Swift published this poem in the Tatler, and called it “the best thing I ever wrote.” The text is lightly modernized, and the notes are my own. This is a reading text, with no pretense to being a critical edition.
| Careful observers may foretell the hour | ||
| (By sure prognostics) when to dread a shower: | prognostics = signs of the future | |
| While rain depends, the pensive cat gives o’er | depends = is expected | |
| Her frolics, and pursues her tail no more. | ||
| Returning home at night, you’ll find the sink [5] | sink = gutter | |
| Strike your offended sense with double stink. | ||
| If you be wise, then go not far to dine; | ||
| You’ll spend in coach hire more than save in wine. | ||
| A coming shower your shooting corns presage, | presage = predict | |
| Old achès throb, your hollow tooth will rage. [10] | [aches pronounced as two syllables] | |
| Sauntering in coffeehouse is Dulman seen; | ||
| He damns the climate and complains of spleen. | spleen = bad mood, depression | |
| Meanwhile the South, rising with dabbled wings, | dabbled = wet and dirty | |
| A sable cloud athwart the welkin flings, | sable = black; athwart = across; welkin = sky | |
| That swilled more liquor than it could contain, [15] | swilled = drank | |
| And, like a drunkard, gives it up again. | ||
| Brisk Susan whips her linen from the rope, | linen = laundry | |
| While the first drizzling shower is born aslope: | aslope = across | |
| Such is that sprinkling which some careless quean | quean = lower-class girl | |
| Flirts on you from her mop, but not so clean: [20] | ||
| You fly, invoke the gods; then turning, stop | ||
| To rail; she singing, still whirls on her mop. | rail = complain | |
| Not yet the dust had shunned the unequal strife, | strife = struggle | |
| But, aided by the wind, fought still for life, | ||
| And wafted with its foe by violent gust, [25] | ||
| ’Twas doubtful which was rain and which was dust. | ||
| Ah! where must needy poet seek for aid, | ||
| When dust and rain at once his coat invade? | ||
| Sole coat, where dust cemented by the rain | ||
| Erects the nap, and leaves a mingled stain. [30] | erects the nap = makes the fabric's fiber stand up | |
| Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down, | contiguous = continuous | |
| Threatening with deluge this devoted town. | deluge = flood; devoted = doomed | |
| To shops in crowds the daggled females fly, | daggled = muddy | |
| Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy. | ||
| The Templar spruce, while every spout’s abroach, [35] | Templar spruce = well-dressed law student; | |
| Stays till ’tis fair, yet seems to call a coach. | ||
| The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, | ||
| While seams run down her oiled umbrella’s sides. | ||
| Here various kinds, by various fortunes led, | ||
| Commence acquaintance underneath a shed. [40] | shed = shelter | |
| Triumphant Tories and desponding Whigs | Tories, Whigs, the two rival political parties | |
| Forget their feuds, and join to save their wigs. | ||
| Boxed in a chair the beau impatient sits, | chair = sedan chair, a box carried by “chairmen” | |
| While spouts run clattering o’er the roof by fits, | ||
| And ever and anon with frightful din [45] | ||
| The leather sounds; he trembles from within. | ||
| So when Troy chairmen bore the wooden steed, | wooden steed = the Trojan Horse | |
| Pregnant with Greeks impatient to be freed | pregnant = filled | |
| (Those bully Greeks, who, as the moderns do, | bully = thuggish | |
| Instead of paying chairmen, run them through), [50] | ||
| Laocoön struck the outside with his spear | Laocoön wanted to test the Trojan Horse | |
| And each imprisoned hero quaked for fear. | ||
| Now from all parts the swelling kennels flow, | kennels = gutters | |
| And bear their trophies with them as they go: | ||
| Filth of all hues and odors seem to tell [55] | ||
| What street they sailed from, by their sight and smell. | ||
| They, as each torrent drives with rapid force, | ||
| From Smithfield or St. Pulchre’s shape their course, | ||
| And in huge confluence joined at Snow Hill ridge, | confluence = flowing together | |
| Fall from the conduit prone to Holborn Bridge. [60] | ||
| Sweepings from butchers’ stalls, dung, guts, and blood, | ||
| Drowned puppies, stinking sprats, all drenched in mud, | ||
| Dead cats, and turnip tops, come tumbling down the flood. |