Analysis of De Hortis Julii Martialis

Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 (Edinburgh) – 1894 (Vailima, Samoa)



MY Martial owns a garden, famed to please,
Beyond the glades of the Hesperides;
Along Janiculum lies the chosen block
Where the cool grottos trench the hanging rock.
The moderate summit, something plain and bare,
Tastes overhead of a serener air;
And while the clouds besiege the vales below,
Keeps the clear heaven and doth with sunshine glow.
To the June stars that circle in the skies
The dainty roofs of that tall villa rise.
Hence do the seven imperial hills appear;
And you may view the whole of Rome from here;
Beyond, the Alban and the Tuscan hills;
And the cool groves and the cool falling rills,
Rubre Fidenae, and with virgin blood
Anointed once Perenna's orchard wood.
Thence the Flaminian, the Salarian way,
Stretch far broad below the dome of day;
And lo! the traveller toiling towards his home;
And all unheard, the chariot speeds to Rome!
For here no whisper of the wheels; and tho'
The Mulvian Bridge, above the Tiber's flow,
Hangs all in sight, and down the sacred stream
The sliding barges vanish like a dream,
The seaman's shrilling pipe not enters here,
Nor the rude cries of porters on the pier.
And if so rare the house, how rarer far
The welcome and the weal that therein are!
So free the access, the doors so widely thrown,
You half imagine all to be your own.


Scheme AABBCCDDEEFGHAIJKKLLDDMMGFNNOO
Poetic Form Tetractys  (20%)
Metre 1101010111 0101101 01110101 101110101 01001010101 11011011 0101010101 1011001111 1011110001 0101111101 110100100101 0111011111 0101000101 0011001101 1101101 01011101 100100011 111010111 010100100111 01010100111 1111010101 01101011 1101010101 0101010101 010111101 1011110101 0111011101 0100011011 1101011101 1101011111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,264
Words 233
Sentences 10
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 30
Lines Amount 30
Letters per line (avg) 34
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 1,015
Words per stanza (avg) 231
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:10 min read
80

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist, and travel writer. more…

All Robert Louis Stevenson poems | Robert Louis Stevenson Books

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