amon and Arcite, Pt. III_. J. DRYDEN.
Round-hoofed, 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.
_Venus and Adonis_. SHAKESPEARE.
Oft in this season too the horse, provoked
While his big sinews full of spirits swell,
Trembling with vigor, in the heat of blood,
Springs the high fence.... his nervous chest,
Luxuriant and erect, the seat of strength!
_The Seasons: Summer_. J. THOMSON.
Champing his foam, and bounding o'er the plain,
Arch his high neck, and graceful spread his mane.
_The Courser_. SIR R. BLACKMORE.
Is it the wind those branches stirs?
No, no! from out the forest prance
A trampling troop; I see them come!
In one vast squadron they advance!
I strove to cry,--my lips were dumb.
The steeds rush on in plunging pride;
But where are they the reins to guide!
A thousand horse,--and none to ride!
With flowing tail, and flying mane,
Wide nostrils, never stretched by pain,
Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,
And feet that iron never shod,
And flanks unscarred by spur or rod,
A thousand horse, the wild, the free,
Like waves that follow o'er the sea,
Came thickly thundering on.
_Mazeppa_. LORD BYRON.
I holde a mouses herte nat worth a leek.
That hath but oon hole for to sterte to.
_Preamble, Wyves Tale of Bath_. CHAUCER.
When now, unsparing as the scourge of war,
Blast follow blasts and groves dismantled roar;
Around their home the storm-pinched cattle lows,
No nourishment in frozen pasture grows.
_The Farmer's Boy: Winter_. R. BLOOMFIELD.
Rural confusion! on the grassy bank
Some ruminating lie; while others stand
Half in the flood, and, often bending, sip
The circling surface. In the middle droops
The strong laborious ox, of honest front,
Which incomposed he shakes; and from his sides
The troublous insects lashes with his tail,
Returning still.
_The Seasons: Summer_. J. THOMSON.
Tossed from rock to rock,
Incessant bleatings run around the hills.
At last, of snowy white, the gathered flocks
Are in the wattled pen innumerous pressed,
Head above head: and ranged in lusty rows,
The shepherds sit, and whet the sounding shears.
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