The Art of Angling ...

Brookes (Richard)

The Art of Angling ...

In two parts. I. Containing an account of fish, and fish-ponds: a new art of fly-making: the new laws that concern angling: the secret ways of catching fish by ointments, pastes, and other arts: directions how to procure baits, and for making all sorts of fish-tackle, with the surest method of finding sport, &c. II. Of the great whale, and whale fishery; the devouring shark; the amphibious turtle; the luscious turbot and sole; with flying fish, sea-devil, and other extraordinary productions of the sea. Likewise a natural history of the inhabitants of the salt water, and the various methods of rock and sea-fishing. Illustrated with one hundred and thirty-five cuts, exactly describing the different kinds of fish that are found in the fresh or salt waters. The whole forming a sportsman's magazine; and comprizing all that is curious and valuable in the art of angling. The fourth edition, with great improvements.

Description: engraved frontispiece, and numerous woodcut illustrations in the text, small original paper flaw tear to D7 (no loss), frontispiece offset onto title, minor browning, pp. viii, 304, 12mo, original sheep, rebacked (not recently), corners rather worn, annotated by perhaps more than one generation of anglers (see below), and with an unrecorded broadside ballad

Publication Details: Printed for T. Lowndes, 1774

Notes: The title-page is misleading. Essentially this is 'The Angler's Dictionary', alphabetically arranged, including fish (each illustrated), tackle - including a long entry on flies - and such things as Fishes Food, and technical terms: a long entry for whales is naturally towards the end (so the title has all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order). The long entry on Flies (occupying over thirty pages), and is copiously annotated in ink by a dedicated early nineteenth-century fly-tier, possibly a Yorkshireman, but with an evident wide circle of acquaintance in the fishing world: ...moreThe title-page is misleading. Essentially this is 'The Angler's Dictionary', alphabetically arranged, including fish (each illustrated), tackle - including a long entry on flies - and such things as Fishes Food, and technical terms: a long entry for whales is naturally towards the end (so the title has all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order). The long entry on Flies (occupying over thirty pages), and is copiously annotated in ink by a dedicated early nineteenth-century fly-tier, possibly a Yorkshireman, but with an evident wide circle of acquaintance in the fishing world: given that the dates run up till 1830, there is perhaps more than one generation involved. His notes on the subject also fill two preliminary blank pages, and there are occasional marginalia in his hand elsewhere in the volume giving the dates fish were caught, where, and by whom. A folding MS sheet, copying an article about flies from an 1819 issue of Blackwood's Magazine, is bound in: this furnishes a pretty good guide to the angling shops in Edinburgh.Also bound in, thanks to which we owe its preservation, is an unrecorded printing of a broadside ballad: The Yorkshire Concert. Printed and Sold by J. Pitts No 14 Great St Andrew Street Seven Dials. It dates from around 1819 and is very fragile. Worldcat records one copy only of this broadside by a different printer, also undated, at the National Library of Scotland, though the song itself, by Charles Dibdin, had appeared in numerous collections.Regarding lobsters: 'The best tasted Lobsters are caught of the Isle of Wight; but those being few in Quantity, the London Markets are chiefly supplied from Norway and the Orkney Isles.'What evidence there may have been to the original owner's identity was perhaps lost when the book was rebacked and recased: this may have taken place c. 1964, as there is a cost code at the end in that year. HIDE

Bibliography: (Westwood & Satchell p. 42)

Enquire about this book

Price: £1,800

Subject: Sciences

Published Date: 1774

Stock Number: 66714

(Your basket is currently empty)