Page:The Works of Alexander Pope (1717).djvu/89
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WINDSOR-FOREST.
53
Our haughty Norman boasts that barb'rous name,
And makes his trembling slaves the royal game.
The [1]fields are ravish'd from th' industrious swains,
From Men their cities, and from Gods their fanes:
The levell'd towns with weeds lie cover'd o'er;
The hollow winds thro' naked Temples roar;
Round broken columns clasping Ivy twin'd;
O'er heaps of ruin stalk'd the ſtately hind;
The fox obscene to gaping tombs retires,
And wolves with howling fill the sacred Quires.
Aw'd by his Nobles, by his Commons curst,
Th' oppressor rul'd tyrannic where he durst,
Stretch'd o'er the Poor, and Church, his iron rod,
And treats alike his Vassals and his God.
Whom ev'n the Saxon spar'd, and bloody Dane,
The wanton victims of his Sport remain.
But see the man who spacious regions gave
A Waste for beasts, himself deny'd a grave!
And makes his trembling slaves the royal game.
The [1]fields are ravish'd from th' industrious swains,
From Men their cities, and from Gods their fanes:
The levell'd towns with weeds lie cover'd o'er;
The hollow winds thro' naked Temples roar;
Round broken columns clasping Ivy twin'd;
O'er heaps of ruin stalk'd the ſtately hind;
The fox obscene to gaping tombs retires,
And wolves with howling fill the sacred Quires.
Aw'd by his Nobles, by his Commons curst,
Th' oppressor rul'd tyrannic where he durst,
Stretch'd o'er the Poor, and Church, his iron rod,
And treats alike his Vassals and his God.
Whom ev'n the Saxon spar'd, and bloody Dane,
The wanton victims of his Sport remain.
But see the man who spacious regions gave
A Waste for beasts, himself deny'd a grave!
- ↑ Alluding to the new forest, and the tyrannies exercis'd there by William the first.
Stretch'd