Skip to content
Linespedia

The Ugly Princess

By Charles Kingsley

Topics: classic

My parents bow, and lead them forth,          For all the crowd to see -     Ah well! the people might not care          To cheer a dwarf like me.     They little know how I could love,          How I could plan and toil,     To swell those drudges' scanty gains,          Their mites of rye and oil.     They little know what dreams have been          My playmates, night and day;     Of equal kindness, helpful care,          A mother's perfect sway.     Now earth to earth in convent walls,          To earth in churchyard sod:     I was not good enough for man,          And so am given to God.     Bertrich in the Eifel, 1851.

AI analysis available. Enable JavaScript to interact.

About this line

"My parents bow, and lead them forth,..."

Exploring the themes of classic, Charles Kingsley delivers a powerful performance in "The Ugly Princess"... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

Attribution & Rights

Author:Charles Kingsley

"My parents bow, and lead them forth,..." by Charles Kingsley

For usage rights, copyright concerns, or to report an issue with this content, please visit our Copyright & Report page.

Related lines

"Over the camp-fires     Drank I with heroes,     Under the Donau bank,     Warm in the snow trench:     Sagamen heard I there,     Men of the"

"I would have loved:    there are no mates in heaven;     I would be great:    there is no pride in heaven;     I would have sung, as doth the ni"

"He wiled me through the furzy croft;          He wiled me down the sandy lane.     He told his boy's love, soft and oft,          Until I told"

"And should she die, her grave should be Upon the bare top of a sunny hill, Among the moorlands of her own fair land, Amid a ring of old and moss-grown"

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Charles Kingsley

About Charles Kingsley

Charles Kingsley (1819–1875) was an English novelist, historian, and poet whose poem "The Three Fishers" and children's book "The Water-Babies" are Victorian classics. He was also a social reformer and advocate for "Christian Socialism."

Full Bibliography
Continue Reading

"Over the camp-fires     Drank I with heroes,     U..."

Weekly Poetic Insight

Join our literary Sanctuary

Get the most inspiring lines, poetic analysis, and secret shayaris delivered to your inbox every Sunday.