The Stag at the Fountain
Full often what you now despiseProves better than the things you prize;Let Esop's narrative decide:A Stag beheld, with conscious pride,(As at the fountain-head he stood)His image in the silver flood,And there extols his branching horns,While his poor spindle-shanks he scorns--But, lo! he hears the hunter's cries,And, frighten'd, o'er the champaign flies--His swiftness baffles the pursuit:At length a wood receives the brute,And by his horns entangled there,The pack began his flesh to tear:Then dying thus he wail'd his fate:"Unhappy me! and wise too late!How useful what I did disdain!How grievous that which made me vain."
Words in this poem
- despise v. t.
- To look down upon with disfavor or contempt; to contemn; to scorn; to disdain; to have a low opinion or contemptuous dislike of. [OF. despis-, in some forms of despire to despise, fr. L. despicere, despectum, to look down upon, despise; de- + spicere, specere, to look. See Spy, and cf. Des]
- champaign n.
- A flat, open country. [OF. champaigne; same word as campagne.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Stag at the Fountain is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Fables of Phædrus Literally translated into English prose with notes, Project Gutenberg ebook #25512; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Phaedrus, The Stag at the Fountain, in The Fables of Phaedrus (1765), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #25512, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/phaedrus-fables/the-stag-at-the-fountain.html, id L21245.
Form and metre
The Stag at the Fountain is 18 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 AABBCCDDAAEEFFGGHH despiseA · prizeA · decideB · prideB · stoodC · floodC · hornsD · scornsD · criesA · fliesA · pursuitE · bruteE · thereF · tearF · fateG · lateG · disdainH · vainH
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Full often what you now despise | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| Proves better than the things you prize; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Let Esop's narrative decide: | 8 | ···/˘˘˘/ |
| A Stag beheld, with conscious pride, | 8 | ··˘/·/˘· |
| (As at the fountain-head he stood) | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| His image in the silver flood, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And there extols his branching horns, | 8 | ··˘/·/˘· |
| While his poor spindle-shanks he scorns-- | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| But, lo! he hears the hunter's cries, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And, frighten'd, o'er the champaign flies-- | 8 | ·/˘··˘/· |
| His swiftness baffles the pursuit: | 8 | ·/˘/˘·˘/ |
| At length a wood receives the brute, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| And by his horns entangled there, | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| The pack began his flesh to tear: | 8 | ··˘/···· |
| Then dying thus he wail'd his fate: | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| "Unhappy me! and wise too late! | 8 | ˘/˘····· |
| How useful what I did disdain! | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| How grievous that which made me vain." | 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.