Lady Onlie, Honest Lucky
A’ The lads o’ Thorniebank,When they gae to the shore o’ Bucky,They’ll step in an’ tak a pintWi’ Lady Onlie, honest Lucky.
Chorus.—Lady Onlie, honest Lucky,Brews gude ale at shore o’ Bucky;I wish her sale for her gude ale,The best on a’ the shore o’ Bucky.
Her house sae bien, her curch sae cleanI wat she is a daintie chuckie;And cheery blinks the ingle-gleedO’ Lady Onlie, honest Lucky!Lady Onlie, &c.
Words in this poem
- ingle n.
- Flame; blaze; a fire; a fireplace. Burns. Ingle nock, the chimney corner. [Gael. & Ir. aingeali fire; cf. L. igniculusi spark, dim. of ignis fire. Cf. Ignite.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Lady Onlie, Honest Lucky is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, Project Gutenberg ebook #1279; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Robert Burns, Lady Onlie, Honest Lucky, in Poems and Songs (1786–1796), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1279, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/burns-poems/lady-onlie-honest-lucky.html, id L03100.
Form and metre
Lady Onlie, Honest Lucky is 13 lines in 3 stanzas. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 82%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.2 syllables. 7 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 23% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 -A-A thorniebank · buckyA · pint · luckyA
- 2 AA-A luckyA · buckyA · ale · buckyA
- 3 -A-A- clean · chuckieA · gleed · luckyA · —
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| A’ The lads o’ Thorniebank, | 7 | ······· |
| When they gae to the shore o’ Bucky, | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| They’ll step in an’ tak a pint | 7 | ······· |
| Wi’ Lady Onlie, honest Lucky. | 9 | ·/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Chorus.—Lady Onlie, honest Lucky, | 10 | /˘/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Brews gude ale at shore o’ Bucky; | 8 | ······/˘ |
| I wish her sale for her gude ale, | 8 | ········ |
| The best on a’ the shore o’ Bucky. | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| Her house sae bien, her curch sae clean | 8 | ········ |
| I wat she is a daintie chuckie; | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| And cheery blinks the ingle-gleed | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| O’ Lady Onlie, honest Lucky! | 9 | ·/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Lady Onlie, &c. | 5 | /˘··· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.