The fishing-rod, that instrument which _destroys in peace_, must find a place: other animals are followed with fire and tumult, but the fishes are entrapped with deceit. Of all the sportsmen, we charge the angler alone with _killing in cold blood_. Just as a pursuit abounds with pleasure, so will it abound with votaries. The pleasure of angling depends on the success of the line: this art is but little practised here, and less known. Our rivers are small, and thinly stored; our pools are guarded as private property: the Birmingham spirit is rather too active for the sleepy amusement of fishing. Patience seems the highest accomplishment of an angler. We behold him, fixed as a statue, on the bank; his head inclining towards the river, his attention upon the water, his eye upon the float; he often draws, and draws only his hook! But although he gets no bite, it may fairly be said _he is bit:_ of the two, the fish display the most cunning.--He, surprized that he has _caught nothing_, and I, that he has kept his rod and his patience. Party excursion is held in considerable esteem, in which are included Enville, the seat of Lord Stamford; Hagley, that of the late Lord Lyttelton; and the Leasowes, the property of the late Wm. Shenstone, Esq. We will omit the journey to London, a tour which some of us have made all our lives _without seeing it_. Cards and the visit are linked together, nor is the billiard table totally forsaken. One man amuses himself in amassing a fortune, and another in dissolving one. About thirty-six of the inhabitants keep carriages for their own private use; and near fifty have country houses. The relaxations of the humbler class, are fives, quoits, skittles, and ale. Health and amusement are found in the prodigious number of private gardens scattered round Birmingham, from which we often behold the father returning with a cabbage, and the daughter with a nosegay. HOTEL. The spot where our great-grandmothers smiled in the lively dance, when they possessed the flower of beauty in the spring of life, is lost in forgetfulness. The floor that trembled under that foot which was covered with a leather shoe tied with a silken string, and which supported a stocking of dark blue worsted, not of the finest texture, is now buried in oblivion. [Illustration: Hotel.] In 1750 we had two assembly rooms; one at No. 11. in the Square, the other No. 85. in Bull-street. This last was not much in use afterwards. That in the Square continued in repute till in the course of that evening which happened in October 1765, when Edward Duke of York had the honour of leading up the dance, and the ladies of Birmingham enjoyed that of the Duke's hand, He remarked, "That a town of such magnitude as Birmingham, and adorned with so much beauty, deserved a superior accomodation:--That the room itself was mean, but the entrance still meaner."