IFn tbe Moobs witb tbe Bow 



when my purring missile went a hand's 

 breadth ahead of the pelican, causing it to 

 back its vast wings and somersault rear- 

 ward in ecstatic surprise. 



But the arrow — how it slanted away on 

 high to curve slowly and dart with accel- 

 erated speed down, far off, into the cream- 

 ing whitecaps ! Some men take wine to 

 stimulate them, some take tobacco, some, 

 like Coleridge and De Quincey, even 

 opium ; but I take a bow-shot at a bird. 

 Daniel Webster liked to play a fish ; other 

 great men have delighted in a roaring gun 

 when the bevies rose from the stubble : for 

 greatness, too, takes a joy out of savage 

 sport. Still, for myself, in all humbleness 

 be it said, let the solitude of a wilderness of 

 wood or water surround me, and let me 

 hear my bow's one fine note, followed by 

 the long, low hiss of my arrow. Some 

 have called this savagery ; others have seen 

 in it a dangerously attenuated estheti- 

 cism; but heathen coarseness, or the last 

 refinement of artificial ideality, — be it 

 whatever it is, — I like it better than wine, 

 tobacco, cards, the theater, or any other 

 204 



