413. To Springs and Fountains
I heard ye could cool heat, and cameWith hope you would allay the same;Thrice I have wash'd but feel no cold,Nor find that true which was foretold.Methinks, like mine, your pulses beatAnd labour with unequal heat;Cure, cure yourselves, for I descryYe boil with love as well as I.
Words in this poem
- methinks v.
- It seems to me; I think. See Me. [AS. þyncan to seem, me þynceedh, me þuhte, OE. me thinketh, me thoughte; akin to G. dünken to seem, denken to think, and E. think. See Me, and Think.]
- descry
- , Discovery or view, as of an army seen at a distance.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
413. To Springs and Fountains 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, 413. To Springs and Fountains, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/413-to-springs-and-fountains.html, id L05414.
Form and metre
413. To Springs and Fountains is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.0 syllables. 38% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, 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 AABBCCDD cameA · sameA · coldB · foretoldB · beatC · heatC · descryD · iD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I heard ye could cool heat, and came | 8 | ········ |
| With hope you would allay the same; | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| Thrice I have wash'd but feel no cold, | 8 | ········ |
| Nor find that true which was foretold. | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Methinks, like mine, your pulses beat | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| And labour with unequal heat; | 8 | ·/··˘/˘· |
| Cure, cure yourselves, for I descry | 8 | ··˘/··˘/ |
| Ye boil with love as well as I. | 8 | ········ |
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.