Tramp And Fish.

        A hungry tramp did long for dish,
        And he stole a big bunch of fish,
        But he full soon did come to grief,
        He was quick captured as a thief.

        And brought before the magistrate,
        So judge he would pronounce his fate,
        Judge asked him how he came by fish,
        The thief said for them he did wish,

        The best fish ever came from brook,
        I own, my Lord, I did them hook,
        Said constable, he speaks what's true,
        And you must give the devil his due.

        Then judge did constable rebuke,
        He owns fish if he did them hook,
        He has not broken any clause
        I know of in our fishery laws.

        Unless you can show this reason,
        He has hooked them out of season,
        Your duty you have thus mistook,
        For man had right the fish to hook.

        Fishing here it is not treason,
        Him you had no right to seize on,
        And when the poor man did fish hook,
        He had a right the same to cook.

James McIntyre

James McIntyre was a Canadian poet, most notable for his poetry concerning cheese, cheese-making, dairying, and dairy products. Often referred to as 'The Cheese Poet,' McIntyre's work is celebrated for its earnestness and unintentional humor, making him both a beloved and an infamous figure in literary circles. He emigrated from Scotland to Canada in 1851 and settled in Ingersoll, Ontario, where he became a successful businessman and community leader.

James McIntyre

Corner Stone Laying.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Child Saved By Dog.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Lofty Actors Withdraw.

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

Lines Sent To Alexander Mclaughlan, Amaranth Station, With A Copy Of My Poems

James McIntyre, Simple Poetry

English

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The Microscopic Trout And The Machiavelian Fisherman

A fisher was casting his flies in a brook,
According to laws of such sciences,
With a patented reel and a patented hook
And a number of other appliances;
And the thirty-fifth cast, which he vowed was the last
(It was figured as close as a decimal),
Brought suddenly out of the water a trout
Of measurements infinitesimal.

This fish had a way that would win him a place
In the best and most polished society,
And he looked at the fisherman full in the face
With a visible air of anxiety:
He murmered "Alas!" from his place in the grass,
And then, when he'd twisted and wriggled, he
Remarked in a pet that his heart was upset
And digestion all higgledy-piggledy.

"I request," he observed, "to be instantly flung
Once again in the pool I've been living in....

Guy Wetmore Carryl

Fisherman's Chant, The

Oh, the fisherman is a happy wight!
He dibbles by day, and he sniggles by night.
He trolls for fish, and he trolls his lay,
He sniggles by night, and he dibbles by day.
    Oh, who so merry as he!
    On the river or the sea!
        Sniggling,
        Wriggling
        Eels, and higgling
        Over the price
        Of a nice
        Slice
        Of fish, twice
        As much as it ought to be.

Oh, the fisherman is a happy man!
He dibbles, and sniggles, and fills his can!
With a sharpened hook, and a sharper eye,
He sniggles and dibbles for what comes by,
    Oh, who so merry as he!
    On the river or the sea!
Dibbling
Nibbling
Chub, and quibbling
Over the price
Of a nice
Slice
Of fish, twice
A...

Francis Cowley Burnand

A Fish Story.

Sir Arthur, the sinner,
Ate twelve fish for dinner,
And you may believe it's just as I say!
For if you but knew it,
'Twas I saw him do it,
And just as it happened, sir, this was the way:
One day this tall fish
Swallowed this small fish
(He had just eaten a smaller one still);
Up came this queer one
And gobbled that 'ere one--
Didn't he show the most magical skill?
Then came this other
And chewed up his brother,
Made but one gulp, and behold he was through!
He was a gold fish
Oh! he was a bold fish--
But before he could wink he was eaten up too!
Up came a flounder,
He was a ten-pounder,
Opened his mouth, swallowed him and was gone;
Before you could blink, sir,
Before he could shrink, sir,
This fish came by and th...

Clara Doty Bates

The Angler's Farewell.

"Resigned, I kissed the rod."


Well! I think it is time to put up!
For it does not accord with my notions,
Wrist, elbow, and chine,
Stiff from throwing the line,
To take nothing at last by my motions!

I ground-bait my way as I go,
And dip in at each watery dimple;
But however I wish
To inveigle the fish,
To my gentle they will not play simple!

Though my float goes so swimmingly on,
My bad luck never seems to diminish;
It would seem that the Bream
Must be scarce in the stream,
And the Chub, tho' it's chubby, be thinnish!

Not a Trout there can be in the place,
Not a Grayling or Rud worth the mention,
And although at my hook
With attention I look,
I can ne'er see my hook with a

Thomas Hood

Perch-Fishing

On the far hill the cloud of thunder grew
And sunlight blurred below; but sultry blue
Burned yet on the valley water where it hoards
Behind the miller's elmen floodgate boards,
And there the wasps, that lodge them ill-concealed
In the vole's empty house, still drove afield
To plunder touchwood from old crippled trees
And build their young ones their hutched nurseries;
Still creaked the grasshoppers' rasping unison
Nor had the whisper through the tansies run
Nor weather-wisest bird gone home.
                How then
Should wry eels in the pebbled shallows ken
Lightning coming? troubled up they stole
To the deep-shadowed sullen water-hole,
Among whose warty snags the quaint perch lair.
As cunning stole the boy to angle there,
Muffling least tread, with no ...

Edmund Blunden

The Drunken Fisherman

Wallowing in this bloody sty,
I cast for fish that pleased my eye
(Truly Jehovah's bow suspends
No pots of gold to weight its ends);
Only the blood-mouthed rainbow trout
Rose to my bait. They flopped about
My canvas creel until the moth
Corrupted its unstable cloth.

A calendar to tell the day;
A handkerchief to wave away
The gnats; a couch unstuffed with storm
Pouching a bottle in one arm;
A whiskey bottle full of worms;
And bedroom slacks: are these fit terms
To mete the worm whose molten rage
Boils in the belly of old age?

Once fishing was a rabbit's foot,
O wind blow cold, O wind blow hot,
Let suns stay in or suns step out:
Life danced a jig on the sperm-whale's spout,
The fisher's fluent and obscene
Catches kept his con...

Robert Lowell