Showing posts with label fish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fish. Show all posts

Thursday, March 20, 2014

How to Cure Gas, 1685

The Tench
Izaak Walton, The Compleat Angler (1653)
"Against the Wind in the Belly. Apply a living Tench to the Patients Navel, the Head being upwards towards the Stomach; and tye it fast on with a Napkin; and there leave it twenty four hours, till it be dead; then bury it in the Dung, and you will see the Wind will vanish." 
Nicolas Lémery, Modern Curiosities of Art & Nature (1685)
If anyone asks why you have a dying fish strapped to your abdomen, just explain that it's for your wind problem. I promise they'll leave you alone.

Monday, June 24, 2013

How to Sniggle, 1653



"And because you that are but a young angler, know not what snigling is, I will now teach it to you: ... you observing your time in a warm day, when the water is lowest, may take a hook tied to a strong line, or to a string about a yard long, and then into... any place where you think an Eele may hide or shelter her selfe, there with the help of a short stick put in your bait, but leisurely, and as far as you may conveniently; and it is scarce to be doubted, but that if there be an Eel within the sight of it, the Eele will bite instantly, and as certainly gorge it... but pull him out by degrees, for he lying folded double in his hole, will, with the help of his taile, break all, unless you give him time to be wearied with pulling."
          Izaak Walton, The Compleat Angler (1653)

Also, young angler, do not confuse sniggling with snuggling. Sniggling is a recommended technique for catching eels; snuggling with eels is strictly discretionary.