The Dolls
“WHENEVER you dress me dolls, mammy,Why do you dress them so,And make them gallant soldiers,When never a one I know;And not as gentle ladiesWith frills and frocks and curls,As people dress the dolliesOf other little girls?”
Ah—why did she not answer:—“Because your mammy’s heedIs always gallant soldiers,As well may be, indeed.One of them was your daddy,His name I must not tell;He’s not the dad who lives here,But one I love too well.”
Words in this poem
- mammy n.
- A child's name for mamma, mother.
- daddy n.
- Diminutive of Dad.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Dolls is in the public domain. This text is taken from Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses, Project Gutenberg ebook #3255; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Hardy, The Dolls, in Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3255, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hardy-moments-of-vision/the-dolls.html, id L24185.
Form and metre
The Dolls is 16 lines in 2 stanzas of 8 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%).
See other poems in iambic 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-B-B mammy · soA · soldiers · knowA · ladies · curlsB · dollies · girlsB
- 2 -A-A-B-B answer · heedA · soldiers · indeedA · daddy · tellB · here · wellB
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| “WHENEVER you dress me dolls, mammy, | 9 | ˘/˘····/˘ |
| Why do you dress them so, | 6 | ······ |
| And make them gallant soldiers, | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| When never a one I know; | 7 | ·/˘···· |
| And not as gentle ladies | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| With frills and frocks and curls, | 6 | ······ |
| As people dress the dollies | 7 | ·/˘··/˘ |
| Of other little girls?” | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| Ah—why did she not answer:— | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| “Because your mammy’s heed | 6 | ······ |
| Is always gallant soldiers, | 7 | ·/·/˘/˘ |
| As well may be, indeed. | 6 | ····˘/ |
| One of them was your daddy, | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| His name I must not tell; | 6 | ······ |
| He’s not the dad who lives here, | 7 | ······· |
| But one I love too well.” | 6 | ······ |
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.