To write on Walton is, indeed, to hold a candle to the sun. The editor
has been content to give a summary of the chief or rather the only known,
events in Walton's long life, adding a notice of his character as
displayed in his Biographies and in _The Compleat Angler_, with comments
on the ancient and modern practice of fishing, illustrated by passages
from Walton's foregoers and contemporaries. Like all editors of Walton,
he owes much to his predecessors, Sir John Hawkins, Oldys, Major, and,
above all, to the learned Sir Harris Nicolas.