If the sun's excessive heat

Make our bodies swelter,
To an oaser hedge we get,
For a friendly shelter;
Where, in a dyke,
Perch or pike,
Roach or dace,
We do chase,
Bleak or gudgeon,
Without grudging;

We are still contented.

Or we sometimes pass an hour
Under a green willow,
That defends us from a shower,
Making earth our pillow;
Where we may

Think and pray,
Before death

Stops our breath:

Other joys

Are but toys,
And to be lamented.

OLD TOWLER.

Anonymous. Eighteenth century. The music by W. SHIELD.

BRIGHT chanticleer proclaims the dawn,

And spangles deck the thorn,

The lowing herds now quit the lawn,

The lark springs from the corn:

Dogs, huntsmen, round the window throng,

Fleet Towler leads the cry,

Arise the burden of my song,

This day a stag must die.

With a hey, ho, chevy!

Hark forward, hark forward, tantivy!

Hark! hark! tantivy !

This day a stag must die.

The cordial takes its

merry round,
The laugh and joke prevail,
The huntsman blows a jovial sound,
The dogs snuff up the gale;

The upland wilds they sweep along,
O'er fields, through brakes they fly;
The game is rous'd; too true the song―
This day a stag must die.

With a hey, ho, &c.

Poor stag! the dogs thy haunches gore,
The tears run down thy face,
The huntsman's pleasure is no more,
His joys were in the chase :
Alike the gen'rous sportsman burns
To win the blooming fair;

But yet he honours each by turns,

They each become his care.

With a hey, ho, &c.

THE HIGH-METTLED RACER.

CHARLES DIBDIN.

SEE the course throng'd with gazers, the sports are begun,
What confusion; but hear!—"I'll bet you, sir!"-"Done, done!"
A thousand strange murmurs resound far and near,
Lords, hawkers, and jockeys, assail the tir'd ear;
While, with neck like a rainbow, erecting his crest,

Pamper'd prancing, and pleased, his head touching his breast,
Scarcely snuffing the air, he's so proud and elate,
The high-mettled racer first starts for the plate.

Next Reynard's turn'd out, and o'er hedge and ditch rush
Hounds, horses, and huntsmen, all hard at his brush;
They run him at length, and they have him at bay,
And by scent or by view cheat a long tedious day;

While alike born for sports in the field or the course. Always sure to come thorough-a staunch and fleet horse; And when fairly run down, the fox yields up his breath, The high-mettled racer is in at the death.

Grown aged, used up, and turn'd out of the stud,

Lame, spavin'd, and wind-gall'd, but yet with some blood;
While knowing postilions his pedigree trace,

Tell his dam won that sweepstakes, his sire won that race;
And what matches he'd won too the ostlers count o'er,
As they loiter their time by some hedge-alehouse door;
Whilst the harness sore galls, and the spurs his sides goad,
The high mettled racer's a hack on the road.

At length, old and feeble, trudging early and late,
Bow'd down by diseases, he bends to his fate;
Blind, old, lean, and feeble, he tugs round a mill,
Or draws sand, till the sand of his hour-glass stands still;
And now, cold and lifeless, expos'd to the view
In the very same cart which he yesterday drew,
Whilst a pitying crowd his sad relics surrounds,
The high-mettled racer is sold to the hounds.

THE season's in for partridges,

Let's take our guns and dogs; It sha'nt be said that we're afraid

Of quagmires or of bogs,

When a shooting we do go, do go, do go.
When a shooting we do go.

Now Flora she doth beat the scent,

And after follows Phillis;

Through hedge and brake the way let's take,

For all our aim to kill is,

When a shooting, &c.

And should success attend us,

What pleasure it will prove;

Let's charge, and prime, and lose no time,

While through the fields we rove,

When a shooting, &c.