THE BLOODLESS SPORTSMAN.
By Sam Walter Foss
I go a-gunning, but take no gun;
I fish without a pole;
And I bag good game, and catch such fish
As suits a sportsman's soul;
For the chiefest game that the forest holds
And the best fish of the brooks
Are never brought down by a rifle-shot,
And are never caught with a hook. I bob for fish by the forest brook,
I hunt for game in the trees,
For bigger birds than wing the air,
Or fish that swim the seas.
A rodless Walton of the brooks,
A bloodless sportsman I;
I hunt for the thoughts that throng the woods,
The dreams that haunt the sky. The woods are made for the hunters,
The brooks for the fishers of song;
To the hunters who hunt for the gunless game
The streams and the woods belong.
There are thoughts that moan from the soul of the
pine,
And thoughts in a flower bell curled;
And the thoughts that are blown with the scent of
the fern
Are as new and as old as the world. So, away for the hunt in the fern-scented wood
Till the going down of the sun!
There is plenty of game still left in the woods
For the hunter who has no gun.
So, away for the fish by the moss-bordered brook
That flows through the velvety sod!
There are plenty of fish still left in the streams
For the angler who has no rod.
—Sam Walter Foss.