I rather think I would not wish,
If I might choose, to be a fish.

They cannot play with bat or ball.
For why? they have no hands at all!

Nor even kick each other's shins,
When all the feet they have are fins.

But little fishes, so they say,
Grand games of hide-and-seek can play

Among the lilies and the reeds
And mass of trailing water weeds;

In sunlit shoal and shadowy pool
And twinkling eddy, bright and cool.

There to and fro they dart and gleam
All up and down their native stream,

Till from the willow's twisted roots,
With fuss and fluster, out there shoots,

Roused from his nap, a cross old trout,
With 'Hi! young varmints! You keep out!'