The Modest Couple Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABB CCDD EEAA FFGG HIIJJ KKLMM NNGG OOPP QQNN RRSS NNTT EEUU JJVV WWXX YYZZ A2A2XX AAZZ| When man and maiden meet I like to see a drooping eye | A |
| I always droop my own I am the shyest of the shy | A |
| I'm also fond of bashfulness and sitting down on thorns | B |
| For modesty's a quality that womankind adorns | B |
| - | |
| Whenever I am introduced to any pretty maid | C |
| My knees they knock together just as if I were afraid | C |
| I flutter and I stammer and I turn a pleasing red | D |
| For to laugh and flirt and ogle I consider most ill bred | D |
| - | |
| But still in all these matters as in other things below | E |
| There is a proper medium as I'm about to show | E |
| I do not recommend a newly married pair to try | A |
| To carry on as PETER carried on with SARAH BLIGH | A |
| - | |
| Betrothed they were when very young before they'd learnt to speak | F |
| For SARAH was but six days old and PETER was a week | F |
| Though little more than babies at those early ages yet | G |
| They bashfully would faint when they occasionally met | G |
| - | |
| They blushed and flushed and fainted till they reached the | H |
| age of nine | I |
| When PETER'S good papa he was a Baron of the Rhine | I |
| Determined to endeavour some sound argument to find | J |
| To bring these shy young people to a proper frame of mind | J |
| - | |
| He told them that as SARAH was to be his PETER'S bride | K |
| They might at least consent to sit at table side by side | K |
| He begged that they would now and then shake hands till he | L |
| was hoarse | M |
| Which SARAH thought indelicate and PETER very coarse | M |
| - | |
| And PETER in a tremble to the blushing maid would say | N |
| You must excuse papa MISS BLIGH it is his mountain way | N |
| Says SARAH His behaviour I'll endeavour to forget | G |
| But your papa's the coarsest person that I ever met | G |
| - | |
| He plighted us without our leave when we were very young | O |
| Before we had begun articulating with the tongue | O |
| His underbred suggestions fill your SARAH with alarm | P |
| Why gracious me he'll ask us next to walk out arm in arm | P |
| - | |
| At length when SARAH reached the legal age of twenty one | Q |
| The Baron he determined to unite her to his son | Q |
| And SARAH in a fainting fit for weeks unconscious lay | N |
| And PETER blushed so hard you might have heard him miles away | N |
| - | |
| And when the time arrived for taking SARAH to his heart | R |
| They were married in two churches half a dozen miles apart | R |
| Intending to escape all public ridicule and chaff | S |
| And the service was conducted by electric telegraph | S |
| - | |
| And when it was concluded and the priest had said his say | N |
| Until the time arrived when they were both to drive away | N |
| They never spoke or offered for to fondle or to fawn | T |
| For HE waited in the attic and SHE waited on the lawn | T |
| - | |
| At length when four o'clock arrived and it was time to go | E |
| The carriage was announced but decent SARAH answered No | E |
| Upon my word I'd rather sleep my everlasting nap | U |
| Than go and ride alone with MR PETER in a trap | U |
| - | |
| And PETER'S over sensitive and highly polished mind | J |
| Wouldn't suffer him to sanction a proceeding of the kind | J |
| And further he declared he suffered overwhelming shocks | V |
| At the bare idea of having any coachman on the box | V |
| - | |
| So PETER into one turn out incontinently rushed | W |
| While SARAH in a second trap sat modestly and blushed | W |
| And MR NEWMAN'S coachman on authority I've heard | X |
| Drove away in gallant style upon the coach box of a third | X |
| - | |
| Now though this modest couple in the matter of the car | Y |
| Were very likely carrying a principle too far | Y |
| I hold their shy behaviour was more laudable in them | Z |
| Than that of PETER'S brother with MISS SARAH'S sister EM | Z |
| - | |
| ALPHONSO who in cool assurance all creation licks | A2 |
| He up and said to EMMIE who had impudence for six | A2 |
| MISS EMILY I love you will you marry Say the word | X |
| And EMILY said Certainly ALPHONSO like a bird | X |
| - | |
| I do not recommend a newly married pair to try | A |
| To carry on as PETER carried on with SARAH BLIGH | A |
| But still their shy behaviour was more laudable in them | Z |
| Than that of PETER'S brother with MISS SARAH'S sister EM | Z |
William Schwenck Gilbert
(1)
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