Song of Saul Before His Last Battle
Warriors and chiefs! should the shaft or the swordPierce me in leading the host of the Lord,Heed not the corse, though a King's, in your path:lpBury your steel in the bosoms of Gath!
Thou who art bearing my buckler and bow,lqShould the soldiers of Saul look away from the foe,Stretch me that moment in blood at thy feet!Mine be the doom which they dared not to meet.
Farewell to others, but never we part,Heir to my Royalty--Son of my heart!lrBright is the diadem, boundless the sway,Or kingly the death, which awaits us to-day!
Words in this poem
- corse n.
- A living body or its bulk. [OF. cors, F. corps. See Corpse.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Song of Saul Before His Last Battle is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 3, Project Gutenberg ebook #21811; 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, Song of Saul Before His Last Battle, in The Giaour, and Other Poems (1816), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #21811, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/byron-works-3/song-of-saul-before-his-last-battle.html, id L23952.
Form and metre
Song of Saul Before His Last Battle is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines. The metre is dactylic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 81%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in dactylic 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 AA-- swordA · lordA · path:lp · gath
- 2 --AA bow,lq · foe · feetA · meetA
- 3 --AA part · heart!lr · swayA · dayA
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 dactylic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Warriors and chiefs! should the shaft or the sword | 10 | /˘········ |
| Pierce me in leading the host of the Lord, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Heed not the corse, though a King's, in your path:lp | 12 | ··········// |
| Bury your steel in the bosoms of Gath! | 10 | /˘····/˘·· |
| Thou who art bearing my buckler and bow,lq | 11 | ···/˘·/˘··· |
| Should the soldiers of Saul look away from the foe, | 12 | ··/˘···˘/··· |
| Stretch me that moment in blood at thy feet! | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Mine be the doom which they dared not to meet. | 10 | ·········· |
| Farewell to others, but never we part, | 10 | ·/·/˘·/˘·· |
| Heir to my Royalty--Son of my heart!lr | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Bright is the diadem, boundless the sway, | 10 | ···/˘·/˘·· |
| Or kingly the death, which awaits us to-day! | 11 | ·/˘···˘/··· |
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.