A Sonnet occasioned by the bad Weather which hindred the Sports at Newmarket in January 1616.
This is printed from Drummond of Hawthornden's works, folio: where also may be seen some verses of Lord Stirling's upon this Sonnet, which concludes with the finest Anticlimax I remember to have seen.
How cruelly these catives do conspire?
What loathsome love breeds such a baleful band
Betwixt the cankred king of Creta land,[820]
That melancholy old and angry sire,
And him, who wont to quench debate and ire 5
Among the Romans, when his ports were clos'd?[821]
But now his double face is still dispos'd,
With Saturn's help, to freeze us at the fire.
The earth ore-covered with a sheet of snow,
Refuses food to fowl, to bird, and beast: 10
The chilling cold lets every thing to grow,
And surfeits cattle with a starving feast.
Curs'd be that love and mought[822] continue short,
Which kills all creatures, and doth spoil our sport.