The word "stoops" in l.10 is the key to this poem; all the Duke's tenderness is for the emblems of his power, the executors of his commands, who do his dirty work for him while allowing him to remain upright, at least in his mind--as Mr. Wilbur says, his affection is misplaced.
I wonder if when this was workshopped no one else was bothered by the syntactically similar rhyme pair of "trout-streamed and wooded" / "gold-belled and hooded," combined with the appositives "his feathered treasure" and "a grey-fletched arrow" (of which the last is the best). One might argue that the patterning reflects the artificiality of such a royal hunt -- the way everything is done for the Duke, so he does no stooping himself -- but even granting this, it grates on my ear a little bit. All in all, though, a fine sonnet.
Chris
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