The Brothers: Act the Fourth: Scene VIII

Terence · 1765

iambic pentameter · 13 lines · from The Comedies of Terence

I'm tir'dWith walking.--Now great Jove confound you, Syrus;You and your blind directions! I have crawl'dAll the town over: to the gate; the pond;Where not? No sign of any shop was there,Nor any person who had seen my brother.--Now I'll in, therefore, and set up my restIn his own house, till he comes home again. (Going.

HarperI'm tir'dWith walking.--Now great Jove confound you, Syrus;Colman 1768I've walk'd, and walk'd, till I'm quite tir'd with walking.

Words in this poem

jove n.
The chief divinity of the ancient Romans; Jupiter. [L. Jupiter, gen. Jovis, OL. Jovis, nom. & gen. for Djovis; akin to E. Tuesday. See Tuesday, and cf. Jupiter.]
harper n.
A player on the harp; a minstrel. [AS. hearpere.]

Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.

About this text

The Brothers: Act the Fourth: Scene VIII is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Comedies of Terence, Project Gutenberg ebook #22695; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.

Cite as: Terence, The Brothers: Act the Fourth: Scene VIII, in The Comedies of Terence (1765), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22695, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/terence-comedies/the-brothers-act-the-fourth-scene-viii.html, id L25842.

Form and metre

The Brothers: Act the Fourth: Scene VIII is 13 lines in 2 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic pentameter.

See other poems in iambic pentameter.

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.

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 pentameter. How this is done.

LineSyl.Stress
I'm tir'd3·/˘
With walking.--Now great Jove confound you, Syrus;11·/˘···˘/···
You and your blind directions! I have crawl'd10····˘/˘···
All the town over: to the gate; the pond;10··········
Where not? No sign of any shop was there,10·····/˘···
Nor any person who had seen my brother.11·/˘/˘····/˘
--Now I'll in, therefore, and set up my rest10··········
In his own house, till he comes home again. (Going.11········˘//
Harper2/˘
I'm tir'd3·/˘
With walking.--Now great Jove confound you, Syrus;11·/˘···˘/···
Colman 17682/˘
I've walk'd, and walk'd, till I'm quite tir'd with walking.11·······/·/˘

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.

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