I saw a river swift, whose fomy billowes
Did wash the ground-work of an old great wall;
I saw it cover’d all with griesly shadowes,
That with black horror did the ayre appall:
Thereout a strange beast with seven heads arose,
That townes and castles under her brest did coure*,
And seem’d both milder beasts and fiercer foes
Alike with equall ravine to devoure.
Much was I mazde to see this monsters kinde
In hundred formes to change his fearefull hew;
When as at length I saw the wrathfull winde,
Which blows cold storms, burst out of Scithian mew,
That sperst these cloudes; and, in so short as thought,
This dreadfull shape was vanished to nought.
[* _Coure_, cover.]