E-text prepared by deaurider, Paul Marshall, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 57845-h.htm or 57845-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/57845/57845-h/57845-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/57845/57845-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/cu31924003431008 Transcriber's note: Underscores “_” before and after text indicate _italics_ in the original text. Equal signs “=” before and after text indicate =bold= in the original text. A carat character “^” designates a superscript. A single character following the carat is superscripted (example: xv^e). Multiple superscripted characters are enclosed by curly brackets (example: VI^{me}). Small capitals have been converted to SOLID capitals. FISHING FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES [Illustration: THE FISH-AVATAR OF VISHNU, WITH SCENES ILLUSTRATING THE LIFE OF KRISHNA.] FISHING FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES by WILLIAM RADCLIFFE Sometime of Balliol College, Oxford With Illustrations [Illustration: THE OLDEST REPRESENTATION (BUT ONE) OF ANGLING, _c._ 1400 B.C.] London John Murray, Albemarle Street, W. 1921 All rights reserved _TO MY FISHING HOSTS AND FISHING FRIENDS IN AFRICA, AUSTRALASIA, AMERICA, THE WEST INDIES, AND EUROPE._ _UPON THEM, UPON ME MAY THE GODS BESTOW THE BOON CRAVED BY MR. ANDREW LANG!_ “_Within the streams, Pausanias saith, That down Cocytus valley flow, Girdling the grey domain of Death, The spectral fishes come and go; The ghosts of trout fly to and fro, Persephone, fulfil my wish, And grant that in the shades below My ghost may land the ghosts of fish!_” PREFACE Despite Francis Bacon’s dictum that “prefaces are great wastes of time, and, though they seem to proceed of modesty, they are bravery,” I hazard a few words as to this book, which, like Topsy, “growed, I ’spects,” from a chance request for a quotation from Homer on Fishing with a Rod for my sister’s game-book. It is, as far as I can discover, the first attempt to examine classical and other ancient writers on Fishing from the standpoint of one who has not only been a practical Pisciculturist for many years and an Angler all his life, but has also been taught (though somewhat forgotten) his Greek and Latin.