Look-out Mountain. The Night Fight
Who inhabiteth the MountainThat it shines in lurid light,And is rolled about with thunders,And terrors, and a blight,Like Kaf the peak of Eblis--Kaf, the evil height?Who has gone up with a shoutingAnd a trumpet in the night?
There is battle in the Mountain--Might assaulteth Might;’Tis the fastness of the Anarch,Torrent-torn, an ancient height;The crags resound the clangorOf the war of Wrong and Right;And the armies in the valleyWatch and pray for dawning light.Joy, Joy, the day is breaking,
And the cloud is rolled from sight;There is triumph in the MorningFor the Anarch’s plunging flight;God has glorified the MountainWhere a Banner burneth bright,And the armies in the valleyThey are fortified in right.
Words in this poem
- lurid a.
- Pale yellow; ghastly pale; wan; gloomy; dismal. [L. luridus.]
- eblis n.
- The prince of the evil spirits; Satan. [Written also Eblees.] [Ar. iblis.]
- fastness n.
- The state of being fast and firm; firmness; fixedness; security; faithfulness. [AS. fæstnes, fr. fæst fast. See Fast, a.]
- anarch n.
- The author of anarchy; one who excites revolt.
- clangor n.
- A sharp, harsh, ringing sound. [L., fr. clangere. See Clang, v. t.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Look-out Mountain. The Night Fight is in the public domain. This text is taken from Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War, Project Gutenberg ebook #12384; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Herman Melville, Look-out Mountain. The Night Fight, in Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War (1866), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12384, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/melville-battle-pieces/look-out-mountain-the-night-fight.html, id L19104.
Form and metre
Look-out Mountain. The Night Fight is 24 lines in 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%).
See 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 -A-A-A-A mountain · lightA · thunders · blightA · eblis · heightA · shouting · nightA
- 2 -A-A-A-A- mountain · mightA · anarch · heightA · clangor · rightA · valley · lightA · breaking
- 3 A-A-A-A sightA · morning · flightA · mountain · brightA · valley · rightA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Who inhabiteth the Mountain | 8 | ·˘/˘˘·/˘ |
| That it shines in lurid light, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| And is rolled about with thunders, | 8 | ······/˘ |
| And terrors, and a blight, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Like Kaf the peak of Eblis-- | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Kaf, the evil height? | 5 | ··/˘· |
| Who has gone up with a shouting | 8 | ······/˘ |
| And a trumpet in the night? | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| There is battle in the Mountain-- | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Might assaulteth Might; | 5 | ·˘/˘· |
| ’Tis the fastness of the Anarch, | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Torrent-torn, an ancient height; | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| The crags resound the clangor | 7 | ···/·/˘ |
| Of the war of Wrong and Right; | 7 | ······· |
| And the armies in the valley | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Watch and pray for dawning light. | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Joy, Joy, the day is breaking, | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| And the cloud is rolled from sight; | 8 | ·····˘·· |
| There is triumph in the Morning | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| For the Anarch’s plunging flight; | 7 | ····/˘· |
| God has glorified the Mountain | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| Where a Banner burneth bright, | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| And the armies in the valley | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| They are fortified in right. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
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.