Lord Rochester’s Song

Victor Marie Hugo 1802 (Besançon) – 1885 (Paris)



[CROMWELL, ACT I.]

'Hold, little blue-eyed page!'
So cried the watchers surly,
Stern to his pretty rage
And golden hair so curly--
'Methinks your satin cloak
Masks something bulky under;
I take this as no joke--
Oh, thief with stolen plunder!'

'I am of high repute,
And famed among the truthful:
This silver-handled lute
Is meet for one still youthful
Who goes to keep a tryst
With her who is his dearest.
I charge you to desist;
My cause is of the clearest.'

But guardsmen are so sharp,
Their eyes are as the lynx's:
'That's neither lute nor harp--
Your mark is not the minxes.
Your loving we dispute--
That string of steel so cruel
For music does not suit--
You go to fight a duel!'

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

39 sec read
105

Quick analysis:

Scheme X ABABCDCD EFEFGXGG HIHIEFEF
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 668
Words 133
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 1, 8, 8, 8

Victor Marie Hugo

Victor Marie Hugo was a French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement. He is considered one of the greatest and best known French writers. In France, Hugo's literary fame comes first from his poetry but also rests upon his novels and his dramatic achievements. Among many volumes of poetry, Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem. Outside France, his best-known works are the novels Les Misérables, 1862, and Notre-Dame de Paris, 1831. Though a committed royalist when he was young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed; he became a passionate supporter of republicanism, and his work touches upon most of the political and social issues and artistic trends of his time. He was buried in the Panthéon. more…

All Victor Marie Hugo poems | Victor Marie Hugo Books

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