And ay the lord of the land is laiking afield, + 

Hunting the hinds by holt and by heath: + 

Such a sum had he slain, when the sun slanted, + 

Of does and other deer, to deem of were wonder. + 

Then they flock’d in full fain, the folk at the last, + 

And quickly of the kill a quarry they made. + 

Those of rank were ready, and right as they should + 

Gather’d the greatest of grease that were there, + 

And had them deftly undone, all duly by law; + 

Sóme by assay searchèd them too, + 

And found two fingers of fat in the poorest. + 

Then they slit up the slot, and, seizing the arber, + 

With a sharp knife shore it, and sewed it again; + 

Next they sever’d the legs and stript off the hide, + 

Broke up the belly, and the bowels took out; + 

Then gripp’d they the gargilon, and graithly departed + 

The weasand from the wind-hole, and wound out the guts; + 

Shore off the shoulders with their shárp blàdes, + 

And máde a líttle hole to líft them, to leave whole sides. + 

Then rived they the breast and broke it in two, + 

And again at the gargilon got them to work, + 

Ripp’d the flesh readily, right to the fork, + 

Voided out the avanters, and featly thereafter + 

The membranes lanced along by the ribs; + 

Last, they clove a clear way, close by the backbone, + 

E’en to the haunch; it was all whole still, + 

And they heav’d it up whole, then hew’d off the loin, + 

And the offals that they name the numbles, I trow, + 

by kind; + 

Along the fork o’ the thigh, + 

The laps they lance behind; + 

To hew in two they hie, + 

By the backbone to unbind. + 