Mary Trevellyn to Miss Roper.—at Lucca Baths
You are at Lucca baths, you tell me, to stay for the summer;Florence was quite too hot; you can't move further at present.Will you not come, do you think, before the summer is over?Mr. C. got you out with very considerable trouble;And he was useful and kind, and seemed so happy to serve you.Didn't stay with you long, but talked very openly to you;Made you almost his confessor, without appearing to know it,--What about?--and you say you didn't need his confessions.O my dear Miss Roper, I dare not trust what you tell me!Will he come, do you think? I am really so sorry for him.They didn't give him my letter at Milan, I feel pretty certain.You had told him Bellaggio. We didn't go to Bellaggio;So he would miss our track, and perhaps never come to Lugano,Where we were written in full, To Lucerne across the St. Gothard.But he could write to you;--you would tell him where you were going.
Words in this poem
- roper n.
- A maker of ropes. P. Plowman.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Mary Trevellyn to Miss Roper.—at Lucca Baths is in the public domain. This text is taken from Amours De Voyage, Project Gutenberg ebook #1393; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Arthur Hugh Clough, Mary Trevellyn to Miss Roper.—at Lucca Baths, in Amours de Voyage (1858), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1393, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/clough-amours/mary-trevellyn-to-miss-roper-at-lucca-baths.html, id L01608.
Form and metre
Mary Trevellyn to Miss Roper.—at Lucca Baths is 15 lines in a single verse paragraph. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. 76% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 15.2 syllables. 8 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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--------- summer · present · over · trouble · youA · youA · it · confessions · me · him · certain · bellaggio · lugano · gothard · going
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| You are at Lucca baths, you tell me, to stay for the summer; | 15 | ···/˘········/˘ |
| Florence was quite too hot; you can't move further at present. | 14 | /˘·······/˘·/˘ |
| Will you not come, do you think, before the summer is over? | 15 | ··········/˘··· |
| Mr. C. got you out with very considerable trouble; | 16 | /˘·····/˘˘/˘˘˘/˘ |
| And he was useful and kind, and seemed so happy to serve you. | 15 | ···/˘·····/˘··· |
| Didn't stay with you long, but talked very openly to you; | 15 | /˘······/˘/˘˘·· |
| Made you almost his confessor, without appearing to know it,-- | 16 | ··/··˘/˘··˘/˘··· |
| What about?--and you say you didn't need his confessions. | 14 | ·······/˘··˘/˘ |
| O my dear Miss Roper, I dare not trust what you tell me! | 14 | ····/˘········ |
| Will he come, do you think? I am really so sorry for him. | 15 | ········/˘·/˘·· |
| They didn't give him my letter at Milan, I feel pretty certain. | 17 | ·/˘···/˘·/···/˘/˘ |
| You had told him Bellaggio. We didn't go to Bellaggio; | 15 | ········/˘····· |
| So he would miss our track, and perhaps never come to Lugano, | 16 | ····/··˘//˘··˘/˘ |
| Where we were written in full, To Lucerne across the St. Gothard. | 16 | ···/˘···/˘˘/··/˘ |
| But he could write to you;--you would tell him where you were going. | 15 | ·············/˘ |
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.