Kynge Harolde Torcie’s trechery dyd spie,
  And hie alofe his temper’d swerde dyd welde,
  Cut offe his arme, and made the bloude to flie,
  His proofe steel armoure did him littel sheelde;
  And not contente, he splete his hede in twaine, 295
  And down he tumbled on the bloudie grounde;
  Mean while the other erlies on the playne
  Gave and received manie a bloudie wounde,
    Such as the arts in warre han learnt with care,
    But manie knyghtes were women in men’s geer. 300

  Herrewald, borne on Sarim’s spreddyng plaine,
  Where Thor’s fam’d temple manie ages stoode;
  Where Druids, auncient preests, did ryghtes ordaine,
  And in the middle shed the victyms bloude;
  Where auncient Bardi dyd their verses synge 305
  Of Caesar conquer’d, and his mighty hoste,
  And how old Tynyan, necromancing kynge,
  Wreck’d all hys shyppyng on the Brittish coaste,
    And made hym in his tatter’d barks to flie,
    ’Till Tynyan’s dethe and opportunity. 310

  To make it more renomed than before,
  (I, tho a Saxon, yet the truthe will telle)
  The Saxonnes steynd the place wyth Brittish gore,
  Where nete but bloud of sacrifices felle. 
  Tho’ Chrystians, stylle they thoghte mouche of the pile, 315
  And here theie mett when causes dyd it neede;
  ’Twas here the auncient Elders of the Isle
  Dyd by the trecherie of Hengist bleede;
    O Hengist! han thy cause bin good and true,
    Thou wouldst such murdrous acts as these eschew. 320

  The erlie was a manne of hie degree,
  And han that daie full manie Normannes sleine;
  Three Norman Champyons of hie degree
  He lefte to smoke upon the bloudie pleine: 
  The Sier Fitzbotevilleine did then advaunce, 325
  And with his bowe he smote the erlies hede;
  Who eftsoons gored hym with his tylting launce,
  And at his horses feet he tumbled dede: 
    His partyng spirit hovered o’er the floude
    Of soddayne roushynge mouche lov’d pourple bloude. 330

  De Viponte then, a squier of low degree,
  An arrowe drewe with all his myghte ameine;
  The arrowe graz’d upon the erlies knee,
  A punie wounde, that causd but littel peine. 
  So have I seene a Dolthead place a stone, 335
  Enthoghte to staie a driving rivers course;
  But better han it bin to lett alone,
  It onlie drives it on with mickle force;
    The erlie, wounded by so base a hynde,
    Rays’d furyous doyngs in his noble mynde. 340