{
 "id": "edward-thomas/the-combe",
 "title": "The Combe",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Edward Thomas",
 "poet_slug": "edward-thomas",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems",
 "book_slug": "poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 14,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1917,
  "venue": "Poems (1917)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22423"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/edward-thomas_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22423",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22732",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Collected_Poems/LMsEAQAAIAAJ",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Two_Poems/3ycPAAAAQAAJ"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 12,
  "n_stanzas": 1,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 52,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The Combe was ever dark, ancient and dark.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Its mouth is stopped with bramble, thorn, and briar;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And no one scrambles over the sliding chalk",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By beech and yew and perishing juniper",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Down the half precipices of its sides, with roots",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And rabbit holes for steps. The sun of Winter,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The moon of Summer, and all the singing birds",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Except the missel-thrush that loves juniper,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are quite shut out. But far more ancient and dark",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Combe looks since they killed the badger there,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Dug him out and gave him to the hounds,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That most ancient Briton of English beasts.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}