The Gay Gordons (Dargai, October 20Th, 1897)
Who's for the Gathering, who's for the Fair?(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)The bravest of the brave are at dead-lock there,(Highlanders! march! by the right!)There are bullets by the hundred buzzing in the air;There are bonny lads lying on the hillside bare;But the Gordons know what the Gordons dareWhen they hear the pipers playing!
The happiest English heart to-day(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)Is the heart of the Colonel, hide it as he may(Steady there! steady on the right!)He sees his work and he sees the way,He knows his time and the word to say,And he's thinking of the tune that the Gordons playWhen he sets the pipers playing!
Rising, roaring, rushing like the tide,(Gay goes the Gordon to a fight)They're up through the fire-zone, not to be denied;(Bayonets! and charge! by the right!)
Thirty bullets straight where the rest went wide,And thirty lads are lying on the bare hillside;But they passed in the hour of the Gordons' pride,To the skirl of the pipers' playing.
Words in this poem
- bonny a.
- Handsome; beautiful; pretty; attractively lively and graceful. [OE. boni, prob. fr. F. bon, fem. bonne, good, fr. L. bonus good. See Bounty, and cf. Bonus, Boon.]
- went n.
- Course; way; path; journey; direction.
- skirl v. t.
- To utter in a shrill tone; to scream. [Of Scand. origin, and originally the same word as E. shrill.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Gay Gordons (Dargai, October 20Th, 1897) is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems: New and Old, Project Gutenberg ebook #24405; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry John Newbolt, The Gay Gordons (Dargai, October 20Th, 1897), in Poems: New and Old (1912), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #24405, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/newbolt-poems/the-gay-gordons-dargai-october-20th-1897.html, id L11406.
Form and metre
The Gay Gordons (Dargai, October 20Th, 1897) is 24 lines in 4 stanzas. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 74%). 86% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.7 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 17% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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 ABABAAA- fairA · fightB · thereA · rightB · airA · bareA · dareA · playing
- 2 ABABAAA- dayA · fightB · mayA · rightB · wayA · sayA · playA · playing
- 3 ABAB tideA · fightB · deniedA · rightB
- 4 AAA- wideA · hillsideA · prideA · playing
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Who's for the Gathering, who's for the Fair? | 10 | ···/˘˘···· |
| (Gay goes the Gordon to a fight) | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The bravest of the brave are at dead-lock there, | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| (Highlanders! march! by the right!) | 7 | /·˘···· |
| There are bullets by the hundred buzzing in the air; | 13 | ··/˘··/˘/˘··· |
| There are bonny lads lying on the hillside bare; | 12 | ··/˘·/˘··/·· |
| But the Gordons know what the Gordons dare | 10 | ··/˘···/˘· |
| When they hear the pipers playing! | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| The happiest English heart to-day | 9 | ·/˘˘/˘··· |
| (Gay goes the Gordon to a fight) | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Is the heart of the Colonel, hide it as he may | 12 | ·····/˘····· |
| (Steady there! steady on the right!) | 8 | /˘·/˘··· |
| He sees his work and he sees the way, | 9 | ········· |
| He knows his time and the word to say, | 9 | ········· |
| And he's thinking of the tune that the Gordons play | 12 | ··/˘·····/˘· |
| When he sets the pipers playing! | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| Rising, roaring, rushing like the tide, | 9 | /˘/˘/˘··· |
| (Gay goes the Gordon to a fight) | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| They're up through the fire-zone, not to be denied; | 11 | ····/····˘/ |
| (Bayonets! and charge! by the right!) | 8 | /˘······ |
| Thirty bullets straight where the rest went wide, | 10 | /˘/˘······ |
| And thirty lads are lying on the bare hillside; | 12 | ·/˘··/˘···/· |
| But they passed in the hour of the Gordons' pride, | 11 | ·····/····· |
| To the skirl of the pipers' playing. | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
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.