The Friend
There are lots and lots of people who are always asking things,Like Dates and Pounds-and-ounces and the names of funny Kings,And the answer's either Sixpence or A Hundred Inches Long,And I know they'll think me silly if I get the answer wrong.
So Pooh and I go whispering, and Pooh looks very bright,And says, "Well, I say sixpence, but I don't suppose I'm right,"And then it doesn't matter what the answer ought to be,'Cos if he's right, I'm Right, and if he's wrong, it isn't Me.
Words in this poem
- funny a.
- Droll; comical; amusing; laughable. Funny bone. See crazy bone, under Crazy. [From Fun.]
- pooh interj.
- Pshaw! pish! nonsense! -- an expression of scorn, dislike, or contempt. [Of. imitative origin; cf. Icel. pu.]
- ought p. p.
- Was or were under obligation to pay; owed. [Orig. the preterit of the verb to owe. OE. oughte, aughte, ahte, AS. ahte. sq. root110. See Owe.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Friend is in the public domain. This text is taken from Now We Are Six, Project Gutenberg ebook #70516; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: A. A. Milne, The Friend, in Now We Are Six (1927), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #70516, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/milne-now-we-are-six/the-friend.html, id L27239.
Form and metre
The Friend is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes AABB. The metre is iambic heptameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
See other poems in iambic heptameter.
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 AABB thingsA · kingsA · longB · wrongB
- 2 AABB brightA · rightA · beB · meB
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 heptameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| There are lots and lots of people who are always asking things, | 15 | ······/˘··/·/˘· |
| Like Dates and Pounds-and-ounces and the names of funny Kings, | 14 | ·····/˘····/˘· |
| And the answer's either Sixpence or A Hundred Inches Long, | 15 | ··/˘/˘/˘··/˘/˘· |
| And I know they'll think me silly if I get the answer wrong. | 15 | ······/˘····/˘· |
| So Pooh and I go whispering, and Pooh looks very bright, | 14 | ·····/˘˘···/˘· |
| And says, "Well, I say sixpence, but I don't suppose I'm right," | 14 | ·····/˘···˘/·· |
| And then it doesn't matter what the answer ought to be, | 14 | ···/˘/˘··/˘··· |
| 'Cos if he's right, I'm Right, and if he's wrong, it isn't Me. | 14 | ···········/˘· |
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.