The White Squall Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AAABAAABAAAB CCCADEDAFFFA GGGHDDDHAAAH IIIHGGGHJJKH AAAH FAIIGGFFAAAAALLLMMNN JJAAAAFFOO GGPPQOGG GGAFN PPGG DDRSOOFFFFOOOO OOIIOOGGG OONNIINNIIIII GGGOAAAOOn deck beneath the awning | A |
I dozing lay and yawning | A |
It was the gray of dawning | A |
Ere yet the sun arose | B |
And above the funnel's roaring | A |
And the fitful wind's deploring | A |
I heard the cabin snoring | A |
With universal nose | B |
I could hear the passengers snorting | A |
I envied their disporting | A |
Vainly I was courting | A |
The pleasure of a doze | B |
- | |
So I lay and wondered why light | C |
Came not and watched the twilight | C |
And the glimmer of the skylight | C |
That shot across the deck | A |
And the binnacle pale and steady | D |
And the dull glimpse of the dead eye | E |
And the sparks in fiery eddy | D |
That whirled from the chimney neck | A |
In our jovial floating prison | F |
There was sleep from fore to mizzen | F |
And never a star had risen | F |
The hazy sky to speck | A |
- | |
Strange company we harbored | G |
We'd a hundred Jews to larboard | G |
Unwashed uncombed unbarbered | G |
Jews black and brown and gray | H |
With terror it would seize ye | D |
And make your souls uneasy | D |
To see those Rabbis greasy | D |
Who did naught but scratch and pray | H |
Their dirty children puking | A |
Their dirty saucepans cooking | A |
Their dirty fingers hooking | A |
Their swarming fleas away | H |
- | |
To starboard Turks and Greeks were | I |
Whiskered and brown their cheeks were | I |
Enormous wide their breeks were | I |
Their pipes did puff alway | H |
Each on his mat allotted | G |
In silence smoked and squatted | G |
Whilst round their children trotted | G |
In pretty pleasant play | H |
He can't but smile who traces | J |
The smiles on those brown faces | J |
And the pretty prattling graces | K |
Of those small heathens gay | H |
- | |
And so the hours kept tolling | A |
And through the ocean rolling | A |
Went the brave 'Iberia' bowling | A |
Before the break of day | H |
- | |
When A SQUALL upon a sudden | F |
Came o'er the waters scudding | A |
And the clouds began to gather | I |
And the sea was lashed to lather | I |
And the lowering thunder grumbled | G |
And the lightning jumped and tumbled | G |
And the ship and all the ocean | F |
Woke up in wild commotion | F |
Then the wind set up a howling | A |
And the poodle dog a yowling | A |
And the cocks began a crowing | A |
And the old cow raised a lowing | A |
As she heard the tempest blowing | A |
And fowls and geese did cackle | L |
And the cordage and the tackle | L |
Began to shriek and crackle | L |
And the spray dashed o'er the funnels | M |
And down the deck in runnels | M |
And the rushing water soaks all | N |
From the seamen in the fo'ksal | N |
To the stokers whose black faces | J |
Peer out of their bed places | J |
And the captain he was bawling | A |
And the sailors pulling hauling | A |
And the quarter deck tarpauling | A |
Was shivered in the squalling | A |
And the passengers awaken | F |
Most pitifully shaken | F |
And the steward jumps up and hastens | O |
For the necessary basins | O |
- | |
Then the Greeks they groaned and quivered | G |
And they knelt and moaned and shivered | G |
As the plunging waters met them | P |
And splashed and overset them | P |
And they call in their emergence | Q |
Upon countless saints and virgins | O |
And their marrowbones are bended | G |
And they think the world is ended | G |
- | |
And the Turkish women for'ard | G |
Were frightened and behorror'd | G |
And shrieking and bewildering | A |
The mothers clutched their children | F |
The men sung 'Allah Illah | N |
Mashallah Bismillah ' | - |
As the warring waters doused them | P |
And splashed them and soused them | P |
And they called upon the Prophet | G |
And thought but little of it | G |
- | |
Then all the fleas in Jewry | D |
Jumped up and bit like fury | D |
And the progeny of Jacob | R |
Did on the main deck wake up | S |
I wot those greasy Rabbins | O |
Would never pay for cabins | O |
And each man moaned and jabbered in | F |
His filthy Jewish gaberdine | F |
In woe and lamentation | F |
And howling consternation | F |
And the splashing water drenches | O |
Their dirty brats and wenches | O |
And they crawl from bales and benches | O |
In a hundred thousand stenches | O |
- | |
This was the White Squall famous | O |
Which latterly o'ercame us | O |
And which all will well remember | I |
On the th September | I |
When a Prussian captain of Lancers | O |
Those tight laced whiskered prancers | O |
Came on the deck astonished | G |
By that wild squall admonished | G |
And wondering cried 'Potztausend | G |
Wie ist der Sturm jetzt brausend ' | - |
And looked at Captain Lewis | O |
Who calmly stood and blew his | O |
Cigar in all the hustle | N |
And scorned the tempest's tussle | N |
And oft we've thought thereafter | I |
How he beat the storm to laughter | I |
For well he knew his vessel | N |
With that vain wind could wrestle | N |
And when a wreck we thought her | I |
And doomed ourselves to slaughter | I |
How gayly he fought her | I |
And through the hubbub brought her | I |
And as the tempest caught her | I |
Cried 'GEORGE SOME BRANDY AND WATER ' | - |
- | |
And when its force expended | G |
The harmless storm was ended | G |
And as the sunrise splendid | G |
Came blushing o'er the sea | O |
I thought as day was breaking | A |
My little girls were waking | A |
And smiling and making | A |
A prayer at home for me | O |
William Makepeace Thackeray
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