980. Ceremony upon Candlemas Eve
Down with the rosemary, and soDown with the bays and mistletoe;Down with the holly, ivy, all,Wherewith ye dressed the Christmas Hall:That so the superstitious findNo one least branch there left behind:For look, how many leaves there beNeglected, there (maids, trust to me)So many goblins you shall see.
Words in this poem
- wherewith adv.
- With which; -- used relatively.
- 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
980. Ceremony upon Candlemas Eve 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, 980. Ceremony upon Candlemas Eve, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/980-ceremony-upon-candlemas-eve.html, id L05887.
Form and metre
980. Ceremony upon Candlemas Eve is 9 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 89% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 33% 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 AABBCCDDD soA · mistletoeA · allB · hallB · findC · behindC · beD · meD · seeD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Down with the rosemary, and so | 8 | ···/·˘·· |
| Down with the bays and mistletoe; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Down with the holly, ivy, all, | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| Wherewith ye dressed the Christmas Hall: | 8 | ˘/···/˘· |
| That so the superstitious find | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| No one least branch there left behind: | 8 | ········ |
| For look, how many leaves there be | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Neglected, there (maids, trust to me) | 8 | ˘/˘····· |
| So many goblins you shall see. | 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.