Analysis of To Arms!
Alfred Austin 1835 (Leeds) – 1913 (Ashford)
World! to arms!
Do you shrink?
What! shrink when the hoofs of the Cossack are crushing
The bosom of mother, the tonsure of priest,
And the youth of a nation, pain-maddened, is rushing
On visible doom, as to tourney or feast?
When the savagest hell-hounds that ever existed
Are hunting the tender and brave of our race,
And the lash of the insolent Tartar is twisted
With mock of defiance, and cracked in your face-
Do you shrink?
World! to arms!
Do you shrink, gallant France, when the blood of a nation,
Ne'er stinted for you, for itself flows in vain?
Aroused by the might of a grand inspiration,
Avenge with your war-clang the souls of the slain.
If you shrink, may you never know ending or respite
To strife internecine and factional hate,
Except when the hand of liberticide despot
Imposes on all one opprobrious fate!
France! to arms!
Do you shrink?
You! politic Austria! now that you only,
If feebly you hesitate, hasten your doom-
Have you yet not discovered that, selfish and lonely,
An Empire but marches blindfold to the tomb?
Let a penitent sword in sublime vindication
Of Freedom its manifold mischiefs undo:
If you shrink, may the multiplied wrongs of each nation
You ever have outraged be hurled back on you!
Do you shrink?
World! to arms!
O my beautiful Italy! nought of misgiving
Doth trouble the summons that touches your pride;
The graves of your slaughtered are fresh, but your living
Are throbbing to conquer, or sleep at their side.
By your maidens equipped, in whose beauty exult you,
Your sons must make ready with pennon and sheen
To go straight. If you shrink-but I will not insult you,
Who, often unfortunate, never were mean.
Then, to arms!
World! to arms!
Do you shrink?
Shrink! England! what! shrink when intoxicate Tartar,
Deriding your wrath, rides in blood to the waist?
When the flesh of the virgin, the bones of the martyr,
The breast of the matron, are bared and defaced?
Do you deem diplomatic frivolities ample
To save you your title of moral and just,
When a horde of ensanguined barbarians trample
Mankind and remonstrance alike in the dust?
England shrink?
No! to arms!
All! to arms!
Will you wait till behind the impassable rampart
Of winter they laugh at your impotent rage,
And your war-nostrils frozen, your ironclads hampered,
Destruction-then ``Order''-shall swoop on the stage?
Yes! the spring will come back, and unbar you the ocean,
But will not the sinews relax of the slain:
Swift! to arms! Set the vengeance-charged tumbrils in motion,
As dread as God's thunder, as blest as His rain!
Scheme | ABcdcdefefB Aghghxixia BjkjkglglB Acmcmlnlna ABopopqrqrba adsxsghgh |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111 111 111011010110 0101100111 001101011110 11001111011 10111110010 110010011101 0011010010110 11101001011 111 111 1111011011010 1111101101 01101101010 01111101101 1111110110110 1101001001 011011110 01011111 111 111 11010011110 1101101011 1111010110010 11001101101 1010010010010 110110101 111101011110 1101111111 111 111 1110010011010 11001011011 011110111110 11011011111 1110010110011 1111101101 1111111111011 11001001001 111 111 111 11011101010 01011101101 1011010011010 01101011001 111010110 11111011001 10111010010 110101001 101 111 111 111101001001 11011111001 01110101110 0101111101 101111011010 1110101101 111101011010 11111011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 2,484 |
Words | 443 |
Sentences | 46 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 11, 10, 10, 10, 12, 9 |
Lines Amount | 62 |
Letters per line (avg) | 32 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 333 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 74 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 2:13 min read
- 78 Views
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"To Arms!" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 9 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/833/to-arms%21>.
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