Collected Works of Michael Drayton by Michael Drayton

Author:Michael Drayton
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Classic literature and art
Publisher: Delphi Classics
Published: 2015-09-12T04:00:00+00:00

POLY-OLBION: THE THIRTEENTH SONG

The Argument

THIS song our shire of Warwick sounds;

Revives old Ardens ancient bounds.

Through many shapes the Muse heere roves;

Now sporting in those shady groves,

The tunes of birds oft staies to heare: 5

Then, finding herds of lustie deare,

She huntresse-like the hart pursues;

And like a hermit walks, to chuse

The simples every where that growe;

Comes Ancors glory next to showe; 10

Tells Guy of Warwicks famous deeds;

To th’Vale of Red-horse then proceeds,

To play her part the rest among;

There shutteth up her thirteenth song.

UPON the mid-lands now th’industrious Muse doth fall;

That shire which wee the hart of England well may call,

As shee her selfe extends (the midst which is decreed)

Betwixt S. Michaels Mount, and Barwick-bord’ring Tweed,

Brave Warwick; that abroad so long advanc’t her beare, 5

By her illustrious Earles renowned every where;

Above her neighboring shires which alwaies bore her head.

My native country then, which so brave spirits hast bred,

If there be vertue yet remaining in thy earth,

Or any good of thine thou breathd’st into my birth,

Accept it as thine owne whilst now I sing of thee; 11

Of all thy later brood th’unworthiest though I bee.

Muse, first of Arden tell, whose foot-steps yet are found

In her rough wood-lands more then any other ground

That mighty Arden held even in her height of pride; 15

Her one hand touching Trent, the other, Severns side.

The very sound of these, the wood-nymphs doth awake:

When thus of her owne selfe the ancient forrest spake;

My many goodly sites when first I came to showe,

Here opened I the way to myne owne over-throwe: 20

For, when the world found out the fitnesse of my soyle,

The gripple wretch began immediatly to spoyle

My tall and goodly woods, and did my grounds inclose:

By which, in little time my bounds I came to lose. 24

When Britaine first her fields with villages had fild,

Her people wexing still, and wanting where to build,

They oft dislodg’d the hart, and set their houses, where

He in the broome and brakes had long time made his leyre.

Of all the forrests heere within this mightie ile,

If those old Britains then me soveraigne did instile,

I needs must be the great’st; for greatnesse tis alone

That gives our kind the place: else were there many a one 32

For pleasantnes of shade that farre doth mee excell.

But, of our forrests kind the quality to tell,

We equally partake with wood-land as with plaine, 35

Alike with hill and dale; and every day maintaine

The sundry kinds of beasts upon our copious wast’s,

That men for profit breed, as well as those of chase.

Here Arden of her selfe ceast any more to showe;

And with her sylvarrjoyes the Muse along doth goe.

When Phoebus lifts his head out of the winters wave, 41

No sooner doth the earth her flowerie bosome brave,

At such time as the yeere brings on the pleasant spring,

But hunts-up to the mome the feath’red sylvans sing:

And in the lower grove, as in the — rising knole, 45

Upon the highest spray of every mounting pole,

Those quirristers are pearcht with many a speckled breast.

Then from her burnisht gate the goodly glittring east

Guilds every lofty top,

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.