A Pastoral Report
One Sunday morning--service done--'Mongst tombstones shining in the sun,A knot of bumpkins stood to chatOf that and this, and this and that;What people said of Polly Hatch--Which side had won the-cricket match;And who was cotch'd, and who was bowl'd;--How barley, beans, and 'taters sold--What men could swallow at a meal--When Bumpstead Youths would ring a peal--And who was taken off to jail--And where they brew'd the strongest ale--At last this question they address,"What's Agricultural Distress?"
Words in this poem
- polly n.
- A woman's name; also, a popular name for a parrot.
- peal v. i.
- To appeal. Spencer.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
A Pastoral Report is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood, Project Gutenberg ebook #15652; 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 Hood, A Pastoral Report, in The Song of the Shirt, and Other Poems (1826–1845), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #15652, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hood-poetical-works/a-pastoral-report.html, id L20171.
Form and metre
A Pastoral Report is 14 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 93%).
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 AABBCCDDEEFFGG doneA · sunA · chatB · thatB · hatchC · matchC · bowl'dD · soldD · mealE · pealE · jailF · aleF · addressG · distressG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| One Sunday morning--service done-- | 8 | ·/·/˘/˘· |
| 'Mongst tombstones shining in the sun, | 8 | ·/·/˘··· |
| A knot of bumpkins stood to chat | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Of that and this, and this and that; | 8 | ········ |
| What people said of Polly Hatch-- | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Which side had won the-cricket match; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And who was cotch'd, and who was bowl'd;-- | 8 | ········ |
| How barley, beans, and 'taters sold-- | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| What men could swallow at a meal-- | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| When Bumpstead Youths would ring a peal-- | 8 | ········ |
| And who was taken off to jail-- | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And where they brew'd the strongest ale-- | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| At last this question they address, | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| "What's Agricultural Distress?" | 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.