An Old Twenty-Third Man
"Is that the Three-and-Twentieth, Strabo mine,Marching below, and we still gulping wine?"From the sad magic of his fragrant cupThe red-faced old centurion started up,Cursed, battered on the table. "No," he said,"Not that! The Three-and-Twentieth Legion'sdead,Dead in the first year of this damned campaign--The Legion's dead, dead, and won't rise again.Pity? Rome pities her brave lads that die,But we need pity also, you and I,Whom Gallic spear and Belgian arrow miss,Who live to see the Legion come to this,Unsoldierlike, slovenly, bent on loot,Grumblers, diseased, unskilled to thrust or shoot.O, brown cheek, muscled shoulder, sturdythigh!Where are they now? God! watch it struggleby,The sullen pack of ragged ugly swine.Is that the Legion, Gracchus? Quick, thewine!""Strabo," said Gracchus, "you are strange tonight.The Legion is the Legion; it's all right.If these new men are slovenly, in your thinking,God damn it! you'll not better them by drinking.They all try, Strabo; trust their hearts and hands.The Legion is the Legion while Rome stands,And these same men before the autumn's fallShall bang old Vercingetorix out of Gaul."
Words in this poem
- centurion n.
- A military officer who commanded a minor division of the Roman army; a captain of a century. [L. centurio, fr. centuria; cf. F. centurion. See Century.]
- cursed a.
- Deserving a curse; execrable; hateful; detestable; abominable.
- damned a.
- Sentenced to punishment in a future state; condemned; consigned to perdition.
- campaign n.
- An open field; a large, open plain without considerable hills. [F. campagne, It. campagna, fr. L. Campania the level country about Naples, fr. campus field. See Camp, and cf. Champaign, Champagne.]
- belgian a.
- Of or pertaining to Belgium.
- loot n.
- The act of plundering. [Hind. l, Skr. l, l, booty, lup to break, spoil; prob. akin to E. rob.]
- muscled a.
- Furnished with muscles; having muscles; as, things well muscled.
- sullen a.
- Lonely; solitary; desolate. Wyclif (Job iii. 14). [OE. solein, solain, lonely, sullen; through Old French fr. (assumed) LL. solanus solitary, fr. L. solus alone. See Sole, a.]
- tonight adv.
- On this present or coming night. [Prep. to+night]
- damn v. t.
- To condemn; to declare guilty; to doom; to adjudge to punishment; to sentence; to censhure. [OE. damnen dap), OF. damner, dampner, F. damner, fr. L. damnare, damnatum, to condemn, fr. damnum damage, a fine, penalty. Cf. Condemn, Damage.]
- 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,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
An Old Twenty-Third Man is in the public domain. This text is taken from Fairies and Fusiliers, Project Gutenberg ebook #10122; 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 Graves, An Old Twenty-Third Man, in Fairies and Fusiliers (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #10122, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/graves-fairies/an-old-twenty-third-man.html, id L02411.
Form and metre
An Old Twenty-Third Man is 30 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.7 syllables. 5 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 20% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See 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 AABBC-CDDEEFFGG-E-EA-AHHIIJJKK mineA · wineA · cupB · upB · saidC · legion's · deadC · campaignD · againD · dieE · iE · missF · thisF · lootG · shootG · sturdy · thighE · struggle · byE · swineA · the · wineA · tonightH · rightH · thinkingI · drinkingI · handsJ · standsJ · fallK · gaulK
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 |
|---|---|---|
| "Is that the Three-and-Twentieth, Strabo mine, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Marching below, and we still gulping wine?" | 10 | /˘·····/˘· |
| From the sad magic of his fragrant cup | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| The red-faced old centurion started up, | 10 | ····˘/˘/˘· |
| Cursed, battered on the table. "No," he said, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| "Not that! The Three-and-Twentieth Legion's | 10 | ·····/˘˘/˘ |
| dead, | 1 | · |
| Dead in the first year of this damned campaign-- | 10 | ········˘/ |
| The Legion's dead, dead, and won't rise again. | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| Pity? Rome pities her brave lads that die, | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| But we need pity also, you and I, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Whom Gallic spear and Belgian arrow miss, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| Who live to see the Legion come to this, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Unsoldierlike, slovenly, bent on loot, | 10 | ····/˘˘··· |
| Grumblers, diseased, unskilled to thrust or shoot. | 10 | ··˘/˘/···· |
| O, brown cheek, muscled shoulder, sturdy | 10 | ···/˘˘/˘/˘ |
| thigh! | 1 | · |
| Where are they now? God! watch it struggle | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| by, | 1 | · |
| The sullen pack of ragged ugly swine. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| Is that the Legion, Gracchus? Quick, the | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| wine!" | 1 | · |
| "Strabo," said Gracchus, "you are strange tonight. | 10 | ········˘/ |
| The Legion is the Legion; it's all right. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| If these new men are slovenly, in your thinking, | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| God damn it! you'll not better them by drinking. | 11 | ·····/˘··/˘ |
| They all try, Strabo; trust their hearts and hands. | 10 | ·········· |
| The Legion is the Legion while Rome stands, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| And these same men before the autumn's fall | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Shall bang old Vercingetorix out of Gaul." | 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.