{
 "id": "george-macdonald/a-mammon-marriage",
 "title": "A Mammon-Marriage",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "George MacDonald",
 "poet_slug": "george-macdonald",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume II",
 "book_slug": "poetical-works-vol-2",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 22,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1893,
  "venue": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume II (1893)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1893 collected Poetical Works, which is the printing this text is and not the poem's first appearance. MacDonald gathered and revised for it work published from 1855 onward, and it arranges the poems by its own editorial grouping rather than by the volumes they came from, so which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poeticalworksge00macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/metadata/poeticalworksge00macdgoog",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9984"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/george-macdonald_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1953",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8949",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9984",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10578",
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofstrifeinfo00macd",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/hiddenlifeandoth00macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/rampolli00macd",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102955776",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011821572"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 30,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 44,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The croak of a raven hoar!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A dog’s howl, kennel-tied!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Loud shuts the carriage-door:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The two are away on their ghastly ride",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To Death’s salt shore!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Where are the love and the grace?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The bridegroom is thirsty and cold!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The bride’s skull sharpens her face!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But the coachman is driving, jubilant, bold,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The devil’s pace.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The horses shivered and shook",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Waiting gaunt and haggard",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "With sorry and evil look;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But swift as a drunken wind they staggered",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "’Longst Lethe brook.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Long since, they ran no more;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Heavily pulling they died",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "On the sand of the hopeless shore",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where never swelled or sank a tide,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And the salt burns sore.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Flat their skeletons lie,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "White shadows on shining sand;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The crusted reins go high",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the crumbling coachman’s bony hand",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "On his knees awry.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Side by side, jarring no more,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Day and night side by side,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Each by a doorless door,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Motionless sit the bridegroom and bride",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "On the Dead-Sea-shore.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}