298 DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 



They were happy days and happy have been 

 those spent with men who, as tired as myself of 

 ordered life, have made a break in it. September 

 friends I have who love to see partridges on the 

 wing and upon their plates on the first of that good 

 month, and November friends who say that to 

 shoot a pheasant coming with the wind, and 

 swerving here and there to avoid the branches 

 of the taller trees, is by far the grandest sport of 

 all. To wear gaiters and carry a gun is excuse 

 sufficient for a surgeon I have often shot with. 

 He seldom fires and, when he does, it is generally 

 just to give an echo to his chum Tom Wilson's 

 gun. 



A clergyman, whose duty it is ever to be reading 

 the burial service, sometimes comes fishing with me 

 bringing with him the echoes of his calling. It is 

 good to see him seated on a stool, half hidden 

 amongst sedge and rush, fishing a baited swim, for 

 when the fish commence to bite I notice by the 

 happy twinkle in his eyes and by his joyous talk 

 that the saintly parson has gone and my companion 

 is a mere joyous man. 



We are all children's children of nomad fathers 

 with somewhere in our hearts a longing to tread the 

 turf. That longing has ever been with me. I feel 

 out of place in crowds, and the rush, tumult and 

 anxiety, of a city life is a battle I have had to take 

 a part in much against my will, but, thanks to days 

 stolen for sport, I have come through smiling. 



THE END 



