FullReads

But lo! from forth a copse that neighbours by,
A breeding jennet, lusty, young, and proud, . . . 260
Adonis’ tramping courier doth espy,
And forth she rushes, snorts and neighs aloud:
The strong-neck’d steed, being tied unto a tree,
Breaketh his rein, and to her straight goes he. . 264

Imperiously he leaps, he neighs, he bounds,
And now his woven girths he breaks asunder;
The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,
Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven’s thunder;
The iron bit he crusheth ‘tween his teeth, . . .269
Controlling what he was controlled with.

His ears up-prick’d; his braided hanging mane
Upon his compass’d crest now stand on end; . . . 272
His nostrils drink the air, and forth again,
As from a furnace, vapours doth he send:
His eye, which scornfully glisters like fire,
Shows his hot courage and his high desire. . . .276

Sometime he trots, as if he told the steps,
With gentle majesty and modest pride;
Anon he rears upright, curvets and leaps,
As who should say, ‘Lo! thus my strength is tried;
And this I do to captivate the eye . . . . . 281
Of the fair breeder that is standing by.’

What recketh he his rider’s angry stir,
His flattering ‘Holla’, or his ‘Stand, I say’? . . 284
What cares he now for curb or pricking spur?
For ri
ch caparisons or trapping gay?
He sees his love, and nothing else he sees,
Nor nothing else with his proud sight agrees. . .288

Look, when a painter would surpass the life,
In limning out a well-proportion’d steed,
His art with nature’s workmanship at strife,
As if the dead the living should exceed; . . . . 292
So did this horse excel a common one,
In shape, in courage, colour, pace and bone.

Round-hoof’d, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long,
Broad breast, full eye, small head, and nostril wide,
High crest, short ears, straight legs and passing strong,
Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide:
Look, what a horse should have he did not lack,
Save a proud rider on so proud a back. . . . . 300

Sometimes he scuds far off, and there he stares;
Anon he starts at stirring of a feather;
To bid the wind a base he now prepares,
And whe’r he run or fly they know not whether; . . 304
For through his mane and tail the high wind sings,
Fanning the hairs, who wave like feather’d wings.

He looks upon his love, and neighs unto her;
She answers him as if she knew his mind; . . . . 308
Being proud, as females are, to see him woo her,
She puts on outward strangeness, seems unkind,
Spurns at his love and scorns the heat he feels,
Beating his kind embracements with her heels. . .312

Then, like a melancholy malcontent,
He vails his tail, that, like a falling plume,
Cool shadow to his melting buttock lent:
He stamps, and bites the poor flies in his fume. . 316
His love, perceiving how he is enrag’d,
Grew kinder, and his fury was assuag’d.

His testy master goeth about to take him;
When lo! the unback’d breeder, full of fear, . . .320
Jealous of catching, swiftly doth forsake him,
With her the horse, and left Adonis there:
As they were mad, unto the wood they hie them,
Outstripping crows that strive to overfly them. . 324

All swoln with chafing, down Adonis sits,
Banning his boisterous and unruly beast:
And now the happy season once more fits,
That love-sick Love by pleading may be blest; . . 328
For lovers say, the heart hath treble wrong
When it is barr’d the aidance of the tongue.