University of Virginia Library

Search this document 
The Whole Works of William Browne

of Tavistock ... Now first collected and edited, with a memoir of the poet, and notes, by W. Carew Hazlitt, of the Inner Temple

collapse section1, 2. 
expand section 
expand section 
expand section 
expand section 

Neere to the shore that bord'red on the Rocke
No merry Swaine was seene to feed his Flocke,
No lusty Neat-heard thither droue his Kine,
Nor boorish Hog-heard fed his rooting Swine:
A stony ground it was, sweet Herbage fail'd:
Nought there but weeds, which Limos, strongly nail'd,
Tore from their mothers brest, to stuffe his maw.
No Crab-tree bore his load, nor Thorne his paw.
As in a Forest well compleat with Deere
We see the Hollies, Ashes, euery where
Rob'd of their cloathing by the browsing Game:
So neere the Rocke, all trees where e're you came,
To cold Decembers wrath stood void of barke.
Here danc'd no Nymph, no early-rising Larke
Sung vp the Plow-man and his drowsie mate:
All round the Rocke['s] barren and desolate.