Analysis of Additions

Thomas Hardy 1840 (Stinsford) – 1928 (Dorchester, Dorset)




                       The Fire at Tranter Sweatley's

THEY had long met o' Zundays--her true love and she--
       And at junketings, maypoles, and flings;
     But she bode wi' a thirtover uncle, and he
     Swore by noon and by night that her goodman should be
     Naibor Sweatley--a gaffer oft weak at the knee
     From taking o' sommat more cheerful than tea--
       Who tranted, and moved people's things.

She cried, "O pray pity me!" Nought would he hear;
       Then with wild rainy eyes she obeyed,
     She chid when her Love was for clinking off wi' her.
     The pa'son was told, as the season drew near
     To throw over pu'pit the names of the peäir
       As fitting one flesh to be made.

The wedding-day dawned and the morning drew on;
       The couple stood bridegroom and bride;
     The evening was passed, and when midnight had gone
     The folks horned out, "God save the King," and anon
       The two home-along gloomily hied.

The lover Tim Tankens mourned heart-sick and drear
       To be thus of his darling deprived:
     He roamed in the dark ath'art field, mound, and mere,
     And, a'most without knowing it, found himself near
     The house of the tranter, and now of his Dear,
       Where the lantern-light showed 'em arrived.

The bride sought her cham'er so calm and so pale
       That a Northern had thought her resigned;
     But to eyes that had seen her in tide-times of weal,
     Like the white cloud o' smoke, the red battlefield's vail,
       That look spak' of havoc behind.

The bridegroom yet laitered a beaker to drain,
       Then reeled to the linhay for more,
     When the candle-snoff kindled some chaff from his grain--
     Flames spread, and red vlankers, wi' might and wi' main,
       And round beams, thatch, and chimley-tun roar.

Young Tim away yond, rafted up by the light,
       Through brimble and underwood tears,
     Till he comes to the orchet, when crooping thereright
     In the lewth of a codlin-tree, bivering wi' fright,
     Wi' on'y her night-rail to screen her from sight,
       His lonesome young Barbree appears.

Her cwold little figure half-naked he views
       Played about by the frolicsome breeze,
     Her light-tripping totties, her ten little tooes,
     All bare and besprinkled wi' Fall's chilly dews,
     While her great gallied eyes, through her hair hanging loose,
       Sheened as stars through a tardle o' trees.

She eyed en; and, as when a weir-hatch is drawn,
       Her tears, penned by terror afore,
     With a rushing of sobs in a shower were strawn,
     Till her power to pour 'em seemed wasted and gone
       From the heft o' misfortune she bore.

"O Tim, my own Tim I must call 'ee--I will!
       All the world ha' turned round on me so!
     Can you help her who loved 'ee, though acting so ill?
     Can you pity her misery--feel for her still?
     When worse than her body so quivering and chill
       Is her heart in its winter o' woe!

"I think I mid almost ha' borne it," she said,
       "Had my griefs one by one come to hand;
     But O, to be slave to thik husbird for bread,
     And then, upon top o' that, driven to wed,
     And then, upon top o' that, burnt out o' bed,
       Is more than my nater can stand!"

Tim's soul like a lion 'ithin en outsprung--
     (Tim had a great soul when his feelings were wrung)--
       "Feel for 'ee, dear Barbree?" he cried;
     And his warm working-jacket about her he flung,
     Made a back, horsed her up, till behind him she clung
     Like a chiel on a gipsy, her figure uphung
       By the sleeves that around her he tied.

Over piggeries, and mixens, and apples, and hay,
       They lumpered straight into the night;
     And finding bylong where a halter-path lay,
     At dawn reached Tim's house, on'y seen on their way
     By a naibor or two who were up wi' the day;
       But they gathered no clue to the sight.

Then tender Tim Tankens he searched here and there
       For some garment to clothe her fair skin;
     But though he had breeches and waistcoats to spare,
     He had nothing quite seemly for Barbree to wear,
     Who, half shrammed to death, stood and cried on a chair
       At the caddle she found herself in.

There was one thing to do, and that one thing he did,
       He lent her some clouts of his own,
     And she took 'em perforce; and while


Scheme A BABBBBA CDXECD FGHFD CIEEEI JKJJK LMLLM NADNNA AAAAAA HCHHM OAOOOX PQPPPQ RRGRRRG SNSSSN TUTTTU XXX
Poetic Form
Metre 0101101 11111101101 011101 1111011001 111011101011 110111101 1101111011 1101101 11111011111 111101101 11101111110 01111101011 111011011011 11011111 01011001011 0101101 0101101111 0111110101 011011001 0101111101 111111001 1100111101 001011011011 01101001111 101011101 01101011011 101011001 111111001111 1011110111 11111001 011101011 1110111 101011011111 1101111011 01110111 11011101101 110101 111101111 00110101111 11101111011 1101101 01101011011 1011011 0110101101 110111101 10111101101 11110111 11101101111 0111101 101011001001 101011111001 101101011 11111111111 101111111 111011111011 111001001101 111010110001 101011011 1111111111 111111111 1111111111 01011111011 01011111111 1111111 111010111 11011111001 1111111 011101001011 101101101111 1011010101 101101011 1010101001 1110101 0101101011 11111111111 10111101101 111011101 1101111101 111011011 111110111 1110111111 11111101101 10111010 111111011111 11011111 01110101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 4,340
Words 729
Sentences 22
Stanzas 16
Stanza Lengths 1, 7, 6, 5, 6, 5, 5, 6, 6, 5, 6, 6, 7, 6, 6, 3
Lines Amount 86
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 188
Words per stanza (avg) 45
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

3:41 min read
135

Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy, was not a Scottish Minister, not a Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland nor a Professor of Eccesiastical History at Edinburgh University. more…

All Thomas Hardy poems | Thomas Hardy Books

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