1. Thousands I have hunted, undaunted
In my mail coat wide and roomy,

2. With my burnished embossed breastplate,
My plumed helm, my byrnie jangling,

3. My lance with its hooked point grating,
My sword in its jewelled scabbard;

4. And on battle-chargers I ride,
In fierce onset impatient, not biding.

5. I espied a score of wild asses
That grazed by a thicketed hollow,

6. Then swerved from their morning carousal,
And charged, as I shouted to rouse all-

7. I bent down my lance for the onset,
They turned to the waste, pellmell posted;

8. I followed on one, and down bore him
Prone with a stroke, ere his friends missed.