A+Description+of+a+City+Shower

=A Description of a City Shower=

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Swift wrote //A Description of a City Shower// in 1710, satirizing Dryden's translation of Virgil's //Georgics.// It was published in the //Tatler//, a weekly newspaper published by Addison and Steele. Swift used the classical model of the idyllic, rural Georgics to satirize modern life in a city. It describes the reactions of city folk to the weather, allowing Swift to mock habits and show some of humanity's foibles.

**A Description of a City Shower**
1 Careful observers may foretell the hour  (By sure prognostics) when to dread a shower.  While rain depends, the pensive cat gives o'er  Her frolics, and pursues her tail no more. 5 Returning home at night you find the sink  Strike your offended sense with double stink.  If you be wise, then go not far to dine,  You spend in coach-hire more than save in wine.  A coming shower your shooting corns presage, 10 Old aches throb, your hollow tooth will rage:  Sauntering in coffee-house is Dulman seen;  He damns the climate, and complains of spleen.

 Meanwhile the South, rising with dabbled wings,  A sable cloud athwart the welkin flings; 15 That swilled more liquor than it could contain, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> And like a drunkard gives it up again. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Brisk Susan whips her linen from the rope, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> While the first drizzling shower is borne aslope: <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Such is that sprinkling which some careless quean <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">20 Flirts on you from her mop, but not so clean: <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> You fly, invoke the gods: then turning, stop <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> To rail; she singing, still whirls on her mop. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Nor yet the dust had shunned th' unequal strife, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> But aided by the wind, fought still for life; <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">25 And wafted with its foe by violent gust, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> 'Twas doubtful which was rain, and which was dust. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Ah! Where must needy poet seek for aid, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> When dust and rain at once his coat invade? <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Sole coat, where dust cemented by the rain <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">30 Erects the nap, and leaves a cloudy stain.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Threatening with deluge this devoted town. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> To shops in crowds the daggled females fly, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">35 The Templer spruce, while every spout's abroach, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Stays till 'tis fair, yet seems to call a coach. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> The tucked-up seamstress walks with hasty strides, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> While streams run down her oiled umbrella's sides. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Here various kinds by various fortunes led, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">40 Commence acquaintance underneath a shed. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Triumphant Tories, and desponding Whigs, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Forget their feuds and join to save their wigs. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Boxed in a chair the beau impatient sits, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> While spouts run clattering o'er the roof by fits; <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">45 And ever and anon with frightful din <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> The leather sounds; he trembles from within. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> So when Troy chairmen bore the wooden steed, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Pregnant with Greeks, impatient to be freed; <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> (Those bully Greeks, who, as the moderns do, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">50 Instead of paying chairmen, run them through) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Laocoon struck the outside with his spear, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> And each imprisoned hero quaked for fear.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Now from all parts the swelling kennels flow, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> And bear their trophies with them as they go: <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">55 Filths of all hues and odors, seem to tell <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> What streets they sailed from, by the sight and smell. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> They, as each torrent drives with rapid force <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> From Smithfield, or St. Pulchre's shape their course; <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> And in huge confluent join at Snow Hill ridge, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">60 Fall from the conduit prone to Holborn Bridge. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Sweepings from butchers' stalls, dung, guts, and blood, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Drowned puppies, stinking sprats, all drenched in mud, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Dead cats and turnip tops come tumbling down the flood.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">31 Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Threatening with deluge this devoted town. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> To shops in crowds the daggled females fly, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> 35 The Templer spruce, while every spout's abroach, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> Stays till 'tis fair, yet seems to call a coach. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> The tucked-up seamstress walks with hasty strides, <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> While streams run down her oiled umbrella's sides.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Flood (line 31) vs. Deluge (line 32) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Swift's decision to use two different words to describe the rain emphasizes the intensity of the water flow as well as allows him to conjure slightly different meanings. By using the word 'Flood', Swift conjures images of the biblical flood covering the earth, suggesting that the duration and intensity of this storm is neverending but eventually worth it. Deluge, on the other hand, is not just a noun but a verb. To deluge this devoted town is different than to threaten with deluge this devoted town, a subtle but important difference. By using deluge as a noun, Swift binds 'deluge' and 'flood' even more inextricable together not only because of their synonymous meaning but because of the symmetrical nature of the two lines.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Daggled Females (line 33) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">The definition of daggled according to the dictionary is to make wet or moisten. In this case it is referring to all the women on the streets who were stuck in the storm and ended up getting wet.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Cheapen Goods (line 34) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">To haggle or to bargain for. In this case the women in the stores are trying to haggle or bargain for items which cost more than they have. They are trying to get them at a cheaper price.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Templer Spruce (line 35) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">A tree or wood from a spruce tree. In this poem Swift is using the term Templer Spruce to refer to the wood of the houses in the town.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Spout's abroach (line 35) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Open or tapped so that liquid can flow through it. In this case Swift is referring to the drainage sprouts of the houses of the town.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Tucked-up (line 37) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">To draw in or contract. This is said in the poem to represent how the people walk through the town. They tuck themselves under their umbrellas to avoid getting wet.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Oiled Umbrella (line 38) <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">To polish with oil. In the days of Jonathan Swift most umbrellas were oiled to allow the water to flow off them easier.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Works Cited

 * Swift, Jonathan. "//Description of a City Shower."// from __The Longman Anthology of British Literature__. 3rd ed. David Damrosch. NY: Pearson Education, Inc, 2006
 * [|www.dictionary.com]

**Contributors**
Matt Turoczy Lindsay Milbourne Diane Aiken