Fight in a Cave

This is a tale of a hunter brave,
He sought for refuge in a cave
To escape a furious storm,
And he built fire to keep him warm.

Dry leaves and twigs made fire and smoke,
Which wild beasts’ fury did provoke;
By its growl he knew ’twas bear,
But bruin’s fury he would dare.

For he determined not to run,
And he gave it a shot from gun,
But this the bear it did enrage,
Resolved in war for to engage.

For it came shambling along,
To have revenge for suflering wrong;
Hunter with the butt of rifle
Struck and stunned him a trifle.

Once more he aimed, it glanced on rock,
And he was left with broken stock;
Now the bear it doth hunter seize,
And gives him many a hug and squeeze.

The struggle is so close for life,
The hunter cannot use his knife;
But the nimble hunter bold
Soon made the bear relax his hold.

By a sudden spring bear he rolls,
With his nose in burning coals;
His nostrils full of fire and smoke,
Poor Brvin it doth almost choke.

The hunter now doth use his knife,
Stabs bear in heart and ends the strife;
So hunter he did victory win,
And spoils of battle in grand skin.

Where this text comes from

First published in Poems of James McIntyre (1889). First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established. [1]

Structure read from the source's markup; the words have not been compared against a page scan. Last checked 2026-08-20.

Taken from Standard Ebooks, standardebooks/james-mcintyre_poetry, poetry.xhtml. Rights: public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931).

Earlier sources (3)

This poem as JSON or plain text. Line anchors #L1–#L32.

Cite this poem

James McIntyre (1828?–1906). “Fight in a Cave.” First published in Poems of James McIntyre (1889). Text: Poem Index, https://poemindex.org/james-mcintyre/fight-in-a-cave/. Append #L14 to cite line 14, or #L4-L9 for lines 4–9.

More by James McIntyre