Analysis of The Ghost,



There stands a City,-- neither large nor small,
Its air and situation sweet and pretty;
It matters very little -- if at all --
Whether its denizens are dull or witty,
Whether the ladies there are short or tall,
Brunettes or blondes, only, there stands a city!--
Perhaps 'tis also requisite to minute
That there's a Castle and a Cobbler in it.

A fair Cathedral, too, the story goes,
And kings and heroes lie entomb'd within her;
There pious Saints, in marble pomp repose,
Whose shrines are worn by knees of many a Sinner;
There, too, full many an Aldermanic nose
Roll'd its loud diapason after dinner;
And there stood high the holy sconce of Becket,
-- Till four assassins came from France to crack it.

The Castle was a huge and antique mound,
Proof against all th' artillery of the quiver,
Ere those abominable guns were found
To send cold lead through gallant warrior's liver.
It stands upon a gently rising ground,
Sloping down gradually to the river,
Resembling (to compare great things with smaller),
A well-scooped, mouldy Stilton cheese,-- but taller.

The Keep, I find, 's been sadly alter'd lately,
And, 'stead of mail-clad knights, of honour jealous,
In martial panoply so grand and stately,
Its walls are fill'd with money-making fellows,
And stuff'd, unless I'm misinformed greatly,
With leaden pipes, and coke, and coals, and bellows;
In short, so great a change has come to pass,
'Tis now a manufactory of Gas.

But to my tale.-- Before this profanation,
And ere its ancient glories were cut short all,
A poor hard-working Cobbler took his station
In a small house, just opposite the portal;
His birth, his parentage, and education,
I know but little of -- a strange, odd mortal;
His aspect, air, and gait, were all ridiculous;
His name was Mason -- he'd been christen'd Nicholas.

Nick had a wife possessed of many a charm,
And of the Lady Huntingdon persuasion;
But, spite of all her piety, her arm
She'd sometimes exercise when in a passion;
And, being of a temper somewhat warm,
Would now and then seize, upon small occasion,
A stick, or stool, or anything that round did lie,
And baste her lord and master most confoundedly.

No matter!--'tis a thing that's not uncommon,
'Tis what we have all heard, and most have read of,--
I mean, a bruizing, pugilistic woman,
Such as I own I entertain a dread of,
-- And so did Nick, whom sometimes there would come on
A sort of fear his spouse might knock his head off,
Demolish half his teeth, or drive a rib in,
She shone so much in 'facers' and in 'fibbing.'

'There's time and place for all things,' said a sage,
(King Solomon, I think,) and this I can say,
Within a well-roped ring, or on a stage,
Boxing may be a very pretty Fancy,
When Messrs. Burke or Bendigo engage;
--' Tis not so well in Susan, Jane, or Nancy;--
To get well mill'd by any one's an evil,
But by a lady --' tis the very Devil.

And so thought Nicholas, whose only trouble
(At least his worst) was this his rib's propensity,
For sometimes from the alehouse he would hobble,
His senses lost in a sublime immensity
Of cogitation -- then he couldn't cobble --
And then his wife would often try the density
Of his poor skull, and strike with all her might,
As fast as kitchen wenches strike a light.

Mason, meek soul, who ever hated strife,
Of this same striking had the utmost dread,
He hated it like poison -- or his wife --
A vast antipathy!-- but so he said --
And very often for a quiet life
On these occasions he'd sneak up to bed,
Grope darkling in, and, soon as at the door
He heard his lady -- he'd pretend to snore.

One night, then, ever partial to society,
Nick, with a friend (another jovial fellow),
Went to a Club -- I should have said Society --
At the 'City Arms,' once called the Porto Bello;
A Spouting party, which, though some decry it, I
Consider no bad lounge when one is mellow;
There they discuss the tax on salt, and leather,
And change of ministers, and change of weather.

In short, it was a kind of British Forum,
Like John Gale Jones's, erst in Piccadilly,
Only they managed things with more decorum,
And the Orations were not quite so silly;
Far different questions, too, would come before 'em,
Not always Politics, which, will ye nill ye,
Their London prototypes were always willing,
To give one quantum suff. of -- for a shilling.

It more resembled one of later date,
And tenfold talent, as I'


Scheme ABABABCD EFEFEFCD GFGFGFFF BHBEBEII JAJKJKHH LJLJXJMA JNJNXXXO PXPBPBKK KBKBKBQQ RSRSRSTT BUBUMUFF VBVBXBOO XM
Poetic Form
Metre 1101010111 1100101010 1101010111 10110011110 1001011111 01111011010 01110100110 11010001001 0101010101 01010101010 1101010101 111111110010 11110111 11111010 01110101110 11010111111 0101010011 10111101001010 1101000101 1111110110 1101010101 10110001010 010010111110 0111011110 011111101010 0111111110 01010011010 11111101010 0101100110 11010101010 0111011111 110111 1111011010 01110100111 01110101110 00111100010 1111000010 11110101110 11101010100 111101110100 11010111001 01010100010 1111010001 1011010010 0101010111 11011011010 01111101111 010101011 11010111010 11111101111 110101010 1111101011 01111011111 01111111111 01011111010 111101001 1101111101 11001101111 0101111101 10110101010 11011101 11110101110 11111101110 11010101010 01110011010 111111110100 1011011110 110100011 1010111010 011111010100 1111011101 1111010101 1011110101 111101011 1101110111 0101001111 0101010101 1101011111 110011101 1111010111 111101010100 110101010010 110111110100 101011101010 010101110111 01011111110 11010111010 01110001110 01110111010 1111010100 10110111010 00010011110 110010111011 111011111 110100110 11110111010 1101011101 011011
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 4,346
Words 800
Sentences 20
Stanzas 13
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 2
Lines Amount 98
Letters per line (avg) 34
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 254
Words per stanza (avg) 61
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

4:05 min read
72

Richard Harris Barham

Richard Harris Barham was an English cleric of the Church of England, novelist, and humorous poet. more…

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