dots-menu
×

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
England: Vols. I–IV. 1876–79.

Plymouth

Plymouth

By Michael Drayton (1563–1631)

(From Poly-Olbion)

Corineus and Gogmagog

ALL doubtful to which part the victory would go

Upon that lofty place at Plymouth called the Hoe,

Those mighty wrestlers met; with many an ireful look

Who threatened, as the one hold of the other took:

But, grappled, glowing fire shines in their sparkling eyes.

And whilst at length of arm one from the other lies,

Their lusty sinews swell like cables, as they strive:

Their feet such trampling make, as though they forced to drive

A thunder out of earth, which staggered with the weight:

Thus either’s utmost force urged to the greatest height,

Whilst one upon his hip the other seeks to lift,

And the adverse (by a turn) doth from his cunning shift,

Their short-fetched troubled breath a hollow noise doth make

Like bellows of a forge. Then Corin up doth take

The giant ’twixt the grains; and voiding of his hold

(Before his cumberous feet he well recover could)

Pitched headlong from the hill; as when a man doth throw

An axtree, that with slight delivered from the toe

Roots up the yielding earth; so that his violent fall

Strook Neptune with such strength, as shouldered him withal;

That where the monstrous waves like mountains late did stand,

They leaped out of the place, and left the bared sand

To gaze upon wide Heaven: so great a blow it gave.

For which the conquering brute on Corineus brave

This horn of land bestowed, and marked it with his name;

Of Corin, Cornwal called, to his immortal fame.

*****