Minister." It has been urged that it has not added in any degree to Mr. Barrie's faine. No doubt these arguments are true enough, but at the same time it must be remembered that the play is a very charming little play, and, further, that, as a work of art, it is very decidedly superior to that prose story of Mr. Barrie's on which it is founded, the story called "When a Man's Single," and that it is quite on a level with the very best pages of "My Lady Nicotine." It is the work of a man of original ideas; it is the work of a man who can write well and wittily, who has a very VOL. CCLXXIII. NO. 1941.

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exquisite humour, and who has succeeded in giving to the people of his sketch a distinct if not very striking individuality of their own. Its existence does much to redeem the dead season from its reproach of artistic barrenness.

The one other bright spot in the season's record, so far as original work was concerned, was Mr. Gilbert's "The Mountebanks." Mr. Gilbert has written better "books," but he has also written worse, and the leading idea of his story was humorously conceived and humorously carried out. The play was really two distinct stories loosely stitched together, and the story which dealt with the doings of the strolling players, who gave the piece its name, was by far the better portion. In this half of the story, too, Mr. Gilbert was exceptionally fortunate in the interpreters of his fancy. The Nita and Bartolo of Miss Jenoure and of Mr. Monkhouse were creations to be remembered with delight both in their original forms as dancing-girl and clown and in their fantastic metamorphoses into clockwork Ophelia and Hamlet. Mr. Monkhouse was an old familiar friend, Miss Jenoure was new to London, and her success was the more welcome because it gave our comic stage an actress who can sing well, who can dance delightfully, and who can act in the most excellent spirit of humour and of fancy.

The other artistic successes of the dead season were the Shakespearean revivals of Mr. Irving and of Mr. Beerbohm Tree, and the performances of two foreign companies-the mimes who played the "Statue du Commandeur" and the company of which Sarah Bernhardt was the head. In each of these two companies there was one actor of genius; in each of these companies the rest of the players did not count for much. It is true that in the pantomime the services of M. Courtès were enlisted, but he had not the opportunity to win such success as he won last year, when he played the Papa Pierrot. The genius of Madame Sarah Bernhardt was familiar to London; the genius of M. Tarride was quite new, and I am glad to think it was received with the enthusiasm that it deserved from those capable of appreciating its extraordinary power. It did not please the general public: it fairly enraptured the few who can welcome and understand masterly acting; it left a memory behind it that will not be lightly effaced.

These entertainments and the three plays of Scandinavian origin sum up all the important work of the past seven months. I have said that many were prepared to regard the Scandinavian plays as little short of miraculous in their ability; yet, to be sure, as a matter of fact, they were, each and all of them, very far short of miraculous.