In the Dials
TO Garryowen upon an organ groundTwo girls are jigging. Riotously they trip,With eyes aflame, quick bosoms, hand on hip,As in the tumult of a witches’ round.Youngsters and youngsters round them prance and bound.Two solemn babes twirl ponderously, and skip.The artist’s teeth gleam from his bearded lip.High from the kennel howls a tortured hound.The music reels and hurtles, and the nightIs full of stinks and cries; a naphtha-lightFlares from a barrow; battered and obtusedWith vices, wrinkles, life and work and rags,Each with her inch of clay, two loitering hagsLook on dispassionate—critical—something ’mused.
Words in this poem
- jigging n.
- The act or using a jig; the act of separating ore with a jigger, or wire-bottomed sieve, which is moved up and down in water.
- aflame adv.
- Inflames; glowing with light or passion; ablaze. G. Eliot. [Pref. a- + flame.]
- twirl v. t.
- To move or turn round rapidly; to whirl round; to move and turn rapidly with the fingers. [Cf. AS. þwiril a churn staff, a stirrer, flail, þweran, aþweran, to agitate, twirl, G. zwirlen, quirlen, to twirl, to turn round or about, quirl a twirling stic]
- ponderously adv.
- In a ponderous manner.
- kennel n.
- The water course of a street; a little canal or channel; a gutter; also, a puddle. Bp. Hall. [See Channel, Canal.]
- dispassionate a.
- Free from passion; not warped, prejudiced, swerved, or carried away by passion or feeling; judicial; calm; composed.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
In the Dials is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #1568; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: W. E. Henley, In the Dials, in Poems (1898), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1568, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/henley-poems/in-the-dials.html, id L12376.
Form and metre
In the Dials is 14 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 57% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 36% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABBAABBACC-DD- groundA · tripB · hipB · roundA · boundA · skipB · lipB · houndA · nightC · lightC · obtused · ragsD · hagsD · mused
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 |
|---|---|---|
| TO Garryowen upon an organ ground | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Two girls are jigging. Riotously they trip, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| With eyes aflame, quick bosoms, hand on hip, | 10 | ··˘/·/˘··· |
| As in the tumult of a witches’ round. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Youngsters and youngsters round them prance and bound. | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| Two solemn babes twirl ponderously, and skip. | 11 | ·/˘··/˘˘˘·· |
| The artist’s teeth gleam from his bearded lip. | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| High from the kennel howls a tortured hound. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| The music reels and hurtles, and the night | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| Is full of stinks and cries; a naphtha-light | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Flares from a barrow; battered and obtused | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| With vices, wrinkles, life and work and rags, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Each with her inch of clay, two loitering hags | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Look on dispassionate—critical—something ’mused. | 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.