The Sweet Hussy
IN his early days he was quite surprisedWhen she told him she was compromisedBy meetings and lingerings at his whim,And thinking not of herself but him;While she lifted orbs aggrieved and roundThat scandal should so soon abound,(As she had raised them to nine or tenOf antecedent nice young men)And in remorse he thought with a sigh,How good she is, and how bad am I!—It was years before he understoodThat she was the wicked one—he the good.
Words in this poem
- scandal n.
- Offense caused or experienced; reproach or reprobation called forth by what is regarded as wrong, criminal, heinous, or flagrant: opprobrium or disgrace. [F. scandale, fr. L. scandalum, Gr. scandle, OF. escandle. See Slander.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Sweet Hussy is in the public domain. This text is taken from Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with Miscellaneous Pieces, Project Gutenberg ebook #2863; 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 Sweet Hussy, in Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries (1914), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #2863, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hardy-satires/the-sweet-hussy.html, id L24086.
Form and metre
The Sweet Hussy is 12 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 79%).
See other poems in heroic couplets, 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 AABBCCDDEEFF surprisedA · compromisedA · whimB · himB · roundC · aboundC · tenD · menD · sighE · iE · understoodF · goodF
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 |
|---|---|---|
| IN his early days he was quite surprised | 10 | ··/˘····˘/ |
| When she told him she was compromised | 9 | ······/˘· |
| By meetings and lingerings at his whim, | 9 | ·/˘·/˘··· |
| And thinking not of herself but him; | 9 | ·/˘··˘/·· |
| While she lifted orbs aggrieved and round | 9 | ··/˘·˘/·· |
| That scandal should so soon abound, | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| (As she had raised them to nine or ten | 9 | ········· |
| Of antecedent nice young men) | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| And in remorse he thought with a sigh, | 9 | ··˘/····· |
| How good she is, and how bad am I!— | 9 | ········· |
| It was years before he understood | 9 | ·······˘/ |
| That she was the wicked one—he the good. | 10 | ····/˘···· |
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.