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I am setting a poem by William Cowper as published in an early 19th-century edition of his work. It uses a curly brace from time to time to mark a rhyming triplet (instead of the usual rhyming couplets). I'm trying to recreate this effect.

Based on a few similar questions on this site and my own reading on the tabular environment, the solution I've come up with so far is:

\documentclass[10pt]{memoir}
\usepackage{verse}
\begin{document}
\begin{verse}

He breaks the cord that held him at the rack,;\
  And, conscious of an unincumber'd back,\
  Snuffs up the morning air, forgets the rein,\
  Loose fly his forelock and his ample mane,;\
  $\left.
  \begin{tabular}{@{}l@{}}
    Responsive to the distant neigh he neighs,;\
    Nor stops, till, overleaping all delays,\
    He finds the pasture where his fellows graze.
  \end{tabular}
  \right}$\
  \vin Canst thou, and honour'd with a Christian name,\
  Buy what is woman born, and feel no shame,?\


\end{verse}
\end{document}

Which results in:

MWE output of Cowper's "Charity"

It's almost perfect, but there's a tiny-but-noticeable amount of padding on the left margin of the bracketed lines.

Can anyone suggest an adjustment to my markup that would eliminate even that?

RansomOttawa
  • 13
  • The space probably domes from the transition to math mode, not the tabular itself. – John Kormylo Apr 27 '21 at 04:15
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    https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/119869/11604 – Fran Apr 27 '21 at 04:17
  • Thank you, Fran. The accepted answer to that question doesn't appear too different from my own (and I believe I may have read that question while trying to solve this). Though I was hoping to avoid multiplying packages needlessly, the answers using the tikz package might be what I'm looking for. – RansomOttawa Apr 27 '21 at 04:32
  • @JohnKormylo \mathsurround is usually 0pt so not visible: this is \nulldelimiterspace from \left. – David Carlisle Apr 27 '21 at 06:43

1 Answers1

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\documentclass[10pt]{memoir}
\usepackage{verse}

\begin{document}
\begin{verse}\nulldelimiterspace=0pt


He breaks the cord that held him at the rack,;\
  And, conscious of an unincumber'd back,\
  Snuffs up the morning air, forgets the rein,\
  Loose fly his forelock and his ample mane,;\
  $\left.
  \begin{tabular}{@{}l@{}}
    Responsive to the distant neigh he neighs,;\
    Nor stops, till, overleaping all delays,\
    He finds the pasture where his fellows graze.
  \end{tabular}
  \right}$\
  \vin Canst thou, and honour'd with a Christian name,\
  Buy what is woman born, and feel no shame,?\


\end{verse}
\end{document}
David Carlisle
  • 757,742