Whose lair is in the wood, sore-famish’d grind

Their sounding jaws, and froz’n and quaking fly

Where oaks the mountain dells imbranch on high:

They seek to couch in thickets of the glen,

Or lurk deep-shelter’d in the rocky den.

[102]Like aged men who, prop’d on crutches, tread

Tottering with broken strength and stooping head,

So move the beasts of earth; and creeping low

Shun the white flakes and dread the drifting snow.

I warn thee, now, around thy body cast,