Choleric should be the answer
<span>The answer is "The excerpt compares the tree to a person, which makes readers feel sympathetic toward the tree." </span>
True? Like when you abbreviate in a text.
<span>L'Allegro
"Married to immortal verse,
Such as the meeting soul may pierce
In notes with many a winding bout,
Of linked sweetness long drawn out,"
This is in contrast with those ideas :)</span>
To understand this phrase you have to analyze it in pieces.
Courtier is a word to describe a person that goes to the court to present, in this case, poetry. The court was the place where the powerful people (kings, princes, queens, royal governors...) of society would go to have a different kind of reunions and presentations.
Middling is a word that was used as a synonym for standard, regular. Here it means that the poet is not particularly bright, not all that talented.