This Chanticleer, of whom the story sings,
  Stood high upon his toes, and clapp’d his wings;
  Then stretch’d his neck, and wink d with both his eyes,
  Ambitious as he sought the Olympic prize. 
  But while he pain’d himself to raise his note,
  False Renyard rush’d and caught him by the throat. 670
  Then on his back he laid the precious load,
  And sought his wonted shelter of the wood;
  Swiftly he made his way the mischief done,
  Of all unheeded, and pursued by none.

    Alas, what stay is there in human state! 
  Or who can shun inevitable fate? 
  The doom was written, the decree was pass’d,
  Ere the foundations of the world were cast! 
  In Aries though the sun exalted stood,
  His patron-planet, to procure his good; 680
  Yet Saturn was his mortal foe, and he,
  In Libra raised, opposed the same degree: 
  The rays both good and bad, of equal power,
  Each thwarting other, made a mingled hour.

    On Friday morn he dreamt this direful dream,
  Cross to the worthy native, in his scheme! 
  Ah, blissful Venus, Goddess of delight! 
  How couldst thou suffer thy devoted knight
  On thy own day to fall by foe oppress’d,
  The wight of all the world who served thee best? 690
  Who, true to love, was all for recreation,
  And minded not the work of propagation. 
  Ganfride,[73] who couldst so well in rhyme complain
  The death of Richard with an arrow slain,
  Why had not I thy muse, or thou my heart,
  To sing this heavy dirge with equal art? 
  That I, like thee, on Friday might complain;
  For on that day was Coeur de Lion slain.

    Not louder cries, when Ilium was in flames,
  Were sent to Heaven by woful Trojan dames, 700
  When Pyrrhus toss’d on high his burnish’d blade,
  And offer’d Priam to his father’s shade,
  Than for the cock the widow’d poultry made. 
  Fair Partlet first, when he was borne from sight,
  With sovereign shrieks bewail’d her captive knight: 
  Far louder than the Carthaginian wife,
  When Asdrubal, her husband, lost his life;
  When she beheld the smouldering flames ascend,
  And all the Punic glories at an end: 
  Willing into the fires she plunged her head, 710
  With greater ease than others seek their bed. 
  Not more aghast the matrons of renown,
  When tyrant Nero burn’d the imperial town,
  Shriek’d for the downfall in a doleful cry,
  For which their guiltless lords were doom’d to die.

    Now to my story I return again: 
  The trembling widow, and her daughters twain,
  This woful cackling cry with horror heard,
  Of those distracted damsels in the yard;
  And starting up beheld the heavy sight, 720
  How Reynard to the forest took his flight,
  And ’cross his back, as in triumphant scorn,
  The hope and pillar of the house was borne.