[Page 116]

The LORD and the BRAMBLE

1 TO view his stately Walks and Groves,
2 A Man of Pow'r and Place
3 Was hast'ning on; but as he roves,
4 His Foe the slighted Bramble proves,
5 And stops his eager Pace.
6 That Shrub was qualify'd to Bite;
7 And now there went a Tale,
8 That this injurious partial Wight
9 Had bid his Gard'ner rid it quite,
10 And throw it o'er the Pail.
11 Often the Bry'r had wish'd to speak,
12 That this might not be done;
13 But from the Abject and the Weak,
14 Who no important Figure make,
15 What Statesman does not run?
[Page 117]
16 But clinging now about his Waste,
17 Ere he had time to fly,
18 My Lord (quoth he) for all your haste,
19 I'll know why I must be displac'd,
20 And 'mongst the Rubbish lie.
21 Must none but buffle-headed Trees
22 Within your Ground be seen?
23 Or tap'ring Yews here court the Breeze,
24 That, like some Beaux whom Time does freeze,
25 At once look Old and Green?
26 I snarl, 'tis true, and sometimes scratch
27 A tender-footed Squire;
28 Who does a rugged Tartar catch,
29 When me he thinks to over-match,
30 And jeers for my Attire.
[Page 118]
31 As to Yourself, who 'gainst me fret,
32 E'en give this Project o'er:
33 For know, where'er my Root is set,
34 These rambling Twigs will Passage get,
35 And vex you more and more.
36 No Wants, no Threatnings, nor the Jail
37 Will curb an angry Wit:
38 Then think not to chastise, or rail;
39 Appease the Man, if you'd prevail,
40 Who some sharp Satire writ.

Text

  • TEI/XML [chunk] (XML - 75K / ZIP - 8.5K) / ECPA schema (RNC - 357K / ZIP - 73K)
  • Plain text [excluding paratexts] (TXT - 1.3K / ZIP - 968 )

Facsimile (Source Edition)

(Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Buxton 100].)

Images

PDF

All Images (PDF - 3.7M)

About this text

Title (in Source Edition): The LORD and the BRAMBLE
Themes:
Genres: satire

Text view / Document view

Source edition

Winchilsea, Anne Kingsmill Finch, Countess of, 1661-1720. Miscellany poems, on several occasions: Written by the Right Honble Anne, Countess of Winchilsea. London: printed for J. B. and sold by Benj. Tooke, William Taylor, and James Round, 1713, pp. 116-118. [8],390p. ; 8⁰. (ESTC T94539; Foxon pp. 274-5; OTA K076314.000) (Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Buxton 100].)

Editorial principles

The text has been typographically modernized, but without any silent modernization of spelling, capitalization, or punctuation. The source of the text is given and all editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. Based on the electronic text originally produced by the TCP project, this ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.

Other works by Anne Finch (née Kingsmill), countess of Winchilsea