| Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904. | | | | Idea | | Sonnet 25. O, why should Nature niggardly restrain | | Michael Drayton (1563–1631) |
| | [First printed in 1599 (No. 25), and in all later editions.] |
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O, WHY should Nature niggardly restrain, | |
| That foreign nations relish not our tongue? | |
| Else should my Lines glide on the waves of Rhine, | |
| And crown the Pyren’s with my living Song. | |
| But bounded thus, to Scotland get you forth! | 5 |
| Thence take you wing unto the Orcades! | |
| There let my Verse get glory in the north, | |
| Making my sighs to thaw the frozen seas. | |
| And let the Bards within that Irish isle, | |
| To whom my Muse with fiery wings shall pass, | 10 |
| Call back the stiff-necked rebels from exile, | |
| And mollify the slaughtering Gallowglass! | |
| And when my flowing Numbers they rehearse, | |
| Let wolves and bears be charmèd with my Verse! | | | |
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