Had Orpheus sung it in the nether sphere, So much the hymn had pleased the tyrant's ear, The wife had been detain'd, to keep the husband there. My lord, your sire familiarly I knew, A peer deserving such a son as you: He, with your lady-mother (whom Heaven rest!) 610 Has often graced my house, and been my guest; To view his living features does me good, For I am your poor neighbour in the wood; And in my cottage should be proud to see The worthy heir of my friend's family. But since I speak of singing, let me say, As with an upright heart I safely may, That, save yourself, there breathes not on the ground One like your father for a silver sound. So sweetly would he wake the winter day, 620 That matrons to the church mistook their way, And thought they heard the merry organ play. And he, to raise his voice, with artful care, (What will not beaux attempt to please the fair?) On tiptoe stood to sing with greater strength, And stretch'd his comely neck at all the length: And while he strain'd his voice to pierce the skies, As saints in raptures use, would shut his eyes, That the sound striving through the narrow throat, His winking might avail to mend the note, 630 By this, in song, he never had his peer, From sweet Cecilia down to Chanticleer; Nor Maro's muse, who sung the mighty Man, Nor Pindar's heavenly lyre, nor Horace when a swan. Your ancestors proceed from race divine: From Brennus and Belinus is your line; Who gave to sovereign Rome such loud alarms, That even the priests were not excused from arms. Besides, a famous monk of modern times Has left of cocks recorded in his rhymes, 640 That of a parish priest the son and heir (When sons of priests were from the proverb clear), Affronted once a cock of noble kind, And either lamed his legs, or struck him blind; For which the clerk his father was disgraced, And in his benefice another placed. Now sing, my lord, if not for love of me, Yet for the sake of sweet Saint Charity; Make hills and dales, and earth and heaven rejoice, And emulate your father's angel-voice. 650 The cock was pleased to hear him speak so fair, And proud beside, as solar people are; Nor could the treason from the truth descry, So was he ravish'd with this flattery; So much the more, as from a little elf He had a high opinion of himself; Though sickly, slender, and not large of limb, Concluding all the world was made for him. Ye princes, raised by poets to the gods, And Alexander'd[72] up in lying odes! 660 Believe not every flattering knave's report, There's many a Reynard lurking in the court; And he shall be received with more regard, And listen'd to, than modest truth is heard.