Plutarch (_De Sol. Anim._, 30) shows that the habit was not entirely altruistic, for “this being done, they feed together upon the common prey.” From the _Pinna_ which haunts the bottom of the sea. From the _Pinna_ which haunts the bottom of the sea came ”the most transparent pearls, very pure and very large.”[424] The enormous industry of Athenæus, who (VIII. 15) speaking of the materials he had amassed for this one book, casually states that he himself “had read and made extracts from 800 plays of the Middle Comedy _alone_,” and in it cites nearly 800 authors, and over 1200 separate books, has undoubtedly preserved to us many valuable passages of the ample literature and numerous plays in which fishermen once figured. My many quotations from and references to his _Deipnosophistæ_ make it unnecessary to deal with this author[425] at greater length. FOOTNOTES: [392] _The Anatomy of Melancholy_ (London, 1806), I. 406. If Burton, “that universal plunderer” has cribbed from Dame Juliana Berners her eloquent eulogy on the secondary pleasures of angling, this book, in turn, till its resurrection in the eighteenth century was ruthlessly pillaged without acknowledgment. Warton, _Milton_, 2nd edition, p. 94, suggests that Milton seems to have borrowed the subject of _L’Allegro_ and _Il Penseroso_, together with some thoughts and expressions, from a poem prefixed to the book, while a writer in _The Angler’s Note Book_, March 31, 1880, believes that “Walton probably drew the inspiration of his Angler’s song from the wonderful storehouse of this quaint and original author.” [393] τὸ γὰρ ἀγεννὲς καὶ ἀμήχανον ὅλως καὶ ἀπάνουργον αὐτῶν αἰσχρὸν καὶ ἄζηλον καὶ ἀνελεύθερον τὴν ἄγραν πεποίηκε. Holland’s _Translation_, published in 1657, if only on account of its quaint turns is preferable to another published in the last century. [394] Milton wrote (1646) a Latin Ode on sending a book to the Bodleian, in which he addresses Roüsius as, “Aeternorum operum custos fidelis Quæstorque gazæ nobilioris.” [395] Two years after this was written, I find that Mr. G. W. Bethune in his edition of _The Complete Angler_ (New York, 1891), p. 6, notes the Aristotimus point, but goes no farther in defence of Plutarch. [396] _De Sol. Anim._, 24. (Holland’s Translation.) [397] London, 1700. Dr. Turrell, _op. cit._, p. 157, believes Whitney to have been the first to recommend the use of _the floating fly_—not for the purpose of circumventing the wily trout, but to prevent the fly being gobbled by the minnows. [398] Cf. R. B. Marston, _Walton and some Earlier Writers on Angling_, 1894, an informative and yet delightful volume. [399] As to the various Guyets, see 6th series, III. 87, 5th series, V. 352, and Lawrence B. Philip’s _Dict. of Biog. Reference_, which gives “Martial Guyet, French poet and translator, 17th century.” [400] _The False One_, Act I., Scene 2.