Canto I XLVI
Enough of Battle's minions! let them playTheir game of lives, and barter breath for fame:Fame that will scarce reanimate their clay,Though thousands fall to deck some single name.In sooth, 'twere sad to thwart their noble aimWho strike, blest hirelings! for their country's good,And die, that living might have proved her shame;Perished, perchance, in some domestic feud,Or in a narrower sphere wild Rapine's path pursued.
Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely wayWhere proud Sevilla triumphs unsubdued:Yet is she free--the spoiler's wished-for prey!Soon, soon shall Conquest's fiery foot intrude,Blackening her lovely domes with traces rude.Inevitable hour! 'Gainst fate to striveWhere Desolation plants her famished broodIs vain, or Ilion, Tyre, might yet survive,And Virtue vanquish all, and Murder cease to thrive.
But all unconscious of the coming doom,The feast, the song, the revel here abounds;Strange modes of merriment the hours consume,Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds;Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck sounds;Here Folly still his votaries enthralls,And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds:Girt with the silent crimes of capitals,Still to the last kind Vice clings to the tottering walls.
Words in this poem
- scarce a.
- Not plentiful or abundant; in small quantity in proportion to the demand; not easily to be procured; rare; uncommon. [OE. scars, OF. escars, eschars, LL. scarpsus, for L. excerptus, p. p. of excerpere to pick out, and hence to contract, to shorten; ex (see Ex-) + carpere. See C]
- sooth a.
- True; faithful; trustworthy. [OE. soth, AS. s, for san; akin to OS. s, OHG. sand, Icel. sannr, Sw. sann, Dan. sand, Skr. sat, sant, real, genuine, present, being; properly p. pr. from a root]
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- desolation n.
- The act of desolating or laying waste; destruction of inhabitants; depopulation. [F. désolation, L. desolatio.]
- tyre n.
- Attire. See 2d and 3d Tire.
- clarion n.
- A kind of trumpet, whose note is clear and shrill. [OE. clarioun, OF. clarion, F. clairon, LL. clario, claro; so called from its clear tone, fr. L. clarus clear. See Clear.]
- girt v. t.
- To gird; to encircle; to invest by means of a girdle; to measure the girth of; as, to girt a tree. [From Girt, n., cf. Girth, v.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Canto I XLVI is in the public domain. This text is taken from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Project Gutenberg ebook #5131; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lord Byron, Canto I XLVI, in Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1812–1818), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #5131, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/byron-childe-harold/canto-i-xlvi.html, id L06491.
Form and metre
Canto I XLVI is 27 lines in 3 stanzas of 9 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABBCBCC, the Spenserian stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%). 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 18% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in the Spenserian stanza, other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABABBCBCC playA · fameB · clayA · nameB · aimB · goodC · shameB · feudC · pursuedC
- 2 ABABBCBCC wayA · unsubduedB · preyA · intrudeB · rudeB · striveC · broodB · surviveC · thriveC
- 3 ABABBCBCC doomA · aboundsB · consumeA · woundsB · soundsB · enthrallsC · roundsB · capitalsC · wallsC
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 iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Enough of Battle's minions! let them play | 10 | ˘/·/˘/˘··· |
| Their game of lives, and barter breath for fame: | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Fame that will scarce reanimate their clay, | 10 | ····˘/˘˘·· |
| Though thousands fall to deck some single name. | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| In sooth, 'twere sad to thwart their noble aim | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Who strike, blest hirelings! for their country's good, | 11 | ········/˘· |
| And die, that living might have proved her shame; | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Perished, perchance, in some domestic feud, | 10 | /˘˘/··˘/˘· |
| Or in a narrower sphere wild Rapine's path pursued. | 12 | ···/˘·····˘/ |
| Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely way | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| Where proud Sevilla triumphs unsubdued: | 10 | ··˘/˘/˘··˘ |
| Yet is she free--the spoiler's wished-for prey! | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Soon, soon shall Conquest's fiery foot intrude, | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Blackening her lovely domes with traces rude. | 10 | /˘·/˘··/˘· |
| Inevitable hour! 'Gainst fate to strive | 10 | ˘/˘˘˘/···· |
| Where Desolation plants her famished brood | 10 | ··˘/˘····· |
| Is vain, or Ilion, Tyre, might yet survive, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And Virtue vanquish all, and Murder cease to thrive. | 12 | ·/˘/˘··/˘··· |
| But all unconscious of the coming doom, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| The feast, the song, the revel here abounds; | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| Strange modes of merriment the hours consume, | 10 | ···/˘˘·/˘/ |
| Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck sounds; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Here Folly still his votaries enthralls, | 9 | ·/˘····˘/ |
| And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds: | 10 | ·······/·· |
| Girt with the silent crimes of capitals, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘˘ |
| Still to the last kind Vice clings to the tottering walls. | 12 | ·········/˘· |
Notes from the edition 3
E. H. Coleridge's notes to Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, The Works of Lord Byron, Poetry vol. II (John Murray, 1899; Project Gutenberg #25340). Bracketed passages are the editor's; unbracketed are Byron's own (Cantos I-III) or John Cam Hobhouse's (Canto IV, his 'Historical Notes'). Digit footnotes ('[17]') are informational and numbered continuously through the whole book; end-notes keyed '[n.B.]' (Byron) or '[n.H.]' (Hobhouse) follow each canto and are numbered afresh from 1 there. Both kinds are placed here by matching each note's own quoted words against the site's text, not by the number or stanza the note states, because the site's text (Gutenberg #5131) and this edition (#25340) are different editions with different stanza counts in Canto I. Lettered footnotes ('[h]', '[dn]') are manuscript and edition variant readings and are not harvested, matching the treatment of Don Juan's and byron-works-3's lettered notes.
- Stanza 2, line 1 [In this "particular" Childe Harold did not resemble his alter ego. Hobhouse and "part of the servants" (Joe Murray, Fletcher, a German, and the "page" Robert Rushton, constituted his "whole suite"), accompanied Byron in his ride across Spain from Lisbon to Gibraltar. (See Letters, 1898, i. 224, 236.)]
- Stanza 3, line 1 [Byron, en route for Gibraltar, passed three days at Seville at the end of July or the beginning of August, 1809. By the end of January, 1810, the French had appeared in force before Seville. Unlike Zaragoza and Gerona, the pleasure-loving city, "after some negotiations, surrendered, with all its stores, foundries, and arsenal complete, and on the 1st of February the king [Joseph] entered in triumph" (Napier's History of the War in the Peninsula, ii. 295).]
- Stanza 3, line 5 [A kind of fiddle with only two strings, played on by a bow, said to have been brought by the Moors into Spain.]
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.