111. A Lyric to Mirth
While the milder fates consent,Let's enjoy our merriment:Drink, and dance, and pipe, and play;Kiss our dollies night and day:Crowned with clusters of the vine,Let us sit, and quaff our wine.Call on Bacchus, chant his praise;Shake the thyrse, and bite the bays:Rouse Anacreon from the dead,And return him drunk to bed:Sing o'er Horace, for ere longDeath will come and mar the song:Then shall Wilson and GotiereNever sing or play more here.
Words in this poem
- quaff v. t.
- To drink with relish; to drink copiously of; to swallow in large draughts. [For quach, fr. Gael. & Ir. cuach a drinking cup; cf. L. caucus a drinking vessel. Cf. Quaigh.]
- 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
111. A Lyric to Mirth is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #22421; 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 Herrick, 111. A Lyric to Mirth, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/111-a-lyric-to-mirth.html, id L05169.
Form and metre
111. A Lyric to Mirth is 14 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, 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 7.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 14% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in trochaic 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 AABBCCDDEEFFGG consentA · merrimentA · playB · dayB · vineC · wineC · praiseD · baysD · deadE · bedE · longF · songF · gotiereG · hereG
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| While the milder fates consent, | 7 | ··/˘·˘/ |
| Let's enjoy our merriment: | 8 | ·˘//˘/˘˘ |
| Drink, and dance, and pipe, and play; | 7 | ······· |
| Kiss our dollies night and day: | 7 | ·//˘··· |
| Crowned with clusters of the vine, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Let us sit, and quaff our wine. | 7 | ·····/· |
| Call on Bacchus, chant his praise; | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Shake the thyrse, and bite the bays: | 7 | ······· |
| Rouse Anacreon from the dead, | 7 | ······· |
| And return him drunk to bed: | 7 | ·˘/···· |
| Sing o'er Horace, for ere long | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Death will come and mar the song: | 7 | ······· |
| Then shall Wilson and Gotiere | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Never sing or play more here. | 7 | /˘····· |
Notes from the edition 1
Word-glosses from Pollard's edition (Muses' Library, 1891; Project Gutenberg #22421).
- Wilson: Dr. John Wilson, the singer and composer, one of the king's · Gotiere: Jacques Gaultier, a French lutist at the court of Charles I
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