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ENGLISH VERSIFICATION

FOR THE USE OF STUDENTS.

REV. JAMES C. PARSONS,

PRINCIPAL OF rUOSPECT HILL SCHOOL, GREENFIELD, MASS.

Who through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,

Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

LONGFELLOW.

LEACII, SIIEWELL, AND SANBORN.

BOSTON. NEW YORK. CHICAGO.

CorvKiGiiT, 1S91,
Bv James C. Parsons.

C. J. PCTER8 4. SON,

Tvl>OOfUPHCM *H0 EllCTIWTVPtM.

Hmim or BtuwiCK A Smith.

PREFACE.

This little book is intended to take its place as one of a
series for the study of the English Language, for pupils in
our higher institutions of learning. There seems no good
reason why the young men and women in our schools should
be more thoroughly and intimately acquainted with the pho-
netics, the grammar, the rlictoric, and the prosody of the
classical languages, than witli those of their vernacular. But,
unfortunately, this is too often the case, notwithstanding the
constant multiplication of text-books upon the English
language.

These text-books, for the most part, lack perspective, and
grasp of the natural method. We need, first, a book which
shall treat thoroughly, but simply, of the phonetic elements
of English, with the laws of euphony, of roots and deriva-
tion, of grammatical forms, and of the syntactical and
idiomatic structure of sentences. The next book in the
series should be an English Prose Composition, — not digni-
fied by the name of Rhetoric, but devoted wholly to master-
ing the various transformations of which sentences are capable,
to produce variety of expression. The third book might be

English Versification, for which the present manual is offered

iv PREFACE.

as a sample ; and the fourth would be a Rhetoric in its most
comprehensive form.

In preparing this book, the autlior lias been guided by the
experience of many years in the class-room. No attempt has
been made to produce an exhaustive treatise on the fascinat-
ing subject of prosody. The controversy of scholars as to
the degree in which quaiitity prevails as a basis for English
rhythm has been studiously avoided. It seems sufficient to
follow the prevalent habit of our best poets, as evidenced in
their utterance and their works, of assigning to accent the
distinguisliing characteristic of English verse. Given this as
a basis, it is possible to go on and add all the charms of
phonetic richness and dt'i)th of which the language is
capable.

One of the chief features of the book will l)e found in the
copiousness of examples. From tlie beginning of the study,
it is absolutely essential that the ear of the student should be
trained to detect all the varieties of melody and harmony, and
those subtler effects which can be better exemplified than
described. For this training, much dei)ends upon the guidance
of the teacher.

It was at first intended to append to each chapter an exer-
cise for the study and practice of the princii)les contained in
it; but upon consideration, it was thought better to leave
such a course to the individuality of the teacher, with only
such general suggestions as are embodied in the advice to
teaeljors following this jjreface.

The need, to an educated person, of familiarity with the
laws of verse, has received but inafleqimtc attention in our

PREFACE. V

courses of study. It is true, that the feeling for rhythmic
expression is born, not made. But whoever is capable of
understanding and reading correctly the best prose in our
literature, is capable also of giving a proper rendering of our
higher poetry, with the same amount of attention to the laws
of rhythm and metre.

Especially is such study important to those who seek
expression of their own thoughts in prose or verse. The
vocabulary in English is essentially the same in poetry as in
prose. " Our prosody," says Henry Reed, in his lectures on
English Literature, "seldom if ever disqualifies words on
account of their sound, whereas in the Latin, as has been
ascertained, one word out of every eight is excluded from its
chief metres by the rules of its prosody. The study of
English poetry, being thus in closer affinity with the prose,
admits of an important use in the formation of a good prose
style. A mind as earnestly practical as Dr. Franklin's ob-
served this, and he recommended the study of poetry and the
writing of verse for this purpose ; it was one of the sources of
his own excellent English."

Even for the sake of the few, in each generation, who are
favored with the gift of song, we may well afford to offer the
advantages of such a study in our regular courses upon
language. If one of the uses of teaching music and drawing
in our public schools is the opportunity afforded to the fortu-
nate ones to discover their gift and to cultivate it, may we
not claim the same office for the study of verse ? Who can
say what young soul may even now be born among us, who,
" mute and inglorious " else, may be thus stimulated and

tI rKEFACE.

informed to use his dawning powers, and who may in future

years pay the tribute to our schools which Bryant rendered to

his father:

" Who t4iught my youth

The art of verso, and in the bud of life

Offered me to the Muses."

J. C. P.
Gkke:<kikli>, January, 18UL

TO TEACHERS.

Two purposes were had in view in the preparation of this
manual : first, study of the forms of verse ; then, practice upon
those forms. "We will consider them separately, although
they may be carried on simultaneously.

First, the study. From the first, the pupil should be
expected to search for additional examples of every form of
language mentioned in the book. Learning and reciting the
definitions and the rules, he should also furnish an example
of each, not only from the book, but also of his own discovery.
To begin with, some practice should be had in reading simple
prose, to catch the significance of accent and emphasis ; then
rhythmical prose ; then rhythm reduced to regular metre.
The reading should embrace longer extracts than those given
in the book, for the sake of getting the full swing of the style.
It would be well to have one example, at least, of each form,
committed to memory and recited. Under Variety of Ehythm,
instances should be found of substitution, elision, and the
rest. In Variety of Metre, additional examples should be
given of each kind. For Rhyme, besides the method already
proposed, we quote the following suggestion of Dr. W. J.
Rolfe, in his Hints to Teachers : ** The teacher may give

vm TO TEACH BIIS.

interest to this subject by asking tlie pupils if there are
English words (not including i)roper names of persons, places,
etc.), for which no rhyme can be found ; and if so, to look up
examples of them (like silver, squirrel, s/iuduw, j)la7iet,^lbert,
beetle, statue, trellis, April, August, temple, virtue, forest, jioet,
open, proper, almond, bayonet, something, nothing, etc.). Words
which have only one rhyme are also curious ; like peojile
(steeple), anguish, winter, hornet, hatchet, mountain, darkness,
blackness, votive, etc. It must be understood that single
words are required in all cases; not combinations of words,
like catch it to hatchet, or hurt you to virtue." In the list of
words to which 710 rhymes can be found. Dr. Kolfe intends,
of course, perfect rhymes; for some of our best poets have
used imperfect rhymes for some of those words; for instance,
find what poet has quarrel to rhyme with squirrel, meadow
with shadow, sorest with forest. Also find the words which
rhyme with the last list given, and, if possible, any use of
them in the poets. In the chapters on Alliteration and Tone-
Color, let genuine examples of each be studied and read with
such appreciation of the feeling a.s to bring out the full
significance of the sounds. Let the subject of Heading Verso
receive the attention it deserves. I'assages of considerable
length, of the more usual forms, should be read in class, first
for naturalness of expression, and then for analysis. Ex-
amples of lyric verse, of unusual metres, should then be taken
up. Specimens of the classical, foreign, and humorous forma
should be sought and analyzed.

Secondly, practiire. Side by sid*; with this study, should
go jiractiee in the conii>osition of verse, which should follow

Ta TEACnEKS. IX

prose composition as a part of the regular course for every
well-educated person. There are many ways in which this
practice may be given. Single lines of each kind of rhythm
,and metre, from iambic to dactylic, from monometer to octam-
eter, should be made by the pupil. Later, a stanza of each
may be required. Preparatory to original work, facility of
construction may be cultivated by giving dissected selections
to be re-combined in their proper order. For instance, let
the teacher take a passage of iambic pentameter from Paradise
Lost, or of dactylic hexameter from Longfellow, and transpose
phrases and clauses, so as to break up the rhythmical order,
and give it to the class to be reconstructed. Again, give an
extract with omitted epithets or phrases, thus changing the
metre, to be restored to the original form. Thus :

"When, as returns this solemn clay,
Man comes to meet his — God,
What rites, what honors, shall he pay ?
How spread his — praise abroad ? "

Once more, try the exercise named bouts rimes, or "rhymed
endings." In this, the final rhymes of a poem are given, —
also the scheme of the verse, and the subject, — for the pupil
to reproduce the poem, or one similar to it. Thus :

WOODS IN WINTER.

u ' I u ' I o ' I u chill

u ' I u ' I ^j ' I i-i gale
u ' I u ' I u ' I o hill

u ' I u ' I w ' I w vale.

Then, as a beginning of original work, assign a short passage
of prose to be turned into verse of any kind which may be

X TO TEACH EIIS.

specified. For example, the Song of Solomon ii. 11-13, to be
converted into iambic pentameter. In this way, the pupil
may be gradually led on to undertake metrical compositiun
for which he shall furnish his own material. Then, let abun-
dant practice be given in all the forms of verse which are laid
before him in this book. As an incentive to the teacher, the
author is glad to testify to very creditable productions as the
regular work of pupils in such a course as is here indicated.

NOTE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

For corrections and improvements in this second edition, the
author gratefully acknowledges his indebtedness to the criti-
cisms and suggestions of Dr. W. J. Rolfo of Cambridge, l*rof.
A. 11. Tolman of the University of Chicago, Prof. .f. H. Gilmoro
of the University of Rochester, Mr. Brander Mattliews, Lec-
turer at Columbia College, Prof. L. 1?. II. Briggs of Harvard
University, and Dr. J. Schip^K-'r of Vienna, author of " Eng-

lische Mt'trik."

J. C. P.

GllBEMFIKLD, JnUj, 18M.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER PAGE

I. INTRODUCTORY 1

Prose. — Verse. — Quantity. — Stress. — Rhythmical Prose.
— Rhythm. — Metre. — Alliteration. — Rhyme. — Tone-
Color.

II. RHYTHM 5

Accent. — Emphasis. — Proclitics and Enclitics. — Unit
of Rhythm. — Names of Feet. — Character of Rhythms.

III. METRE 12

Examples of Metres, from Mononieter to Octameter, in
each of the Four Rhythms.

IV. VARIETY IN RHYTHM 18

Substitution. — Elision. — Slurring. — Extra-rhythmical
Syllables. — Rests. — Pauses. — Caesura of the Foot. —
Caesura of the Line. — Run-on Lines. — End-stopped Lines.

V. THE STANZA 33

Couplet. — Triplet. — Stanza. — Quatrain. — Hymn Metres.
— Stanzas of five, six, seven, eight, and nine Lines. —
Rime Royal, or Short Chaucerian. — Spenserian. — Long
Chaucerian. — Sonnet. — Otic,
xi

xn TAULE OF CONTEXTS.

CIIAPTEK PACK

VI. lUlYME 43

Use of tlic Term. — HIank Verse. — Proper llliyino, its
Rcquirouiouts. — Identical Kliynio. — Masculine and Femi-
nine. — Imperfect. — Assonance. — End-lihymc. — Middle
Rhyme. — Rhyme Order. — Complicated.

VII. ALLITERATION 51

Anglo-Saxon. — Early English. — Its Ahusc. — False Use.

— Disguised. — Examples.

VIII. QUANTITY M

Early Usage. — Music and Speech. — Length of Syllables.

— Length of Measures. — Modern Uasis of Rhythm. — Use
of Quantity in English.

IX. TONE-COLOR Gl

Imitation. — Correspondence. — Suggestivcncss. — Signif-
icance of Certain Sounds. — Examples.

X. ON READING VEi:SE OS

Naturalness. — Accent. — Emphasis. — Unequal Stress.

— Cuisural Pause. — End of Lines. — Practice. — Analysis.

XI. DEVELOPMENT OF EN(iLl.SII FORMS ... 70

Three Periods: — Anglo-Saxon, Norman, New English. —
Saxon Couplets. — French Riming Couplets and Alexan-
drine. — Latin Septenary. — Poulter's Measure. — Railads
and Lyrics. — Iambic Pentameter. — Its Law.s. — Cbauecr.

— .Surrey. — Marlowe. — .Shake^peuru. — Analysis of Millon,
Tennyson, lirowning.

TABLE OF CONTENTS. Xiu

CHAPTEE PACK

XII. IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES . . .105

Dactylic Hexameter. — Elegiac. — Hendecasyllabics. —
Alcaics. — Sapphics. — Septenarius. — Saturnian. — Chori-
ambic. — Galliambic.

XIII. FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE 115

Ballade. — Rondel. — Rondeau. — Roundel. — Kyrielle.
— Pantoum. — Virelai. — Virelai Nouveau. — Rondeau Re-
double. — Sicilian Octave. — Sestina. — Villanelle. — Trio-
let. — Chain Verse. — Chant Royal.

XIV. COMIC FORMS 131

Ballad Form, — Recitative. — Short Trochaic. — Dactylic
with Anacrusis. — Trochaic Tetrameter. — Dactylic. —
Anapaistic. — Irish Form. — Negro Minstrel. — Nonsense
Verses. — Csesural Pause. — Double and Triple Rhymes. —
Echo. — Parody. — Dialect.

APPENDIX 141

Definitions. — Acrostic. — Alliteration. — Antiphon. —
Ballade. — Cento. — Courting in the City. — A Pastoral. —
Palinode. — Poems within Poems. — Queer Devices. — Vi-
relai Nouveau. — Villanelle. — Tail-Rhyme Stanza.

INDEX 157

ENGLISH YEESIFICATIOl^.

CHAPTER I.
INTEODUCTOET.

1. Language, spoken or written, may take the form either
of prose or verse. Prose is the form of ordinary speech.
Verse differs from this chiefly in a certain regularity of
movement.

2. This regularity of movement is called Rhythm. Rhythm,
in verse, is the occurrence of similar phenomena of sound at
regular intervals.

3. In the Greek and Latin languages, the chief feature
which produced rhythm was the length or duration of sound.
At regular intervals, the voice was drawn out upon the long
syllables, as in a musical chant. This is called Qu^^jsttity.
It will be more fully explained in a subsequent chapter.

4. In English, rhythm is the occurrence, at regular in-
tervals, of sounds having more Force, or loudness, than the
others.

5. This force, or loudness, is called Stress. Stress is of two
kinds. Accent and Emphasis. Accent is the force which is

2 ENfJLISII VERSIFICATION.

given to ono syllable in a word more than to the otliois,
to call attention to it as significant. Thus : in-dcl-i-blc.
Emphasis, in the same manner, is emjjloyed to call attention
to one or more words in a scntenco, as inure important than
the rest. Thus: Wfuit in the world are r/oti do-ing? Vmxo
three words receive the emphasis, and in the last one, the
syllable do receives both the accent and emphasis, thus having
an extra stress.

6. In prose, the words generally follow any order which
most naturally expresses the thought, without regard to the
number or frequency of the accents. Thus, in this sentence
from Dickens's " Old Curiosity Shop : " " Night is generally my
time for w.'ilking. Siive in the country, I seldom go out until
dfter dark." Here no regularity is observable in the occur-
rence of the stress. This is simple prose.

7. lint when the thoughts become animated by feeling or
imagination, there is a tendency to express them in a riiythmi-
cal form. Thus, in another passage from the same work of
Dickens: "When Death strikes down the innocent and young,
from eceri/ friijile funn from ir/itrk he lets the pihitinr/ spirit
free, a hundred virtues Hsc, in shapes of mercy, charity and
love, to walk the earth and bless it." In the passage italicized,
the stress occurs on every alternate syllable.

Again : *' Faint streaks of purple soon blushed aMng the
sky; tlie whole celestial concave w:is filled with the inllowing
tides of the morning light." — luliranl Ererctt.

In the first part of this sentence, if we omit soon, or change
purple to lifjht, we have unbroken rhythm, i)roduced by the
occurrcnco of the stress on every alternate syllable.

Once morn: " Agiiin the jK-aling organ heaves its thrilling
thunders, compressing uir into nui.sic and rolling it forth up(»n
the 86ul." — Washington Irving.

In the first part of the sentence, the stress falls on every

INTllODUCTORY. 3

second syllable ; in the last part (if we change upon to on) it
falls upon every third syllable.

Tije three sentences quoted in this section are examples of
rhythmical prose. Neither can properly be called verse. To
constitute verse, not only rhythm is needed, but Metre.

8. Metre is the arrangement of rhythmical language in
portions of a determinate length. Rhythmical prose might
run on indefinitely, with only such break as would be required
by the rhetorical divisions of the sentence. It would still be
rhythmical, but not metrical. Metre is a measured portion of
rhythm.

Its first and simplest division is that of the Line. The
length of the line is determined by the number of accents,
which may vary from one to eight. The metre is named
accordingly.

The next division of Metre is that of the Stanza. It con-
sists of a group of Lines, varying in number from two upwards,
and bound together by a certain organic unity.

9. Besides rhythm and metre, other elements contribute to
the charm of verse. The ear is pleased with harmony of tones.
The repetition of the same or similar sounds was early seized
upon to produce this effect. This similarity may occur only
incidentally and irregularly, serving merely as an ornament;
or it may be used as an aid in marking the rhythm, or in bind-
ing the lines together into the organic unity of the Stanza.
The earliest form in which this element occurred in English
is known as Alliteration.

10. Alliteration. In Anglo-Saxon and Old English, this
consisted in the repetition of the same or similar consonant or
vowel sounds at the beginning of several of the most emphatic
syllables in the line. It served both to mark the rhythm, and
to bind together the two halves of the line. In later times,

4 ENGLLSII VEliSlFlCATION.

the strict rules have been disregarded, and the term aUiteration
is applied to the general predominance of similar initial sounds
in any passage of verse.

11. EiiYME. This came into use later than alliteration in
Englisli Verse. It is sometimes called End-rhyme to distin-
guish it from alliteration. It is similarity of sounds at the
end of words instead of at the beginning. It was not com-
monly emploj'ed in the ancient classical languages, but is very
generally used in modern verse, both as an ornament and as a
means of uniting lines together in a stanza.

12. A.ssoNANCE. This is a modified form of rhyme, in which
there is not a complete resemblance between the closing sylla-
bles of words, as respects their final consonants, but the simi-
larity is wholly in the vowel sound.

13. Tone-Color. A still more subtle element of beauty in
verse is found in the correspondence between the rpiality of
the sounds employed and the sentinu'nt ex})ressed. This may
be merely an imitation of sounds in nature, or it may be an
indefinite suggestion of certain feelings by the use of the
appropriate consonant or vowel sound. Thus in l*oe's de-
scription of the fire-bells :

" How llioy clang and clash and roar,
What a horror Ihoy outpour
On the busoiu of the palpitating air 1"

Each of these suljects will be fully treated in its appropriate
chapter.

EHYTHM.

CHAPTER II.
EHYTHM.

1. As Rhythm is the most important feature of verse, it is
necessary, first of all, to understand its nature, and catch its
spirit. To appreciate the external charm of poetry, one must
be susceptible to the grace of all swaying movements in
nature.

2. Examples of these are found everywhere about us and
within us ; in the rise and fall of leafy branches in the spring-
time ; in the winding curves of the river, hollowing out its
banks to the right and to the left ; in the rolling in of the
billows toward the shore ; and, as if in response to these, the
beating of our hearts, felt with regular pulsations in all parts
of our bodies.

Thou canst not wave thy staff in air,

Or dip thy paddle in the lake,
But it carves the bow of beauty there,

And the ripples in rhymes the oar forsake.

— Evierson.

3. Rhythm, in its most comprehensive sense, is the recur-
rence of similar phenomena at regular intervals of space or
time, thus showing itself to the eye or the ear. A force is
exerted, and then spends itself. The wave swells and then
sinks, making a crest and a hollow, visible to the eye. A
succession of crests and hollows forms a rhytlim. So of the
voice ; it pulsates loudly and then softly, and the succession
of loud and soft syllables forms a rhythm.

6 ENGLISH VEr.SIFICATION.

4. In tlie earliest times, this resjjonse of man to nature gave
rise to dance and song, marking off the time into regular
intervals, in obedience to a natural instinct. The alternate
beating of the foot served as an accompaniment and measure
of the movements of the voice. So it happens that the first
literature thought worthy of preserving was in the form of
verse rather than of prose.

5. But rhythmic movement is determined b}' law, as well in
human language as in outward nature. To learn these laws,
in English verse, we must study the nature of Stuess, or force,
as employed to give significance to speech. Stress, as wo
have before learned, is of two kinds, Accent and Emphasis.

ACCENT.

6. If we notice carefully the speech of others, we shall
observe that we catch the meaning chiefly by means of certain
syllables ami words, which are more prominent than the rest.
The intervening syllables are comparatively obscure. The
prominent syllable in a word is made so, because it contains the
I)rinoipal idea in the word. It is said to be accented. Thus:
in-del-i-ble. Here the .syllable del, meaning to blot out, is the
root idea of the word, and is accented.

7. But the unaccented syllables are also of some importance.
They tell what is to be done with the root idea. The word
indtdlblc means not to be blotted out. Therefore, the unaccented
syllables can never be wholly neglected in speech. The
attention of the speaker and hearer, while directed chiefly to
the jiocented syllable, must also carry the unaccented syllables
which are necessary to modify its ujeaning. Each accented
syllable carries one or more unaccented syllables as modifiers.

8. But to give attention to the strong syllables and the
weak ones at the same time, requires effort, and this effort has
its limits. It has been found that it is not easy to jtronounce

RHYTHM. 7

or to hear more than two unaccented syllables attached to an
accented one, whether they come before or after it. There-
fore, the accent in any word cannot easily be placed farther
back than the antepenult. If it should be placed farther
back, either some unaccented syllable that follows must be
slurred, or obscured, in pronunciation, or a secondary accent
must fall on some one of the following syllables. Thus, if we
accent the first syllable of cemetery, "we must either pronounce
it cemefry, or cemetery. In the word unconstitutionality, we
find three accents, with single unaccented syllables intervening.

9. Each accented syllable, then, may carry with it not more
than two unaccented syllables. If these follow it, they are
called enclitics, from a Greek word meaning to lean iqjon. If
they go before it, they are called j^^'oclitics, meaning leaning
forward.

EmPHASIS.

10. The same principle which applies to syllables in a word
is applicable also to words in a sentence. Certain words in a
sentence are more important than others, and are made notice-
able by stress of voice. This stress is called Emphasis. Such
words are usually nouns, adjectives, and verbs ; connected by
less important words, such as conjunctions and prepositions,
which do not receive any stress.

11. Between accent and emphasis, this difference is observ-
able. The place of the accent in a word is generally fixed by
the prevalent usage of the time. Whereas the place of
einphasis in a sentence varies somewhat with the habit of the
individual speaker, or with his conception of the relative
importance of the thoughts or feelings expressed.

12. But wherever the emphasis may fall in a sentence, the
same general law holds good as in accent, that a strong
syllabic cannot ciisily carry with it more than two weak
syllables, before or after it.

8 ENGLISH VKIiSlFICATlON.

13. Tlierefore, if rhythm, in English, is produced by the
stress of voice falling at regular intervals, its limits are
determined by this general law. It will consist of a succes-
sion of accented syllables fulloiced each by one or two unac-
cented, or preceded by one or two unaccented. To compare
it with the waves of the sea, it will be a series of crests
subsiding into hollows, or a series of hollows rising into
crests.

14. Khythm, being thus regular, is capable of being
measured. One of the regular intervals will constitute the
nnit of rhythm. It can be measured from the beginning of
one stress to the beginning of the next; or from the end
of one stress to the end of the next.

Thus:
Or:

15. As an accented syllable may carry with it either one or
two unaccented, the uikit of rhythm may consist of either two
or three syllables. If it consists of two, it may bo called
double movement, as is marked in the preceding section. If
it consists of three syllables, it may be called triple move-
ment.

Thus :'^ou|^ww|^>^^j|'^uw|
Or : uu^|v-ii-i^|ou'^|wi.j^|

In subsequent marking of rhythm, the stressed syllables
will have the usual sign for accent, and the other syllables
will bo left unmark(;d except in special cases.

16. 'i'lie unit of rhythm is commonly called a foot. It will
Ite seen that there are four ]>rincipal kinds of feet — two of
double movement, and two of triple movcmont.

Thus, of double movement: | ' o | or | v.; ' |
Of trii)k' movement : | ' .^ >^ | or | w w ' |

RHYTHM. »

17. For convenience, the ancient names of the feet are still
employed; always with the understanding that we are speak-
ing of accented and unaccented, instead of long and short
syllables.

The iambus may be thus represented : | u ' | as, alone.
The trochee may be thus represented : | ' u | as, onivarcl.
The anapaest may be thus represented : | w u ' | as, intei'vene.
The dactyl may be thus represented : | ' u u | as, delicate.

18. Other feet are also possible. In marking time Avith the
feet, in marching, instead of making each alternate stroke a
heavy one, as is the custom, it is possible to emphasize every
stroke. Carrying the analogy into verse, we have a unit of
rhythm in double movement, with both syllables accented.

Thus we have the spondee : | ' ' | as, amen.

Again, in marching, the heavy stroke, or the tap of the
drum Avhich designates it, may be intermitted, for a moment,
the movement being carried on, in the mind, during the
interval. Applying this principle to verse, the unit of rliythm
may lose the accent occasionally.

Thus we have the pyrrhic : | u u | as, in the.

19. Still other types may be formed. The unit of rhythm
may consist of an accented syllable with an unaccented pre-
ceding and following.

Thus we have the amphibrach : | u ' «-- | endurance.

Or, in a different order, the amphimacer : | ' u ' | give me life.

We find even the choriambus : | ' u u ' | over the sea.

This last is a compound of trochee (or choree) and iambus.

20. As the character of a rhythm cannot be seen in a single
foot, it will be necessary to give here an example of each.
Double rhythm, is, in general, a staid and stately movement.

— Gray.

10 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Triple rhytlim is more animated and graceful.

— Scott.

Again, iambic and trochaic rhythms differ from each other.

The former is more calm and sustained :

One sweet | ly sol | euin thought. |

— Phabe Cary.

The latter is more energetic and forcible :

6nvvanl, | Christian | soldiers. |

— Ilaring Oould.

"The trochee starts forward from impulse, the iambus
pauses for reflection." — Hodgson.

The spondee gives dignity and solemnity.

Roll 6n, I thou dC-ep | and dark | blue 6 | ccan, roll. |

— liyron.

The following is the rhythm given by the anapiest:

Where the cit | ron and 61 | ive are fair | est of fniits. |

— nyron.

* ' IJird of the | wilderness, |

lilytliesonift and | cumberless. |
Amphibrach (occasional): —iiogg.

No pearl ev | er lay un | der Oman's | green wdtcr. |

— Moore.

This line may also be scanned as anapsestic ; see i)age IG.
Amphimacer (as an occasional substitute) :

Tiikc the ht'Im, | l(\id the line, | siivc the squad | ron, cried |

the chief. |

— Ilrowning.

Choriambus (occasional) ;
Love, what | ailod thee to It'ave | life that w.as made | lovely wo
thought I with love? -Su-iubume.

21. As a liclj) toward remembering the name and character
of the difft'rf'nt tinits of rhythm, it may be widl to commit to
memory the foUcjwing:

Tr<'»clioc I trips from | l^ng to | sliort;
From long to lung in .solcinn sort

RHYTHM. 11

Slow Spon I dee stalks, | strong foot, | yet ill able

]^ver to I come up with | Dactyl tri | s^^llable. |

lam I bics march | from short | to long; |

With a leap | and a bound | tlie swift An | apsests throng; |

One syllable long with one short at each side

Aniphibra | chys hastes with | a stately | stride:

First and hist | being long, | middle short, | Amphima | cer

Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high-bred racer.

Coleridge.

12 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

CHAPTER III.
METRE.

1. "WiiKX a rhythmic succession of words is divided into
lines of a definite number of feet, the result is called metre.
In other words, metre is a measured portion of rhythm.

2. The number of units in a line determines the name of
the metre. A line of one unit is called AFon'omktkk; of two,
])iMKTKU; of three, Tki'mktku; of four, TKTnXMKTjcu; of five,
1'entXmetek; of six, HkxXmkteu; of seven, Hki'tXmeteu; of
eight, OctXmetek. Thus, a line of five iambuses is called
Iamiuc Pentameter.

3. Besides these regular measures, there may be fractions
of a foot at the beginning or end of a line, and sometimes in
the middle. This is especially the case with lyric metres, or
those adapted for singing.

4. To illustrate the various kinds of metre, the following
examples are given. It should be remarked that it is very
rare to find specimens of lines consisting of one unit, or more
than six units, of any rhytlim.

I A M II I C.

5. Iambic monomctcr :

As jiist
A frk-nd
I uiiist.

-Hood.

METRE. 13

6. Iambic dimeter ;

— Jlerrick.

With added syllable :

She wept, | sweet la | dy,
And said, | iu weep | ing —

— liossetti.

7. Iambic trimeter :

O let I the sol | id gi-ound |
Not fail 1 beneath | my feet. |

— Tennyson.

With added syllable :

— Cowptr.

8. Iambic tetrameter :

Come live | with me | and be | my love. |

— Marlowe.

This is a form frequently used ; as in Milton's " L' Allegro,"

Tennyson's " In Meraoriam," and many others.

With added syllable :

Wee, sleek | it, cow'r ] in, tim I 'rous bdast | ie.

— Bums.

9. Iambic pentameter :

— Chaucer.

Tliis is the most common of all English metres.

It has received the name of heroic verse in English, German,
and Italian ; and the same name is given to the iambic hexam-
eter in French, and the dactylic hexameter in Greek and
Latin. It will receive special attention in another chapter.

With added syllable :

On helm | and har | ness rings \ the Norse | mau's hiim | mer.

— Longfellow.

14 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

10. Iambic hexameter :

— Spetuer.

This is called the Alexandrine line, — as being the metre of
a French poem upon the life of Alexander. It naturally
divides into two trimeters ; thus :

— Wordsworth.

11. Iambic heptameter :

liyron.

With added syllable :

— Mrs. Brotcning : Cowpcr'a Grave

TKOCII AIC.

li Trochaic monometer :

Sphlshing
Dashing.

— Southcy.

13. Trochaic dimeter :

— C'avtpion.

With added syllable :

Give the | vengeance | diic
To the I viiliant | crew.

— liryden.

14 Trochaic trimeter :

Go where | glory | wails thee. |

— Moan.

METRE. 16

With added syllable :

Home they | brouglit her | warrior | d^ad.

— J'etinyson.
Of this last, numerous examples may be found.

15. Trochaic tetrameter :

Space to I breathe how ) short so | ever. |

— Beji Jonson.

This is the metre of Longfellow's " Hiawatha."
With added syllable :

Only I kneel once | more a | round the | sod.

— Afrs. Jlemans.

16. Trochaic pentameter :

— Mattluic Arnold.

With added syllable :

Think when [ e'er you | see us | what our | beaiily | saith.

— Leigh Hunt.

17. Trochaic hexameter :

— Swinburne.

— Tennyson.

18. Trochaic heptameter :

Let the student find an example of this, if possible.

With added syllable :

T^U me I whdt thy | lordly | name is | on the | night's

Plu I tonian | shore.

— Poe.

19. Trochaic octameter :

my I spirit | o'er you. |

— Mrs. Browning.

16 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

ANAPAKSTIC.

20. Anapaestic mouometer :

On thy blink
In a nink.

— Drayton.

21. Anapaestic dimeter :

On the 6in | erakl main. |

- Shelley.

With added syllable :

lie is gone | on the muun | tain;
He is lust I to the for | est.

— Scott.

22. Anapaestic trimeter :

— Cowper.
With adiled syllable :

Comes a pdusc | in the day's | occupil | tions.

— Longfdlow.

23. Anapaestic tetrameter:

For a fii'ld I of the di'ad | rushes n'd | on my sight. |

— Campbell.

With added syllable :

— Scott.

In each of tliese last two forms, an iambus is often substi-
tuted for the first anapaest :

Three fish | crs went sail | ing out in | to liio wt'-st. |

— Charlis KingtUy.

IIow dear | to my luart | are the scenes | of my chiltl | hood.

— ifoodworth.

No p<5arl | ever lay | under 6 | man's green wa | Itr.

Moore.

These la.st two may be scanned perfectly as consisting of
amphibrachs.

METRE. 17

24. Anapaestic pentameter :

— Robert Browning.

25. Anapaestic hexameter :

nose. I

— Tentiyson.

26. Anapaestic heptameter :

Let the student seek an example of this.
With added syllable :

ing and shad | ow-like na | tions.

— Swinburne.

DACTYLIC.

27. Dactylic monometer :

Memory !
Tell to me.

— George Eliot.

With added syllable :

Weary Of | breath.

— Hood.

It will be seen that this last is the same as the choriambus.

28. Dactylic dimeter :

Cannon to | right of them. |

— Tennyson.

A form similar to this, with accents much modified, is
found in several well-known poems : as Drayton's " A^incourt,"
and Longfellow's " Skeleton in Armor."

29. Dactylic trimeter :

Here let the student seek for an example.

With added syllable :

J}l/ron.

18 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

30. Dactylic tetrameter :

Why art thou | dim when thy | sisters arc | radiant ? |

— «. II. Iiokfr.
This is more commonly found witli the last foot a trochee :

Brightest and | hust of the | sons of the | morning.

— Ilcber.

31. Dactylic pentameter:

An example may be furnished by the student, either selected
or original.

— n'. ir. story.

32. Dactylic hexameter :

This is an example of pure dactylic hexameter. The classi-
cal dactylic hexanictor dilTcrs from this in having a spondee
or trochee in the last foot, and allowing spondees in other
places ; only, the fifth foot is usually a dactyl. Thus :

— Longfellovf.

As sj)ondoos are not easily formed in English, trochees take
their place, as in the above example.

NoTK. — Tlu- most couiuiou of those metres will rociivo special attcutiou
ill a later chapter.

VARIETY IN RUYTHM. 19

CHAPTER IV.
VARIETY IN EHYTHM.

1. In the preceding chapters, the laws of rhythm and
metre have been given as seen in their most exact and regular
forms. But it is by no means necessary that they should be
limited to these. Much of the charm of verse would be lost
by this strict uniformity. In all languages, and especially in
English, a larger freedom of movement is allowed, without
changing essentially the rhythmic effect. Just as in music,
added notes may be thrown into a measure, called "grace-
notes," which, being played rapidly, do not disturb the regular
time of the movement, so lighter syllables may be introduced
in the unit of rhythm, without affecting the general flow of
the accent. Then, also, silences or rests may take the place
of syllables occasionally. And again, a few light syllables
may occur as a sort of flourish at the beginning or end of
a line, without affecting the regularly accented portion. The
present chapter is devoted to these variations.

SUBSTITUTION.

2. In the first place, it is to be observed, that the same
unit of rhythm is not necessarily preserved throughout an
example of verse. One kind of foot may occasionally be sub-
stituted for another. In general, it is desirable that the rela-
tive place of the accent should be retained. That is, tlie
accent should be struck regularly at the hetjliinhig of every
foot, or at the end of every foot, without having necessarily

20 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

the same number of syllables in each foot. In this way,
iambuses and anapaests may iuterchaiijje with each other in
the same verse. Thus :

— Shelley.

Or trochees and dactyls :

— Tennyson.

3. In iambic movement, which represents marching time,
tl»e stroke or accent, which usually comes only on the last
syllable, may, at times, come equally on the lirst syllable, lu
this case, a spondee takes the place of the iambus.

K611 on, I thou deep | .liid dark | bliie 6 | cein, roll. |

— Hjjron.

Or the stroke may be omitted from each syllable, iti one
measure, occasionally, the time being carried on in the mind,
during the interval. .This gives the pyrrhic in the place of
an iambus :

New li^ht I M An I il hcav | en-kiss | Inn hill. |

— Shitki-sitenre.

Here the second foot is a jiyrrhic.

Owing to the large number of particles in English, the
pyrrhic is a foot of very frequent occurrence. Some writers
u])on verse are afciistoined to mark the pyrrhic with an
accent like tlie other feet in the line, calling it a metrical
accent as distinguished from the true accent. Hut tliis leads
to a sing-song, scanning movement, which detracts from the
gracefulness of the natunl reailing. A genuine ]»oet will
always dis])ose the parti(^les in his verse in sneh a luanin'r,
that it may be read naturally without impairing flie rhythmic
effect.

VARIETY IN EIIYTIIM. 21

4. It is less easy to explain how an Inverted foot can occur
in any given rhythm. It would seeiu to destroy the onward
flow, if the accent should suddenly be thrown upon the begin-
ning of the foot, when it had been running prevailingly upon
the end. But it is nevertheless true, that a trochee is fre-
quently found in the place of an iambus. The law seems to
be, however, that this occurs most easily and properly after a
pause ; that is, at the beginning of a line, or after a rest, in
the middle. Thus :

— ColvritUje.
Nay, c4n | swCr md. || Stand and | unfold | ydurself. |

— Shiikesj)eare.

The true explanation may therefore be, that it is like the
effort made to catch the step, when one is "falling in" to
marching time.

5. Besides the substitution of tliese more commonly used
feet for each other, we sometimes find the invasion of an
unusual unit of rhythm for a brief period. Thus in Brown-
ing's " How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix,"
the prevailing rhythm is anapaestic, and yet an amphibrach or
amphimacer may occasionally be found. Thus :

Amphibrach :

6. It will thus be seen that the rliythmic effect may be
sustained, with a great number of variations in tlie i)revailing
unit of rhythm. The movement, in English, is very free, and
consists mainly in keeping up a succession of equal time-
intervals, marked off by accents, gi'uerally at the beginning or

22 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

end of the intervals. There is a limit, liowever, to. the varia-
tions. They may be carried to such an extent as to bring us
perilously near to the border-line of verse. Thus :

When men were all asleep the snow came flying;

In lari;e white flakes falling on the city brown:
Stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying,

Hushing the latest trallic of the drowsy town;
Deadening, luuflling, stifling its niurnmrs failing,

Lazily and incessantly floating down and down;
Sili-ntly sifting and veiling road, roof and railing;

Hiding difference, making unevenness even.
Into angles and crevics softly drifting and sailing.

Author of The Oroirthof I.oit, Luiidon, IS^O.

Although tlie general effi-ct here is rhythuiioal, yet there
are instances of partial failure, especially in the eighth line,
where we feel that we are left on the sliallows of prose ; or,
at least, at that lowest ebb of verse, which is scarcely more
than rhythmical prose.

K M S I O N.

7. AVc have thus seen that tlie essential feature of rhythm
is tliat the accents shall flow along easily at regular intervals,
with not more than one or two unaccented syllaldes between.
JUit as there are a great many unaccented syllables, in
P^nglish, to dispose of, it is necessary to resort to various
expedients to bring them witliin the recpiircd limits. One of
these is called Elision.

8. Elision, in its strict sense, is the partial or entire loss of

a vowel sound at the end of a wonl, when the next word

begins with a vowel; a,s, "th' earth." In this way, more

syllables can be brought' into a foot than by the ordinary

pronunciation. Thus :

— t'ope.

But in all sucli cases, the vowel may not be wholly omitted,
but rather blended with the following. Jilision, in English,

VARIETY IN RUYTHM. 23

is not required, but is optional with the poet. In the follow-
ing instance, Pope chooses to neglect it :

Tho' oft I the ear | the o | pen vow | els tire. |

SliVRKING.

' 9. Another form of partial suppression of syllables is called
Slurring. This is a wider application of the same princi-
ple, having reference not to the end of a word, but to the
syllables in a Avord. Slurring, in its simplest sense, is the
obscuring of unimportant syllables. It is very common in
ordinary conversation, as when we say, " What o'clock is it ? "
omitting the and the final consonant of the preceding word of.
Its use, in verse, enables us to bring a larger number of light
syllables into a foot, without breaking the rhythm.

10. But care should be taken not to employ it mechanically.
The syllable should not be entirely omitted, but should be
read trippingly, with a light and graceful blending with the
following syllable. In iambic verse, for instance, it is not
necessary to make every foot of two syllables, by sharply
dropping out all superfluous ones, but it is much more in
accordance witli the true spirit of rhythm, to allow three or
more syllables, if need be, rapidly bringing them in, like
grace-notes in music, within the proper limits of the
measure.

11. But, though a sensitive ear is the best guide, our choice
is determined, after all, by the laws of euphony. Some sylla-
bles can be easily blended with those following, and others
cannot. There are several classes.

First, Certain vowels, wliich ordinarily form syllables, may
at other times perform the part of consonants, and thus unite
with the succeeding vowel. Thus, i in radiant may make a
syllable by itself: ra-di-ant ; or it may be pronounced like y,
with the next syllable : rade-ya7it. So e in beauteous, and in

24 ENGLISH VERSIFICATIOX.

general, any vowel which can make a y sound with the follow-
ing vowel. Thus :

— J'ope.
where the secoiul a in Tanais is sounded like ij.

Secondly, The consonant w, being also a serai-vowel having
the sound on, may be so pronounced as either to divide two
syllables, or to blend them into one. Thus, the word power
may be sounded in one or two syllables. In a similar way,
over and ever become o'er and e'er, and hearen, heav''n.

Thirdly, A vowel may easily be slurrcil wlien it precedes or
follows one of the liquids, /, ///, n, r, which coalesce with the
adjoining consonant; as the second u in viurmuring, i in
ominous, i in delicate, and linal i in spirit.

Fourthly, Certain slurrings are allowable which do not
follow strictly from the laws of eujdiony, but arise from the
omission of some elements in fre(]uent and familiar combi-
nations of sound; as, V the for in the, wV ye for with ye;
as " God be with ye " has been contracted into " Good-bye."
So whc'r for vhrther, whi'r for whither. In Shakespeare,
well-known prefixes are omitted; as, 'stroy for destroy, 'cide
for decide, etc. Tlie termination ed in the preterite of verbs
may be sounded or not, at the option of the poet.

In some editions of the i)oets, the slurred vowel is omitted
in the printing, and an apostrophe used to indicate its i)lace;
but this is objectionable, as it leads to a meclianical style of
reading, instead of trusting to the taste of the reader.

ICxamples of slurring:

— Trnnyton.
Wdrr'inm (Iml \ chiefs sliould Iho | sliafl or the | sword.

— Ilyron.
IJy licr I aid's voice | explaln'd; | the hoi | low ahi/ns. |

- MtUon.

VARIETY IN RHYTHM. 26

PHKASING.

12. Besides the regular rhythmical accent which occurs in
each foot, an additional stress arising from emphasis may
occur at irregular intervals, giving rise to what may be called
phrases. These afford a pleasant variety, as in the case of
overtones which play upon the surface of the fundamental or
primary tone. Thus :

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty,
Early in the morning our song shall rise to thee.

Holy, holy, holy, Lord, God, Almighty!

[All thy rourks] shall [praise thy name] in earth and sky and sea.

— Bishop Jh'bcr.

The rhythm here is trochaic, but in addition to tlie trochaic
rhythm, there comes in, in the last line, an extra stress upon
all and works, and again on praise and name, setting off two
phrases of three words each, whose occurrence heightens the
pomp and swell of the movement.

Again in Browning's " Herve lliel," in which the movement
is generally anapaestic, but is frequently diversified by phrases
of three syllables, like that in the preceding, we have a very
different effect. In the stanza above quoted, the phrasing
adds to the majestic flow of the rhythm. In " Herve Kiel,"
it gives the intended effect of quick spasmodic action:

Not a minute more to wait.

"Steer us in then, small and great!

Take the helm, lead the line, save the sqnadronl^' cried its chief.

It is owing to this fact of frequent difference of stress on
the accented syllables, that it seems possiV)le at times to divide
a line into feet of more than three syllables, regard being had
only to the stronger stress. Thus, the following line may be
divided into trochees :

Or into units of four syllables :
When the | rose was new in | blossom and the | siin was on the | hill.

26 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

E X T R A - K II Y T II M I C A L SYLLABLES.

13. "The general principle may be thus laid down, that one
or two unaccented syllables preceding the initial accent, or
following the final accent of the line, are non-essential to the
rhythm^ and may be added or omitted without changing the
metre." — Mayors J^/i(/lish Metre, p. 94.

14. First, syllables at the beginning. It is not unusual,
especially in lyric metres, for one or more syllables to come
lightly in, before the first regular accent in the line. Tims :

A I his for the | nirity |

Of I Christian | charity |

Under the sun.

- Jlood.

— Scott.

In the first extract, the rhythm is dactylic, and the sylla-
bles A and Of are extra syllables thrown lightly in at the
beginning of the line.

In the second, the rhytliin is anapaestic, and is preceded by
two extra syllables forming an iambus. This is sometimes
called " a catch ; " as if it were catching step with the regular
rhythm.

15. liut besides this case of extra syllables which are pre-
liminary to the regular rhythm, there is another of frequent
occurrence, in which what appear to be extra syllables at the
beginning of a line, are really only the completion of a foot at
the end of the preceding line. So the rhythm is not really
interrupted, but runs on from line to line. In the same way,
in m\isic, a note wanting in the last measure of a verse is
found in the first measure of the following verse. This is
called anacrusis.

VARIETY IN RIIYTnM. 27

Thus, in the following examples, the initial syllables marked
short will be seen to complete the final foot of the preceding

line :

Know ye the ] hind where the | cypress and | niyrtlg

— Byron,
Come from deep | glen Jliid

Fr5m | mountain so | njckj",
The I war-pipe and | pennOu
Are I at Inver | lochy. 1

— Scott.
nigh in Val | hulla
A I window stands ] 6p6n,
Its I sill is the | siiow pSaks,
Its I posts are the | watdr spOuts. |

— Klngsley,

The I bleak wind of | March

Made her | tremble and | shivCr,
Biit I not the dark | arch
N6r the I black flowing | river,

— Tennyson.

RESTS.

16. Besides this variety of rhythm caused by additional
syllables, we have another consisting in the omission of
syllables at the beginning of lines, or within the line.

— Tennyson.
u Break! | u Break! | u Break! |

On thy cold | gray stones, | O sea! |

— Tennyson.

28 ENGLISH VEruSIFICATIOX.

— Scott.
Here the place of one or more syllables is j)assed over in
silence. It would be indicated by a rest in music.

PAUSE.

17. Under this head, of variety in rhythm, comes naturally
the subject of Pause. The tiow of all speech, whether in
prose or verse, is constantly interruptetl by the breaks which
are necessary to indicate the ending of words, phrases, and
sentences. Therefore, just ;us the accents of ordinary speech
have to be so managed, in verse, as to meet the requirements
of the rhythm, in like manner, the natural pauses must be
arranged so as to aid in the rhythmical effect.

CAESURA OFTUE FOOT.

18. First, of the ])ause after vords. If, in every case, the
end of a foot slioidd coincide with tlie end of a word, the
rhythmic effi'ct would be very monotonous. I'lius :

— MUton.
Puts forlli I an arm, | and creeps | from pine | to pine. |

— Ti-nni/>on.

To prevent this, there must bo frequent ending of a word
before the foot is completed. Thus:

Willi ro I sy slf'M | ilrr liii | gcrs back | ward drew. |

— Tcnnyion.

This is called, in classical language, the ccvsura of the foot.
That is, the cutting of the foot into sections.

CAKSUUA OK Tin: LINE.

19. Next, of tlu; pause after ////m.sv.s-. In ordinary speech,
a long sentence is frequently broken up by natural divisions
in tlic 8CU8C. If none of these divisions should occur in verse,

VARIETY IN RHYTHM. 29

or if they should occur only at the end of lines, the sameness
would be a serious defect in the rhythm. Variety arises
from the occurrence of rhythmical pauses in the line, cor-
responding with the logical pauses in the meaning. This is
called cccsura of the line.

The tendency is, at first, for this ctesura to occur near the
middle of the line :

Come live | with me || ami be | my love. |

— Marlowe.

The cffisura of the line is here marked with two short vertical
lines.

And smooth or rough || with them is right or wrong.

— Pope.

The dew was falling fast, || the stars began to blink.

— Wordsworth.

There's not a joy the world can give II like that it takes away.

— Byron.

Saw the vision of the world, || and all the wonder that would be.

— Tennyson.

Dear my friend and fellow-student, || I would lean my spirit o'er you.

— Mrs. Brotvning.

20. But variety requires that even this should be changed.
Especially is this the case in unrhymed iambic pentameter.
Says Cowper : " The writer in this kind of metre, in order
that he may be musical, must exhibit all the variations, as he
proceeds, of whicli ten syllables are susceptible. Between
the iirst and the last, there is no place at which he must not
occasionally pause, and the place of the pause must be contin-
ually shifted."

The following examples show the caesura occurring in every
place, from the first syllable to the ninth :

Not to me returns
Day, II or the sweet approach of cv'n or morn.

—Milton.

30 ENGLISH VEKSIFICATION.

For tlic time I study
Virtue, II and that part of pliilosopliy.

— Sltakesjitare : Tamtiuj of the Shreto,

For it of honor and all virtue is
The root, || and brings forth glorious (lowers of fame.

— :Sj)eiiscr: Favric (Jiutne.

Assassins || and all flyers from the hand
Of justice, II and w hatever loathes a law.

— Tttmyson.

From branch to branch the smaller binls with song
bolaced the woods || and spread their painted wings.

— Aflltoa,
A daring pilot in extremity,

Pleased with the danger, || when the waves went high.

— I>rijden.

Endeavor thus to live; || these rules regard.

— Wordsworth.

Not less Geraint believed it, || and there fell

A horror on him.

— Tennyson,

To him who in the love of Nattirc holds

Conniiiniion with her visible forms, || she speaks

A various language.

— Ilryant.

Loud as from numbers without number, || sweet

As from blest voices, uttering joy.

— Millon.

In very long lines the cicsura is almost indispensable. Tho
presence and the want of it arc well illustrated iu these two
lines from " Locksley Hall : "

Comrades, leave me here a little, || wliilc as yet 'tis early mom.
Many a night from yonder ivied casement ere I went to rest.

The movement in the last line seems labored and exhausting.

21. At the place of the cajsura in the line, there sometimes
occurs an extra syllable ; tho caisura falls sometimes before
and sometimes after this syllable. In IJryaut's "Waiting by

VARIETY IN RHYTHM. 31

the Gate," we find the extra syllable occurring sometimes
before and sometimes after the csesural pause. Thus :

Beside | a mass | ive gate | way, || | built up | in years | gone by, |
Upon 1 wliose top | the clouds | II in | eter | nal shad | ow lie, |
While streams | the eve | ning sun | shine || on qui | et wood | and lea, |
I stand I and calm | ly wait | II till | the hin | ges turn | for me. |

Here each line contains six iambuses with an extra syllable
after the first three feet. Throughout the entire poem, the
caesural pause falls sometimes before and sometimes after
this extra syllable. To show that this peculiarity is not
removed by dividing the lines in the middle, as is sometimes
possible, it is only necessary to make the division. Thus :

Beside | a mass | ive gate | way

Built up I in years | gone by, |
Upon I whose top | the clouds | in

Eter I nal shad | ow lie |

The structure of the entire poem is so regular, that there is
no reason why the first and third lines of this last quatrain
should not be treated alike. It is possible to carry the final
in of the third line over to the fourth as an anacrusis ; but it
is not possible to carry waij of the first line over to the second
line, in a similar manner. In short, there is an extra syllable
in each series of six iambuses, and the caesural pause does fall
sometimes before and sometimes after this extra syllable. It
was doubtless as a continuous movement of six iambuses that
the metre was conceived in the mind of the writer.

END-STOPPED AND RUN-ON LINES.

22. A pause naturally takes place, also, at the end of a lino,
simply because it is a line ; that is, because it is the first dis-
tinguishing mark of the metre, as different from rhytlimical
prose. In reading verse, some slight recognition of the end
of the line should always be made ; otherwise there would be

32 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

no reason for the division into lines. But it would be very
wearisome if the sense should require a logical pause, also,
at the end of each line. A pleasing relief is afforded by
carrying on the meaning, occasionally, from one line to the
next, without rhetorical pause. Thus :

Or if Sion hill
Delight thee more, ami Siloa's brouk tliat Ilowcd
Fast by the oracle of God : — I thence
Invoke thy aid. - MUton.

Indeed, this has become so decided an evidence of improved
taste, that it has been ado})ted as one test, among others, to
distinguish between the earlier and the later plays of Shake-
speare. It has been shown that he was much limited, at
first, by stoj)ping the sense with the line, but as he advanced
in ease of composition, he more frequently carried the mean-
ing over to the following line. Thus the critics speak of
END-STOPPED and KUN-oN LINES, respectively. Attention will
be paid to this in a later chapter.

THE STANZA. 33

CHAPTER V.
THE STANZA.

1. So far we have treated of rhythmical language as sub-
jected to the laws of metre, only to the extent of forming the
line. We have seen that a line may consist of any number
of feet or accents, from one to eight. But lines themselves
may be formed into groups, by being bound together into a
certain organic unity. Such a group is called a stanza.

The earliest poems usually consist of a succession of single
lines of generally equal length. In later development, usually
by the up-rising of some kind of rhyme, two or more lines
become unitt^d together so as to form a distinct group. The
simplest instance of this is the rhyming of the end of one line
with the end of the next. This is called a couplet ; as :
Know, then, this truth, enough for man to know,

Virtue alone is happiness below.

— Pope : Essay on Man.

Three such lines constitute a triplet.

Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks.
It still looks home, and short excursions makes;
But rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks.

— Pope : Essay on Criticism.

2. Couplets and triplets usually make part of a continuous
and undivided poem. When a poem is divided into groups of
lines characterized by a definite structure and arrangement,
such groups av". called stanzas, or, in common speech, verses.

Stanzas of three lines. Of equal length :

A still small voice spake unto me,

" Life is so full of misery,

Were it not better not to be ? "

— Ttnnyson.

34 ENGLISH VEIiSIFlCATlON.

Of unequal length :

Yo voices, that arose

After the Eveiiiiif^'s close,

And whispered tu my restless heart repose!

— Longfellow.

3. Stanzas of four lines.

A stanza of four lines is technically known as a quatrain.
The lines may be of any rhythm and of any length, and with
various kinds of correspondence. The rhymes may occur only
in the second and fourth lines, or in the first and third, also;
or the first and fourth may rhyme together, and the second
and tliird. This last is the kind of stanza used in Tennyson's
*' In Memoriam : "

I hold it truth with him who sings
To one clear hai-p in divers tones,
That men may rise on stepping-stones

Of their dead selves to higher things.

4. To designate the order of rhymes in a stanza, the first let-
ters of tlie alpliabc't are usually employed, each letter denoting
the same rhyme-sound wherever it occurs. Thus, in the
stanza last given, the rhyme-order would be described as
abb a. It is customary, also, as far as is i)racticable, to indent,
or set in, those lines which rhyme together, at equal distances
from the left-hand margin. This, too, is illustrated in the
stanza given above.

5. At tliis point, we may properly give the names of metres
usually employed in hymns.

Common metre. Iambic tetrameter and trimeter:

I sing the mighty power of fJod,

That made llie nioimlains rise;
That sjiread llic flowing seas ahruad

And hiiilt llie lofty skies.

- /. }raltt.

THE STANZA. 35

Long metre. Iambic tetrameter :

O thou to whom in ancient time *

The lyre of Hebrew bards was strung,
Whom kings adored in songs sublime,

And prophets praised with glowing tongue.

— J. Pierpont.

Short metre. Iambic trimeter, with tetrameter in tliird
line :

O everlasting Might!

My broken life repair;
Nerve thou my will and clear my sight,
Give strength to do and bear.

— //. Bonar.

Eights and sevens. Trocliaic tetrameter, and trimeter with
added syllable :

Love divine, all love excelling,

Joy of heaven, to earth come down;

Fix in us thy humble dwelling;
All thy faithful mercies crown.

- C. Wesley.

Sevens. Trochaic trimeter, with added syllable :

Slowly, by God's hand unfurled,
Down around the weary world
Falls the darkness. Oh, how still
Is the working of his will!

— W. n. Fumess.

Eights, sevens, and four. Trochaic tetrameter, trimeter
with added syllable, and dimeter in fifth line :

Open now the crystal fountain

Whence the healing waters flow;
Let the fiery, cloudy pillar
Lead me all my journey through.
Strong Deliverer!
Be thou still my strength and shield.

— William Williams.

36 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Sevens and sixes. Iambic trimeter, with added syllable in
first and third lines :

Before him on the mountains

Shall Peace, the herald, go,
And Kighteousness in foinitains

From hill to valley How.

— J. Montgomery.

Sixes and four. Iambic trimeter and dimeter :

My country, 'tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty.

Of thee I sing;
Land where n)y fathers died,
Land of the pilgrim's pride,
From every mountain side

Let freedom ring!

— 5. F. Smith.

Tens. Iambic pentameter :

Abide with me! fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide!
"When other helpers fail, and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me!

- //. F. Lyte.

Elevens. Anapaestic trimeter preceded by iambus :

Let goodness and mercy, my bountiful God,
Still follow my steps till I meet thee above!

I seek by the path which my forefathers troil.
Through the laud of their sojourn, thy kingdom of love.

— J. .Miintyttmery.

Hallelujah metre. Four lines of iambic trimeter, and four
lines of iambic dimeter:

Upward I lift mine eyes ;
From God is all niy aid :
The God that built the skies
And earth and nature made.
God is the tower
To which I fly;
His grace is nigh,
lu every hour.

THE STANZA. 37

Other hymn metres might be mentioned, but the above are
those most commonly employed.

6. Of four-line stanzas, with varying number of units, the
following may serve as examples :

Whither, midst falHng dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far tluoiigh the rosy depths dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way ?

— Bryant.

There is a calm for those who weep,

A rest for weary mortals found,
Who softly lie and sweetly sleep.

Low in the ground,

— Campbell.

7. Stanzas of five lines :

O that I were an orange tree,

That husy plant!
That I might always laden be,

And never want
Some fruit for him that dresseth me.

— George Herbert.

Or (unrhymed and rare) :

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean;
Tears from the depths of some divine despair,
Ivise in the heart and gather to the eyes.
In looking on the happy autumn fields.
And thinking of the days that are no more.

— Tennj/son.

8. Of six lines ;

O what a sight it was, wistly to view,
JIow she came stealing to the wayward boy!

To note the fighting conflict of her line,
How white and red each other did destroy I

But now her cheek was pale, and by and by

It flashed forth fire, as lightning from the sky.

— Shakespeare : Venus and AdonU.

38 ENGLISH VEKSIFICATION.

9. Of seven lines :

So like a luan of arini's and a knyght,
He was to sen, fixllilil of heigli prowesse;

For bolhe he hadile a body and a uiyght
To don that tliyng, as wele as hardynesse;
And eke to sen hiiu in his gere him dresse,

So fressh, so yong, so weldy scuiiid he,

It was a heven upon hiui for to se.

— Chauctr: Troylus and Crisryde.

This stanza has b^en called the Rime Koyal, or short
Chaucerian stanza. The rliyme order is a b a b b c c.

10. Of eight lines :

Willi every morn their love grew tenderer,
AVilh every eve decjtcr and tenderer still;

lie might not in house, field, or garden stir.
But her full shape would all his seeing fill;

And his continual voieo was pleasaiitcr
To her, than noise of trees or hidden rill;

Her lute-string gave an echo of his name;

She spoilt her half-done broidery with the same.

— Keats : Isabella.

This is tlie Ottava Kiina from tlie Italian. See also the
close of IMilton's "Lycidas," and Byron's ''Don Juan."

Also of eight lines :

Ofif Hercules, the sovereyn conquerour,
Syngen his werkes, laude, and heigh renoun;
For in his tynie of strengthe he was the Hour.
He slow, and rafte the skyn of the Icoun ;
He of Centaurus Icyde the boost adoiui ;
He Arpies slow, the crucel bryddes fellc;
He golden apples refte of the dragoun;
He drow out Cerberus, the hound of helle.

— Chaucer: Tht Monk's Tale.

The rhyme order is a b a b b c b c. Spenser adds the Alex-
andrine to this, and makes the following, called the Spenserian
stanza.

THE STANZA. 39

11. Of nine lines :

A lovely Ladie rode him faire beside,

Upon a lowly Asse more white than snow,
Yet she much whiter; but the same did hide

Under a vele, that wimpled was full low;

And over all a black stole shee did throw;
As one that inly mourned, so was shee sad,

And heavie sat upon her palfrey slow:
Seemed in heart some hidden care she had,
And by her, in a line, a milke-white lamb she lad.

— Spenser.

This Spenserian stanza, it will be seen, consists of eight
lines of iambic pentameter, followed by a line of iambic hex-
ameter, or an Alexandrine. The rhyme-order is ababbcbcc.
It is the stanza used in Byron's "Childe Harold," Burns's
" Cotter's Saturday Night," and Keats's " Eve of St. Agues."

Also of nine lines :

To whom shal I then ployn of my distrcsse ?

Who may me helpe ? Who may my harm redresse ?

Shal I compleyn unto my lady fre ?

Nay, certes, for she hath such hevynesse

For fere, and eke for wo, that, as I gesse,

In lytil tyme hit wol her bane be;

But were she safe hit were no fors of me!

Alas, that ever lovers mote endure.

For love, so many a perilouse aventure!

— Chaucer : Complaint of Mars.

This is known as the long Chaucerian stanza. It differs
from the short Chaucerian by the addition of lines second and
fifth ; making the rhyme order, aabaabbcc.

12. Examples of longer stanzas are given in the Appendix,
p. 15G ; also of the so-called Tail-rhyme stanza.

40 ENGLISU VEiiSIFlCATION.

THE SONNET.

13. The sonnet is not a stanza, but a poem complete in itself.
It consists of fourteen lines in iambic pentainotor. It was
introduced into our language from the Italian, but has since
been modified. In the strict, or Italian form, it separates into
two parts, — the first eight lines being called the octave, and
the last six the scstette. There are but two rhyming sounds
in the octave, — a b b a a b b a. In the sestette there is
more liberty in the rliymes ; there may bo two or three
rhyming sounds, in either of tlie following orders : cd cd c d ;
ox c d e c d e. It is not considered correct, in this strict form,
for the sestette to rhyme in couplets, although Milton adopts
this method. In this strict, or legitimate sonnet, a change
of sentiment was made in passing from the octave to the
sestette.

Tlie modified form of the sonnet docs not break up into
two sections, as in tlje Italian, but carries the tliought and
sentiment on towards a climax at the end. It also allows
more liberty in the rliymes. Thus, in Surrey and in Sliake-
sjjoare, we have the following ordur : a b a h c d c d e f e f g g.

The sonnet has been written in English for three hun-
dred years, and by the best poets. We need mention only
those of W^-att, Surrey, Daniel, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton,
Wordsworth, Keats, and Mrs. Urowning. The folhnving will
serve as examples :

Wlion to llic sessions of swoot silont tlioiight,

I suiniuon up n'liicniljriiiir-n of lliiii.i;s past,
I sii^li the l.irk of iii.iiiy ;i tliiir^ I s()ii},'lit,

An«l witli old woes iii'W wail my dear time's waste;
TIk'II ran I drown an eye, unused lo (low,

For pn-cious friends hid in death's dateless ni^ht,
And weep afr<->h love's loii^ since eanecll'd woe.

And nii>an llii' i-xpi-nse of many a vanish'd sight;

THE STANZA. 41

Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,

And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,

Which I new paid as if not paid before.
But if the while I tliink on thee, dear friend.
All losses are restored, and sorrows end.

— Shakespeare.

It is a beauteous evening, calm and free;

The holy time is quiet as a Nun,

Breathless with adoration ; the broad sun

Is sinking down in its tranquillity;

The gentleness of heaven broods o'er the Sea.

Listen! the mighty Being is awake,

And doth with his eternal motion make

A sound like thunder — everlastingly.

Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkcst with me here.

If thou appear untouched by solemn thought,

Thy nature is not therefore less divine;

Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year,

And worship'st at the Temple's inner shrine,

God being with thee when we know it not.

— jronlsicorth,

THE ODE.

14. The ode may be said to be the most comprehensive metri-
cal group known in English. It may consist of any num\)er
of lines, with any number of units in a line, but all boun<l
together in a symmetrical Avhole. Gosse defines it as "any
strain of enthusiastic and exalted lyrical verse, directed to a
fixed purpose, and dealing progressively with one dignified
theme." It is usually divided into stanzas of unequal length.
As good examples of the ode, we may cite Wordsworth's " On
Immortality," Coleridge's "To France," Tennyson's "On the
Death of the Duke of Wellington," Bayard Taylor's "National
Ode," and Lowell's " Commemoration Ode."

15. The Pindaric Ode is named from the Grecian poet
riudar. lu its original form it consisted of groups of lines

42 ENGLISH VEItSIFICATION.

arranged in multiples of three. These three groups were
named Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode. The number of
lines in a strophe, antistrophe, or epode varies from six to
twelve. In any ode, the number of lines, their length, and
their arrangement remain the same for each strophe, for each
antistrophe, and for each epode. In Pindar's Fourth Pythian
Ode there are thirteen multiples of the three groups.

Translations and imitations of the Pindaric Ode, in greater
or less degrees of exactness, have been numerous in English
poetry, from Ben Jonson to Gray.

16. The length of an ode renders it impracticable to give an
example entire, and the following stanza from Wordsworth's
" Immortality " must suffice :

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;

The Soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Ilath had elsewhere its setting,
And conicth from afar.

Not in entire forgeifulness.

And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From (jod who is our home.

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shados of the prison house begin to close

Upon the growing boy;
But he beholds the light and whence it (lows,

He sees it in his joy;
The youth, who daily farlhor from the East
Must travel, still is Natun-'s priest,

And by the vision spK-ndid

Is on his way attended ;
At length the man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

KHYME. 43

CHAPTER VI.
RHYME.

1. We have, thus far, treated of rhythm as the chief feature
of English verse. We notice most the movement produced by
the accents. But the quality of sounds also attracts attention.
First of all, similarity of sounds strikes the ear. Syllables
beginning alike were early used to mark off the metre, as
the accents mark off the rhythm. In Anglo-Saxon verse,
the initial sounds of certain accented syllables were em-
ployed in this way. This was known as Rime. This form
of rhyme is now called Alliteration, and will be described in
Chapter VII.

2. The word, now commonly spelled Rhyme, is limited to
similarity of vowel-sounds, most frequently used to mark the
ends of lines, and thus to indicate the metre. To some minds,
rhyme seems essential to verse. In French poetry, it is
always used ; in classical Greek and Latin, seldom, if ever.
In English, it may or may not be employed, at the option of
the poet. Verse without rhyme is called blank verse. Blank
verse may be written in any kind of metre, but is mostly con-
lined to iambic pentameter ; as in epic poetry, by Milton, and
in dramatic, by Shakespeare.

3. Proper end-rhymes require four conditions :

First, the voicel sounds must be alike ; thus, now and plough
rhyme together, but do and f/o do not.

Secondly, the sounds before the vowels must be unlike;
li(jht and brif/ht are proper rliymes ; but not riyht and tvrite.

44 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Thirdly, the sounds after the vowel sounds must be alike :
thus, tveak and pique ; but not seen and team.

Fourthly, the syllables must be similarly accented; ci'ti/
and charity do not rhyme, though city and jjity do. or charity
and p/irify. City and defy do not rhyme, as defy and
comply do.

4. But a syllable having a secondary accent is sometimes
made to rhyme with one similarly situated, having a primary
accent ; as in the last syllable of the following words, found
in Milton: began and ocean, throne and contemplation.

5. Ehyme between final syllables is called single, or mascu-
line rhyme ; between penultimate syllables, double, or femi-
nine ; as holy, sloxcly. Tiie rhyme may fall even farther back,
on the antepenult, as importunate, unfortunate.

6. An identical rhyme is one in wliicli the syllables coincide
in sound tliroughout; as in ^jaZ/i and pane. Such rhymes
are, in general, not regarded as allowable, but instances of
them may be found in some of the best poets. Thus Lowell
has wholly and holy, ^Nlilton Ruth and ruth, Tennyson eai^e
and eve. Some authorities lay down a rule that the aspirate
h at the beginning of a syllable is not enough to prevent two
syllables from forming an identical rhyme ; but this is gener-
ally disregarded. Thus ^Milton rhymes high and /, harms and
arms.

7. r.ut, besides proper, or perfect, rhymes, others are somc-
tinw's found in good writers, in which the conditions are not
wholly fullillcd; as in love and prove (Marlowe). Indeed, it
is hard to di'tcrinine the limit between rhymes that are allow-
able, and those that are unallowable, if we regard the iisage
of some of our most esteemed ]>oets. Thus I'opo has light,
wit ; Jove, love ; g<><><l, bloml ; care, war. (J ray, towcr.t, adores ;

RHYME. 45

bent, constraint ; lost, coast. Burns, startle, mortal; censure,
answer; sent you, memento. Coleridge, clasping, aspen. Long-
fellow, abroad and accord. The widest liberty, perhaps, which
has been taken by any serious poet, may be found in the writ-
ings of Mrs. Browning ; as, fr'mges, inches ; human, commo7i ;
turret, chariot ; angels, candles ; conquer, anchor ; vigil, eagle ;
glory, doorway ; Goethe, beauty.

8. In humorous poetry there is still greater liberty. Much
use is made of two-syllable and even three-syllable rhymes.
Thus in "Hudibras," inclined to, mind to ; disparage, plum por-
ridge ; drum beat, combat ; ecclesiastic, a stick. In the " In-
goldsby Legends," ^aws off, he, philosophy ; sully verse, Gulli-
ver's ; suffice at her, eyes at her ; etc.

9. It must not be thought, however, that these double and
triple rhymes are used exclusively in comic poetry. In Ten-
nyson's " Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington," the
double rhyme is freely used ; as wrought for, fought for. So
in Hood's pathetic poem of the " Bridge of Sighs : " unfortu-
nate, imjiortunate ; scrutiny, mutiny ; evidence, eminence. To
these, we may add the following from ]\[rs. Browning :

Let us sit on the thrones

In a purple subliinitj',
And grind down men's bones

To a pale unanimity!

10. It is to be observed that in any but comic poetr}', forced
rliymes are objectionable ; also, bringing into close proximity
two pairs of rhymes which are nearly alike in vowel-sounds ;
as 7irt???e,/a?«P, contiguous to vain, stain. It is good practice,
to seek, occasionally, for possible rhymes to certain words
which are capable of but few rhymes.

11. A modified form of rhyme, borrowed from other lan-
guages, is called assonance. In this the similarity is wholly

46 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

in the vowel sounds, the beginning and end of the syllable
being disregarded. Thus, in George Eliot's " Spanish Gypsy : "

Maiden crowned with glossy blackness,

Lithe as panther foiasl-roamiiig,
Loncj-armod naiad, when she danceSf

On a stream of ether^oatingr.

It is claimed that the vowel-sounds after the accented vowel
should also correspond with each other; as, reticence, penitent.

12. Having thus described the character of rhyrae in gen-
eral, the next point we have to consider is its \)]ar.e in the
metre. Its first and simplest use is at the end of lines. Fur
example :

In couplets :

Sweet was tlie sound when oft at evening's close,
Up yonder hill the village luurmur rose.

— Goldsmith.

In triplets :

'Tis life whereof our nerves aroBCnnt,
O life, not death, for wliioh we pant,
More life, and fuller, that wu want.

— Tennyson,

In quatrains, the second and fourth lines alone may rliyme;

And now the storm-hlast came, and ho

Was lyranuDus and strong;
lie struck with his o'ertaking wings,

And chased us south along.

— CoU-ridgc.

Or the first and third also :

Hast thou from the cavos of CJolcoiida, a gem
I'uri! as the Icf-ilro]) that fro/.t- on lln- mountain?

Urii^lit as tin- hunuiiing-hiid's gn-cii di.idcm.

When it llultcis in sunbeams that sliiuc through a fountain?

— Aeu/i.

RHYME. 47

Or, the first may rhyme with the fourth, and the second

with the third :

I sometimes hold it half a sin,
To put in words the grief I feel,
For words, like nature, half reveal
And half conceal the soul within.

— Tennyson.

The whole of "In Memoriam" is written in this form, and
it is also found in Ben Jonson, Lord Herbert of Cherbury,
and others.

Still another form is a a b a :

I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell:

And by and by my Soul returned to me,
And answered, "I Myself am Heaven and Hell."

— Omar Khayyam : transl. by Fitzgerald.

13. As we pass into stanzas of more than four lines, we
find a wider variety in the order of rhymes, some of which
are described under the stanzas in which they occur ; as in
the Rime Royal, the Sonnet, Foreign Forms, etc. In the
Ode, and such poems as Emerson's "Threnody," and Long-
fellow's "Rain in Summer," the end rhymes occur at widely
varying distances from each other.

14. But rhymes are by no means confined to the end of lines.
They may be in the middle :

And now there came both mist and snow,

And it grew wondrous cold.
And ice mast high came floating by,

As green as emerald.

— Coleridge.

The splendor /a ?/.s on castle ivalls

And snowy summits old in story ;
The long light shakes across the lakes,

And the wild cataract leaps in glory.

- Tennyson.

48 ENGLISH VEIISIFICATION.

Even these, coining at definite division points of the line,
are nuich the same us end-rliynios. But tlieic may be a larger
freedom still :

Jliirk I hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings.

— Shakespeare.

The snowy-bandcdt deUcatc-Zai/uZcJ, dilettante priest intone.

— Tennyson.

Can ever disserer my soul from tlio soul.

— I'oe.

And {]\o lark's hrarCs outbreak tuneless.

— linnniing.

These may be said to partake more of the nature of asso-
nance than of rhyme.

15. A cnrious poem by Hood has three rhyming words at
the end of each line :

'Tis eve, and from llu! dark park, hark!
The signal of the setting sun, one gun.

Of a different character is the poem by George Herbert, in
whicli the rhyming syllable is twice decapitated of its initial

sound :

I bk'ssc thee Lord, bocausc I grow
Among Iby trees, wbicli, in a row,
To thee both fruit and order ow.

What open force or hidden charm
Can bla.st my fruit, or bring me harm,
While the inclosure is thine arm ?

Inclose me still, for fear I start ;
Be to me rather sharp and tart.
Than let me want thy hand and art.

When thou dost greater judgements spare,
And witli thy knife but prune and pare,
Kv'n fniilfid trees more fruitful are.

Such sharpnes shows the sweetest frend;
Riich rnttings rather heal than rend;
And such beginnings touch their end.

RHYME. 49

In the following from Mrs. Browning's " Drama of Exile,"
the first and fifth lines rhyme together, the second and sixth,
third and seventh, fourth and eighth:

Exiled Iminan creatures,
Let your hope grow larger ;
Larger grows the vision
Of the new delight:
From this chain of Nature's
God is the discharger,
And the Actual's prison
Opens to your sight.

16. An ingenious example of complicated rhyming is seen
in the verses given below. The poem is entitled '' A Pastoral,"
by A. J. INIunby, of London. The rhyme order may be indi-
cated thus :

a b

I> c

(I e

e c

« /

/ y

d h

h g

Two stanzas are needed to complete the scheme. It will
be seen that the end rhyme of the first line becomes the
middle rhyme in the second line ; and the end rhyme of the
tliird line becomes the middle rhyme of the fourth line. Not
only so, but the middle rhymes of the first and third lines of
the first stanza become the middle rhymes of the first and
third lines of the second stanza.

I sat with Doris, the shepherd maiden;

Her crook was laden with wreathed llowors;
I sat and wooed her through sunlight wheeling,

And shadows stealing fur hours and hours.

60 EXOLISII VEIISIFICATION.

And she my Doris, whose lap encloses

Wild sunmier roses of faint perfume,
The while 1 sued her, kept hushed, and harkened,

Till shades had darkened from gloss to gloom.

A. J. Miiubij (SfC Appendix).

17. Another order of rhymes which has been sometimes
used in English is the terza rima of Dante. In a series of
triplets the rhyme order is a J a — b c b — c d c — d c d, etc.
Thus in Shelley's " Ode to the West Wind : "

O wild West Wind, thou hrcath of Autumn's being,
Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves duad
Are driven like ghoSts from au enchanter lleeing,

Yellow and black and pale and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes! O thou
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed.

Other combinations of rhyme will appear in the chapter
on Foreign Forms of Verse.

ALLITERATION. 51

CHAPTER VII.
ALLITERATION.

1. Alltteratto^st is a kind of rhyme. It is a similarity of
sound at the beginning of syllables instead of at the end. The
same or similar consonants or vowels are repeated at the be-
ginning of prominent accented syllables in more or less close
succession. There is probably an instinctive tendency to it in
human speech. Under strong emotion, there is an impulse to
use words having the same initial consonant ; as " You ^oor
^>itiful pettifogger ! " This tendency is afterwards consciously
employed in shaping proverbs and maxims which shall cling
to the memory. " i^ast bind, /ast find." " Time and ride
wait for no man." " When the wine is in, the wit is out."

2. This mode of utterance seems to be especially pleasing to
people of the Anglo-Saxon stock, if we may judge by the
headings of newspaper columns in our own day. In genuine
Anglo-Saxon verse, it was the distinguishing characteristic.
End-rhyme was seldom used, and there was no nice division of
the line into feet. But the rhythm was strongly marked by
accent. The one long-line consisted of two half-lines, separated
by a cgesural pause. In each half-line there were at least two
strongly accentsxl syllables, making four in the wliole line.
Of these four strongly accented syllables, the first three were
still further marked by liaving the same or a similar initial
letter. With consonants, the repeated letter must be the sanu' ;
with vowels, any vowel might corresijond to any other. Tlie
first accented syllable in the second half-line was considered as
giving the leadiny letter, to which the others must correspond.
Thus :

52 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Frunisccaft/ira l|/eorran reccan.
(The origin of man from far reiale.)

Tliis strict form of alliteration admitted some modifications,
even in Anglo-Saxon verse, and gradually gave way to all sorts
of perversions ; but a good example of it is found even when
Anglo-Saxon verse had given place to Early English. The
famous poem entitled "The Vision concerning I'iors tlie Plow-
man," in the time of Chaucer, is considered a fair representa-
tion of the old use of alliteration :

In a .somor .scson || whon .soft was the sonnc,
I shope me in .s/jroudes || as 1 a s/icpe were.

Even as late as ICOO a.d. wc find the following:

iSitting by a river's .sitle, ||
Where a .silent stream doth glide,
3/use 1 did of many things, ||
That the »nnd in quiet brings.

— Griiiie.

Even after this strict .system h:id gone out of date, the
habit of alliteration still continued, and lias never lost its
charm for the English car. Witness the opening of Tenny-
son's " Elaine : "

E/aine the fair, K/alne the lov.abfe,
E/aine the iily maid of Asto/at.
3. But it needs to be particularly noticed that the beauty of
alliteration consists in its spontaneousness, or at least in
some natural correspondence between the sounds and the
ideiis or sentiments which tlicy express. It is comparatively
easy to string together a series of words beginning with the
same letter, without regard to their peculiar expressiveness.
This is merely mechanical work, as in the curious piece of
verse, in wliich the first line consists of words all beginning
with a, and the second of words beginning with b, and so on
through the alphabet :

An Anxtrian army awfully arrayoil,

lioldiy by ballery besieged Belgrade, etc. (See Appendix.)

ALLITERATION. 53

This hardly deserves the title of what Churchill calls
Apt alliteration's artful aid.

Much of the alliteration in Early English was not much bet-
ter than this, and so it is not strange tliat both Cliaucer and
Shakespeare ridiculed this excessive and mechanical use of it :

But trusteth wel I am a solherne man ;

I cannot geste row, raw, ruff, by my letter.

— Prol. Persone's Tale.

Whereat with 61adn, with Moody Wameful Made,
He bravely broached his /^oiling ?^ioody breast.

— Midsummer Aipht's Dream, Act V., Scene 1.

4. In making this criticism it is not meant tliat alliteration
should receive no deliberate attention on the part of the poet,
and should be left wholly to spontaneous utterance. As in
the use of all the forms in the art of versification, reason may
avail itself of the promptings of instinct, but only such em-
ployment should be made of the form as would seem to have
sprung naturally from the demands of the sentiment. An
illustration may be drawn from our greatest modern master of
the art of poetry, whose taste is usually unexceptionable in
such matters. In Tennyson's "Dream of Fair Women," the
expression "bold ilack eyes" heightens the feeling intended
to be conveyed; but in the same poem, in "Zirow-iound with
burning gold," no especial force seems to be added by the
alliteration.

5. Tlie following examples appear to be genuinely effective :

Hear the loud alarum bells;

Brazen bells 1

What a /ale of /error now their /urbulency /ells.

- Poe.

The a/uill-edged s/triek of a motlier divide the shuddering night.

— Tennj/ion,

54 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

The /isp of ieaves and ripple of rain.

— Swinburne.
Under his spurning feet the road,
Like an an-owy yl/i)ine river ^fowcd.

— T. li. Uciid.

The 77ioan of doves in ii;j;?io»iorial eh/is,
And »(ur?;mring of ijunu/ierai^fe ^ees.

— Tennyson.

Smothered it wilhiii my panting 6ulk,
Which almost 6ursL to ^elch it in the sea.

— Shakw^pairu : Richard III.

That bubble they were ient on Mowing h\g,
lie had 6iovvn already till he 6urst his cheeks.

— lirowning.
That the rude .soa grow civil at her song,
And certain .stars sliot madly from their spheres,
Tu hear the sea-maid's mu.sic.

— Hhakespvare: Midsumnur Night's Dream.

6. It will bo noticed, of course, that it is not necessary that
the same letter should be used, if the sound is the same; as,
in the last example, c and s are interchangeable. Indeed, we
may go farther and sa}' that consonants of the same class may
be used for each other, as the labials p and b, and the
dentals t and d. Tiiis is sometimes called " disguised "
alliteration.

7. It is not well, however, to attempt a too curious search for
alliteration, as one may easily discover instances never sus-
pected by the writer, and without special significance, lliit
we can hardly go amiss in attributing the charm of the follow-
ing extract to something more than ** giddy cunning," and
believing it to have sprung from "the hidden soul of har-

njony : "

Or sweett'st Shakesp>'.in', Fancy's cliild,
H'arlile his native irood-notos loild.
And ever against mating cares,
Lap mc in soft //ydian airs,

ALLITERATION-. 65

3/arried to immortal verse;
6'uch as the meeting soul may pierce
In notes with ina?iy a winding bout
Of linked sweetness /ong drawn out,
TFith wanton heed and giddy cunning,
The 7«eltiiig voice through mazes running,
Uniwisiing all the chains that tie
The /iidden soul of /iarniony.

— Milton : L' Allegro.

66 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

CHAPTER VIII.
QUANTITY.

1. It was stated in the first chapter, that while rliythm in
the Greek and Latin languages depended on (judntity, in
English it depends upon accent. For a fuller understanding
of this difference, it seems necessary to explain more clearly
the nature of Quantity.

2. In the earliest times, poetry, or verse, was sung, rather
than read. It sprang up, probably, before there was any
written language. Under the influence of religious or war-
like excitement, the primitive people were moved to utter
their devotion, or celebrate their victories, in words and tones
that naturally took on the rhythmic jjulsations of emotion.
In a rude dance or march about tlie altar, their voices kept
time to the beating of their feet. So, however imperfect tlio
melody or the meaning, the measure was, of necessity, very
regular. Their steps were all of equal length. The same
qxiantity of time was occui)it'd by each. Their verse, then,
was a sort of monotonous cliant.

a This idea of verse continued to prevail for many cen-
turies. It was associated in the popular mind with music
ratlier than with speech. Its tones were not the natural tones
of conversation, varying constantly in rapidity of utterance,
but were alternately long and short, in regular j)ulsations.
There was probably, also, some difference in pitch, and in force,
of sound, but these w«'re ineideiital <nily. The rhic'f feature
which caught the car, and marked the rliythm, was the recur-

QUANTITY. 67

rence of the long-drawn syllables. Thus, the first line of
Virgil's iEneid, instead of being read with the natural vivacity
of common speech, was doubtless sounded with somewhat of
the followingr effect :

:il=:^iiivp4=^zijs

iziMTM—M—Mi

-^1

::1=:1:

s—s

-^ — N

Ar - ma vi - rum-que ca - no Tro - ja; qui pri - mus ab o - rls

Here every syllable had its exact length or quantity of time
taken in pronouncing it. Let the syllable Ar, with its quarter
note, occupy half a second ; then ma and vi would each occupy
quarter of a second, and the whole of the first measure would
occupy a second. The same time was given to each measure.

4. Quantity of time, therefore, was the basis of the ancient
rhythm. Each measure had its exact time, and each syllable
in the measure had its proportionate part of tliat time.
Every syllable in the language, for purposes of metre, was
either long or short. A long syllable occupied twice the time
of a short one. A syllable was constituted long, either by the
nature of its vowel, or by having two or more consonants
following its vowel. So general and established were these
rules, that one may go through an entire poem of thousands
of lines, as, for example, the Iliad or the ^Eneid, and prove
the long or short quantity of every syllable contained in it,
making allowance only for the few exceptions which are
necessary with any general rule. This shows that these
poems must have been read with a regard to the length of
feet and syllables which would make the reading sound very
strangely to modern ears.

5. What is the change, then, that lias taken place in modern
times? Poetry, in common use, has become separated from
music, and given over to speech. "We are no longer content
to chant our verse. We can do much better with music than

58 ENGLISH VEUSIFICATION.

that. Music has become capable of expressing sentiments
and emotions in a way that was imj)ossible in early times.

We now read our poetry in the tones of our ordinary speech,
depending for the rhythm, not upon the quantity of the
syllables, but upon the natural undulations of accent and
emphasis. Thus, iu a line from Longfellow's " Evangeline,"
very similar to that quoted from the i^neid, we read :

This is the | forest pri | m(5val. The | murmuring | pines and
the I hemlocks.

Here the rhythmic effect is produced by the accent and
emphasis occurring at somewhat regular intervals. And in
this there is nothing forced, or unnatural. The words receive
the same emphasis and accent as they would in prose. The
art of the poet consists iu the arrangement of the words so
that the accents shall occur at such regular intervals as to
produce a rhythm. Nor is this wholly art ; for all emotion,
as we have seen, tends to rhythmical expression.

6. It will be noticed that the length of syllables, in this
last example, does not alTcct the rhythm. The vowel i in
primeval is as long as i in phic.t, but the latter marks the
rhythm, while the former does not, because it does not happen
to have the accent. In Greek or Latin, a syllable, if long,
must always occupy the same relative position in a foot. In
English, the same syllable may occupy now one and now
another position in a foot, according as it does or does not
receive the accent. Thus, in Latin, the first syllable in
humanus is long, and could never stand in any part of a foot
where a short syllable would be required. But in English,

I the same syllable hu may stand at the beginning of a trochee,
\or an iambus, or a dactyl, as it happ(Mis to be accented; as,
1 I human | , or | human \ ity, or | humunt \ tiirian.

7. In saying, then, that English verse does not di'ix'iid on
quantity, like the Greek and Latin, we mean tliat the rliythm

QUANTITY. 69

is not marked by the length of the syllables. Of course,
quantity of time must come somewhat into the account, or
else verse would not be metrical, or measured, language. The
line is divided into measures of time, and these measures
must be pretty nearly equal quantities of time, or they
would not constitute rhythm. But, even in this respect,
there is great freedom in actual usage. Whenever we attempt
to mark the beginning or end of the feet with much precision
'or accuracy of time, the result is at once recognized as scan-
ning, not reading. Indeed, some writers go so far as to deny
the possibility of feet in English.

8. But to say that quantity does not produce our rhythm is
not to say that it is without effect in our verse. In English,
as in every other language, there are long and short syllables.
First, there are long and short vowels, as i in viachine, and t
in pin, oD in boot, and do in foot. Less time is occupied in
pronouncing a-hil-i-tij in the usual manner, than if it were
written a-beel-ee-tij. Secondly, a syllable in which the vowel
is encumbered with several consonants, is more difficult of
pronunciation, and therefore occupies more time, than one not
so encumbered. The difficulty varies according to the character
of the consonants, and the combinations which they form.
The same amount of effort would sound the syllable met in
less time than the syllable strength.

9. Now, this difficulty or ease of expression connects itself
naturally with the character of the idea or sentiment to be
expressed. And so the most skilful poets are tliose who use
the natural quantities of the language to convey their mean-
ing by harmonious correspondence :

When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,
The line, too, labors, and the words move slow.
Not so when swift Camilla sconrs the ^Jain,

^ Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skJnis along the main.
^ . — I'ope.

60 ENGLISH VEIISIFICATION.

In the first two lines we notice liow the intended effect is
produced by the preponderance of long vowels and difficult
consonants, together with the skilful arrangement of pause
and emphasis. In the last two lines^ the short vowels, the
liquids and sibilants, and the movement unobstructed by
pauses, produce precisely the opposite effect.

10. Appreciation of the capabilities of our language in this
direction is steadily gaining in modern times. This is true
not only of quantlti/, but still more of the (jualit)/ of tones.
]^ot only do the sounds of the voice differ in length, but also
in richness, fulness, delicacy, and in many other qualities
which can be better exemplified than described. The con-
sideration of this subject will be found in the following
chapter.

TONE-COLOR. 61

CHAPTER IX.
TONE-COLOE.

1. The term Tone-Color is used in acoustics to describe
the quality by whicli one sound differs from another, not in
pitch, or length, or force, but in a way in which one shade or
tint of a color differs from another. Just as two shades of
red or green are easily distinguishable from each other,
although of the same general color, so two notes of the same
pitch have a different quality when coming respectively from
a flute or a violin. The difference in each case is due to the
character of the vibrations, — to the overtones, as they are
called, rising from the fundamental tone.

2. As in musical instruments, so in the human voice. Not
only does one voice differ from another in quality, but each
vocal element, each vowel and consonant, has its appro-
priate tone-color. It is readily seen that some of the vowel-
sounds are much fuller, richer, deeper, than others ; as of the
0 in rose compared with the i in jmi. We have said that
this quality is not the same as that of length. And yet
there is a difference of quality, or tone-color, between the
so-called long and short vowels j as the i in ravine and the i
in fin.

3. This difference exists, of course, in prose as well as in
verse, and is seen in the sonorousness or mellifluence of one
passage of prose, as compared with another, liut it is at
once evident of how much greater effect this quality is capable

62 EXGLISU VERSIFICATION.

in a form of speech like verse, in whicli so much depends on
the pleasure of the ear. If rhythm is the anatomy of verse,
without which it could not exist, then tone-color is the flesh-
tint which clothes it witli life and animation. Tlierefore,
when we say that in English, rhythm is founded upon accent
and not upon quantity, we do not forget, that the quantity
and quality of the sounds have as much to do perhaps with
the beauty of our verse as with that of the ancients.

4. In one sense, both rhyme and alliteration, of which we
have already spoken, come under the head of tone-color, as
they both have to do with the quality of sounds, liut their
character is such as to need special treatment, and they reveal
similuriti/ only, of sounds, whereas we have now rather to do
with variety.

5. The main i)rinciple which concerns us now is that certain
tones are naturally significant of certain emotions, or expres-
sive of certain ideas. These may be definable or undefinable,
but they are unmistakable. Certain elements of language
are derived from imitation of sounds or motions in the natural
world; as in the words, fjio'f/le, splash, thud. This ])rinciplo
is called onomtitnpfrUt, from a Greek word whicli means ''the
making of names." But there is something more than mere
imitation in this. Even wlicre there is no exact similarity,
there is correspondence between the effort reqiiired to utter
certain sounds, and certain motions in nature. The mute con-
sonant t requires more elTort than the licpiid /, and the diiTerence
is plainly indicated in the word tug as compared with tlie word
Ini/. L enters words (',\|»ressiv(! of litpiid jnotion, iinJ/ou\ glUle ;
anil in is used of viurinurinrj sounds. Tlien, again, besides
imitation and correspondence, there is also a suggestiveness
in sounds, which is j)erhaps iiHlfnn.ililc, but is noverthclj'ss
real. All these elTccts are j)rodueod by tone-color in human
speech.

TONE-COLOR. 63

6. To appreciate this charm in verse, needs a nicer ear for
the harmonies of tone, than is sufficient to notice the effects
of rhyme or rhythm. One must read and listen with the eye
and ear of the imagination. Take the following example from
Longfellow's " Voices of the iSTight : ''

I heard the trailing garments of the Night

Sweep through her marhle liails;
I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light

From the celestial walls.

The poet here personifies the cool and soothing Kight as a
serene and consoling goddess. Her presence comes to him as
of the one he loves, moving down a dim marble corridor, her
flowing silken robes just rustling on the smooth pavement,
and fringed with the fading light of day. Now read the
verse, with the voice protracted on the word trailing, and
giving full force to both initial consonants in the word sweep,
as well as to the vowel sound in the same word ; notice the
open coolness of the vowel a in garment and marhle; give
fringed its complete expression ; observe the alliteration in
sau', sahle, skirts, celestial ; catch the rhythmic effect of the
trochee i)receding the iambus in the second line ; and we can
hardly fail to bring the vision of the poet into an open reality
to the eye and ear.

7. Imitation, correspondence, suggestiveness, we have said,
are all found in tone-color. Those who have studied the
subject minutely, and classified the vocal elements, indicate
the various ideas which the different vowels and consonants
are fitted to express. Professor Tolman, in the "Andover
Review " for March, 1887, tells us tliat the lower vowels in
his scale, aiv (awe), oo (gloom), o (gore), etc., are fitted to
express ''solemnity, horror, and deep grief," as well as "slow-
ness of motion and great size." The colors at the top of the
scale, i (little), e (met), a (mat), express " joy, gayety, triviality,

64 ENGLISH VErvSIFICATIOX.

rapid movement, delicacy, and pliysical littleness." Of the
consonants, he says the surd mutes, ^j, t, k, express "unex-
pectedness, vigor, explosive passion, and startling effects of
all kinds ; " " s and zh are rich, pleasant colors ; " I and r
smooth are used for " softness, smoothness, liquidity, linger-
ing, and love ; " the whispered consonants, s, sh, h, and wh,
express " fear, secrecy, deception, caution, mystery."

8. The following examples range through the various de-
grees of imitation, correspondence, and suggestiveness.

9. In the first, notice how the surd mutes and their vowels
help to convey the idea of littleness, delicacy, and spright-

liness :

But as for faeries that will Hit,

To make the greensward fresh,
I hold them exquisitely knit,
But far too spare of llesh.

— Tennyson : Taiking OcUc,

Speaking of Queen Mab, Shakespeare says :

She comes
In sliapc no bigger than an agate stone,

Drawn hy a team of little atomics;

Her whip of cricket bone, the lash of fihn.

— Romeo and Julii t, Act I., Scene 4.

So Drayton, of the same Queen Mab :

Hop and Mop and Drap so clear,
rip and Trip and Skip that were
To Mab their sovt-reign dc^ar,

Her special maids of honor ;
Fib and Tib and I'inck an<l Tin,
Tick and Quick and .lill and .lin,
Tit and Wit and Wap and Win,

The train that wail upon lier.

TONE-COLOR. 65

The wreck of a tiny glass fleet upon a golden reef, seen in

a dream, is thus described :

The brittle fleet
Touch'd, clink'd, and clash'd, and vanish'd.

Tennyson: Sia Dreams.

Similarly :

Crisp foam flakes scud along the level sand.

— Tennyson.
Crisping ripples on the beach
And tender curving lines of creamy spray.

— Tennyson.

10. Observe the character of eacli of the following examples,
and notice the vocal elements which help to produce it :

And clattering flints battered with clanging hoofs.

— Tennyson.
So wrangled, brangled, jangled they a month.

— Browning.
And evermore, the harsh tambour

Breaks in upon tlieir wailing.

— Lock-fiart.

The ponderous syllables, like sullen waves

In the half-glutted hollows of reef-rocks.

Came booming thus.

— Keats.

{Of thour/Ms in dreams, like pehhlcs in a brook,)
Rolled on e.ach other, rounded, smoothed, and brought

Into the gulfs of sleep.

— Tennyson.

Softly sweet in Lydian measures.

— Dryden.

And lucent syrops, tinct with cinnamon.

— Keats.
The moan of doves in immemorial elms,
And murmuring of innumerable bees.

— Tennyson.

A low melodious thunder to the sound
Of solemn psalms and silver litanies.

— Tinny son.

The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums
Ilath rung night's yawning peal.

— Shakespeare: Macbeth.

CG ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

11. Contrcost the tones of Lady ^lacbeth in the resolute
lianluess of her guilt, with the innocence of Banquo, where
each, at different times, is speaking of the entrance to the
castle :

Lady Machcth. Tlie rawn hiinstlf is hoarse
Tliat croaks the fatal enteraiice of Duncan
Under my battlements.

lianqxio. This giiost of sunimor,
The tomple-hannting martlet, does approve
By his lov'il masonry, that the heaven's breath
Smells \Vooinj;Iy here. . . .
The air is delicate.

So Milton portrays the opening of the gates of heaven and

of hell :

Ileavcn opened wide
Her cver-<luring gates, liarmonious sound,
On golden hinges turning.

On a sudilen open fly
"With impetuous recoil and jarring soimd,
Th' infernal doors, and on their hinges grate
Harsh thunder.

12. Only brief mention can be made of whole poems charac-
terized by effectiveness of tone-color. Soutliey, in "Lodore,"
mimics with liis ver.se all the tumultuous changes of a cataract.
Lowell, in "I'ieturos from Applodoro," sets wonderfully before
us the craggy island, bufieted by the billows of tlie Athmtic.
One short specimen must suffice :

I have seen it when its crags seomod frantic,

Butting against the mad Atlantic;
When surge on surge would heap cnormo

(MifTs of emeral.I, topped with snow,

That lifted ntid lifted, and llien let go
A great wliilc avalanilie of thmuler.

A grinding, blinding, deafening ire,
Monadnoek might liavc Iri-mbled under.

TONE-COLOR. 67

In Tennyson's "Lotus Eaters," the inimitable expression of
drowsy languor pervades the whole, produced in large measure
by the tone-color of the prevailing sounds :

In the afternoon they came unto a land,

In which it seem(id always afternoon.

All round the coast the languid air did swoon,

Breathing like one that hath a weary dream.

Full faced above the valley stood the moon ;

And like a downward smoke, the slender stream

Along the cliff to fall and pause and pause and fall did seem.

Here are cool mosses deep,

And tlirough the moss the ivies creep,

And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep.

And from the craggy ledge the poppy hangs in sleep.

Last of all, we mention the remarkable poems of Poe,
"Ulalume," "The Raven," and especially "The Bells," in
which last the perfection of success seems to have been
reached in uttering the inarticulate language of nature in
articulate speech.

68 ENGLISH VEIISIFICATION.

CHAPTER X.

ON READING VEESE.

1. We liave now reached that point in our study of the
elements of metre, in which we may put our knowledge into
practice, so far as to read properly any ordinary specimen of
English verse. Two things we need to remember; lirst, that
any serious piece of composition is to be read for the meaning
of it rather than the jingle; but, secondly, a piece of good
verse can be read for the meaning, and at the same time give
to the ear the pleasure of rhythm. The power to make verse
of which this is possible constitutes the difference between a
good poet and a poor one.

2. This indicates the way in which we are to proceed to
read verse properly. We are not to find out, first of all, liow
to scan it, and then, dividing it up into feet, to put the accent
in tlie proper places, regardless of tlie meaning, liut we are
to read it to express as completely as possible the thought and
feeling in the mind of tlie writer, letting ax'cent and emphasis
fall naturally wliere they will. Then, discovering tlie metri-
cal intention of tl»e writer, we shall see where a slight modifi-
cation of emphasis may be necessary to give the riiytlim its
best exj)ression.

3. For we must observe this. Rhythm depends on stress.
Stress includes accent and emphasis. Tlie accent of words is
fixed, for any given time and country. We cannot modify
that. Rut cnjphasis varies with the meaning. It changes its

ON READING VERSE. 69

place according to the conception in the mind of the writer or
reader. Therefore, if our emphasis does not seem to make the
verse read rhythmically, it may be possible to catch the rhythm,
by varying the emphasis to express more nearly the concep-
tion of the author. In lyric poetry, especially, we cannot
always determine the rhythmic intention, in the first line or
two of the poem. We may need to read a whole stanza for
that purpose.

4. Notice this also. Although stress makes the rhythm, it
is not necessary that there should be equal force in every
stress. All that is needed is that the stressed syllable shall
be distinguished from the unstressed syllables. The stressed
syllables may all differ from one another in their degree of
force.

5. Read the poem, therefore, to give the meaning, letting
the emphasis be guided somewhat by the evident metrical
intention. Then, if the stressed syllables be marked, it will be
found that they will divide the lines according to some defi-
nite rhythm and metre. It will be seen, that even where
there are slight differences of conception as to the exact
meaning and the proper emphasis, the different readings will
each be susceptible of correct rhythmical measurement.
"Accent is always arranged by the great masters, so as to
enhance and illustrate their prosody ; and they require of tlije
reader only that he should understand their meaning, and
deliver it with proper accentuation ; then they will answer for
the prosody coming right." — Buskin : Elements of English
Prosodi/.

6. In ])utting tliis principle into practice, it needs to be
remembered that in English, there is a large number of sub-
ordinate words, — articles, prepositions, and conjunctions, —
which ordinarily require no emphasis. Such are a, the, of,
on, ivith, and, etc. Some persons make too much of these,

70 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

even in prose ; by sounding, for instance, the article a like
the letter a. Such words should be sounded obscurely, like
the final a in America. This applies as well to poetry.
Never emphasize unimportant words for the sake of the
rhythm. Empliasize them only when there is some special
reason for doing so. To disregard tliis principle is inev-
itably to introduce sing-song into the verse. Yet some
writers on verse insist on placing a mark of accent over
such syllables, if they occur in that part of a foot which
should regularly be accented. They call this a metrical or
unemphatic accent, as distinguished from the natural accent.
But it is dilticult to see how such syllables or words can be
accented in any way by the voice, and not produce a sing-song
effect. Thus we find lines marked as below in a treatise on

metre :

That lic'als the wouinl, ami ciircs not thd disgr.-ice.

— Shakespeare,

But fuol'd hy liope, men favor thf- (lec(?it.

— Dryden.

The mother of mankind, what time his pride.

- Milton.
'Tis siire the luirdest science 16 forget.

— Pope.

Here such unimportant words as the and of and to are
accented, simply because they occur in the last part of a foot
which should be an iambus according to the regular scheme
of the ver.se. But let us read naturally, whatever comes of
the metre, and then we shall find, when we come to divide the
line according to the metre, that other feet can take the place
of tlie iambus, — as, the trochee and the pyrrhic, — without
destroying, but rather enhancing, the pleasure of the rhythm.
Thus, in the lines quoted above, reading naturally, and divid-
ing into feet of two syllables each, we have :

with the fourth foot a pyrrhic; that is, with nu accent.

ON READING VERSE. 71

The second line has also a pyrrhic in the same place. The
third has it in the second place, and the fourth again in the
fourth.

Or, a trochee may take the place of the ianibus :

7. One more hint is needed in this connection. Besides
the natural reading with proper accent and emphasis, due
regard must be had to the pauses ; not only those required by
the sense, but also the caesural pause which occurs at the
appropriate break in the line, and the pause at the end of the
line. The csesural pause is soon determined by the ear, but
once found, it should not be followed mechanically. For
example, in *' Locksley Hall," when we have discovered that
the caesural pause occurs after the fourth foot, Ave should
bring ourselves into the realm of the ridiculous by applying
our rule in the second of the two following lines :

He will hold thee, when his passion || shall have spent its novel force,
Something better than his dog, a || little dearer than his horse.

8. Besides the caesural pause, some slight pause should also
be indicated at the end of the line. Some persons seem to
think that in order to read verse naturally, it is necessary to
push right on, if the sense requires it, regardless of the end
of the lines, as if it were prose. The effect of this is, espe-
cially in lyric poetry with lines of varying length, to produce
a confusion in the mind of the hearer, which destroys the
effect of the rhythm. Certainly, if it were not desirable that
the end of the line should be indicated to the ear, it would
not have been necessary to indicate it to the eye. The line is
one of the natural divisions of the metre, and should be recog-
nized as such. By nice attention, this can always be done in
the reading, without impairing the connection in the meaning.

72 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

9. So far, we liave had reference strictly to the rhythm ami
the metre. This is tlie anatomy of tlie verse. Kext, comes
tlie clothing of it with flesh and blood. That is, we need the
feeling of everything that makes it melodious and liarmonious,
in variety of tone. There must be a feeling for the effect of
consonant and vowel sounds. Khyme, assonance, alliteration,
onomatopoeia, all come in for a share of attention ; and not only
these, but the duration or quantity of vowel-sounds, even where
neither of the above effects is noticeable. Not only intelli-
gence, but sympathy, is needed for such an interpretation of
the poet's work. "We must enter into tiie scene or the event,
picture it, feel it, and not only so, but feel the author's
portrayal of it.

10. With these principles, let us proceed to read, first, an
examj)le of heroic blank verse, as the most simple and regular
in its construction. My custom has been, in teaching classes
who have followed the method here proposed, to write the
given extract upon the blackboard, and then to ask each
member of the class, in turn, to read it naturally. The teacher
stands prepared to mark each syllable that receives either
accent or emphasis. There will not be much room for differ-
ence of opinion as to accent; for there is general agreement as
to tlie accent of English words. The difTerence of idea and
sentiment will appear in the emphasis; and even in this, it
will be seen that different interpretations can be given with-
out impairing the rhythmic effect.

11. To avoid repetition, we give the passage as already
marked, reserving comment on marking till the end. First
of all, however, the jjoem should have been read silently,
simply to get the conception and the feeling contained in it;
the time, before sunrise ; the place, at the base of the moun-
tain ; the air, above the mountain, still dark, with one glowing

ON READING VERSE. 73

star; the mountain itself a solid wedge in the surrounding
darkness ; the pine forest at the foot ; the torrents rusliing
ceaselessly towards us. All the awe and sublimity of the
scene should be upon us.

Hast thou a charm to stay the morning-star
In his steep course ? So long he seems to pause
On thy balil awful head, O sovran Blanc!
The Arve and Arveiron at thy base
Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most awful form I
Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines,
How silently! Around thee and above
Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black,
An ebon mass; niethinks thou piercest it
As with a wedge! But when I look again.
It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine,
Thy habitation from eternity!

0 dread and silent Mount ! I gazed upon thee,
Till thou, still present to the bodily s^^nse,

Didst vanish from my thought; entranced in prayer,

1 worshipped the Invisible al(3ne.

— Coleridge : Address to Mont Jilanc.

Of course, the accents were fixed, on words of more than
one syllable. There was no question about morning, mvfid, etc.
In emphasis, there may have been some choice. For example,
some might have been disposed to mark Hast, instead of thou,
at the beginning. But it will be seen that the question is not
asked so much for the sake of an answer, and therefore
requires no special force on the interrogative word. Such
force would be too precipitate as the first word of address to
the awful form. There would simply be a gentle stress on
thoxi, as tlie subject of the sentence. In a similar way, thij in
the third line has some stress, as relating to the subject of ad-
dress, but not so much as the words immediately following —
bald awful. In the eleventh line, Avhatever force thine might
have is lost in comi)arison with the three strong stresses
immediately following, own calm home.

74 ENGLISH VERSIFICATIOX.

12. We now proceed to divide the lines into feet, or units,
of two syllables each.

1 wor I shii>ped the | Invis | ible | alone. |

In sixteen lines of five feet cacli, which would regularly
contain eighty iambuses in this kind of metre, we find fifty-
seven iambuses, enough to give the iambic movement; with
fifteen pyrrhics, five spondees, two trochees, and one anapoest.
There is also one supernumerary syllable, or feminine ending.

13. How much more impressive is the effect of this variety,
than if the feet liad been uniformly iambics ! The spondees
give weight and sublimity. Notice the effect of a spondee fol-
lowed by a pyrrhic, in Race ceuseloisii/, where the torrents seem
to pause, and then break into fragments. Also, Arve and
Arveiroti, beginning alike, but accented differently, Notica
the constant changes in the place of the ciesural pause. Ob-
serve the wejght of the heavy vowels, in pause, bald, and
awful ; the crystal clearness in charm and star. Other effects
might also be detected, although the i)asbage is not strongly
marked in tone-color.

ON READING TERSE. 75

14. In lyric poetry, where we are no longer guided by the
strict form, as in iambic pentameter, it is not always easy to
catch the rhythm on the first reading. The opening lines
may not be so determinate in emphasis as to fix the character
of the metre. In such cases, it is necessary to read one or
more stanzas, to get the movement intended. Thus :

Down toward the twilight drifting.

Toward is accented on the first syllable according to the
dictionaries, and may be pronounced as either one or two
syllables. It may be esteemed so unimportant, compared with
down, as to lose its accent in comparison. So we might sup-
pose either of the following readings :

But reading the whole stanza we find the movement to be
different from either of these :

Down to I ward the | twilight | drifting, |

And the | storm is | over | past.

— S. D. nobbing.

15. Again:

So we'll go no more a-roving.

This might be read :

So we'll I go no | more a- | roving. |

But we find that Byron intended :

So we'll go I no more | a-rov | ing,
So late I into | the night, | etc.

16. Once more :

One word is too often profaned,

is not especially rhythmical if read :

6ne word is too often profaned;

76 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

lu its connection, liowever, it becomes :

6ne word I Is tOo of | tCu profaned |

For md | to profane | it ;

One feel | ing too false | ly disdained |

For thee I to disdain | it.

— ShelUy.

17. So, even in iambic pentameter, a line may seem entirely-
unrhythmical, if we fail to feel the emphasis as it lay in the
mind of the writer. Thus, in Milton :

'Tis true I am that spirit unfortunate,
will seem like prose if thus accented :

Throw the emphasis, however, on urn as the sense requires,
and it becomes at once rhythmical, if we remember that sjiirit
is frequently one syllable in tlie poets:

18. The following extract from liuskiu illustrates this dis-
crimination in emphasis :

"A true master-poet invariably calculates on his verse
being first read as })rose would be ; and on the reader's being
jdeasantly surprised by finding that he lias fallen unawares

into music.

I said thore was naotliinjj I halod like men!
— Tiie deil gae wi' him, to holieve me.

"The only doubtful accent in this piece of entirely prosaic
and straightforward expression is on the him, and this accent
depends on the context. Had the sentiment been, for instance,
'He's gaen — the deil gae wi' him,' the accent woidd prob-
ably have been on the wi\ But here, the speaker is intent on
fastening the fault on her lover instead of on herself; and the
accent comes therefore full on the A////, if only tlie retider
understands completely the sense of what he is reading."

ON READING VERSE. 77

19. But that there may be difference of opinion as to
emphasis and expression, may be seen by the exceptions
taken by Mr. Hodgson to the judgment of Mr. Ruskin, in cer-
tain instances. Mr. Ruskin accents the first line of Tenny-
son's well-known stanza, as follows, and I think the common
instinct would agree with him :

for the general rhythm of the lyric is undoubtedly anapaestic.
But Mr. Hodgson says : " I should read the first and third
lines with a strong stress on Come, and on the first syllable of
garden, leaving everything else more or less unstressed. The
lover is eager for her to come ; he is waiting at the gate ; she
is in the house. He wants her to come to him where he is
waiting: Come; — don't delay. Emphasizing into contrasts
his wish, not with delaij, but with get out of the garden."

20. This last sentence affords a good occasion to illustrate
the principle that there may bo all degrees of difference of
stress without affecting the general flow of the rhythm. Mr.
Hodgson understands Mr. Ruskin as intending to throw strong
emjjhasis upon into, as if to contrast it with out of ; which
would indeed show a ridiculous nervousness on the part of
the lover. Whereas the ordinary accent of into, with the
slight preponderence of stress upon the first syllable, is suffi-
cient to give the rhythmical effect intended. This is one of
the principles which need special consideration in the study
of verse : that it is the alternation between stressed and un-
stressed syllables which determines the rhythm, without refer-
ence to the difference of emphasis among tlie stressed syllables
themselves. This difference of emphasis may result in pht'as-
iiig, wliich has already been described as an additional effect,
superimposed upon tlie fundamental flow of the verse.

78 ENGLISH VERSIFICATIOX.

21. Another example is from "In Memoriam:"

Or that the past will always win

A glory from its being far,

And orb into the perfect star
We saw not when we moved therein.

^fr. Euskin says: "If the reader has intelligence enough
to put the accent on the Or, and he of being, the verse comes
right; but imagine the ruin to it if a merely formal reader
changed the first line into a regular iambic by putting the
accent on that ! "

Mr. Hodgson replies : " My intelligence is not enough, I
confess, to make me put the accent on the be of being, though
it is adequate to the Or. To put the stress on the be of being
is to make logic of the verse, and bad logic into the bargaiiu
The true stress is on far. That gives an imaginative picture
of the receding past. Whereas, to lay stress on being is to
give an argument for the i)ast winning a glory, and a bad
argument to boot, because much of the past is very near —
yesterday, for instance."

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 79

CHAPTER XI.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS.

1. Three periods, according to Schipper, mark the growth
of English verse ; first, the Anglo-Saxon ; second, the Norman
and Transition; third, the New English, or Modern Period.

2. The Anglo-Saxon gave the strong basis of our rhythm,
characterizing it as Germanic, or accented, as distinguished
from the classical, or quantitative metres. There was no
smooth or regular flow of syllables, nor were the syllables
counted as in Greek and Latin. The emphatic syllables in the
line were forcibly struck with a strong accent, leaving the
other syllables to take care of themselves, whether few or
many. — A long-line was made up of two half-lines, in each of
which were two strong accents. Of these four strongly accented
syllables, the third, and either or both the first and second were
still further indicated by having the same or similar initial
letter. This accented, alliterated long-line, without stanzas,
was the chief characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon period. Al-
though afterwards modified, broken up, and discarded, it
retained some influence, even to the time of Chaucer.

3. During the Norman and Transition period, various modi-
fying influences came in, from French and from Latin sources.
These affect the character of tlie rhythm and the length of the
line, and introduce the stanza. — The rhythm becomes more
uniform and regular by the greater attention paid to the un-

80 ENGLISH VEUSiriCATION.

accented syllables. These are more closely proportionod to
the number of the accented syllablos, and are counted in tlie
length of the lino. A double-syllabled foot becomes apparent,
whicli finally becomes j)revailingly iambic. At the same time
end-rliyme begins to take the place of alliteration. — The length
of the line is modified. The Saxon long-line is affected in two
Avays. Under the influence of the French " Riming Couplet"
of eight syllables, it becomes formed into couplets, bound to-
gether by rhyme. Under the influence of the Alexandrine, its
two accents in each half-line increase to three, and the lines of
six accents, thus formed, are bound by rhyme into couplets. —
Thus both short couplets and long couplets find a place in our
metres. Beside these, a new form from the Latin is introduced,
named the Septenary. It consisted of a half-liue of four ac-
cents, followed by another half-line of throe acconts. Thus,
with an equal number of unaccented syllables, a line of four-
teen syllables was produced. Tliis Septenary was at first a
church hymn metro, in the Latin of the Middle Ages. Intro-
duced into English, either at full length, or in half-lines, it
became the popular metre of our ballad poetry, which was pro-
duced in groat abiindance in the fifteenth and sixteenth cen-
turies. A combination of the Alexandrine of twelve syllaldos,
and the Septenary of fourteen — used alternately — was after-
wards called P<mlters' Measure ; so oallod from the |H)ult<'rers,
who gave twelve for tiie first do/en, and fourteen for the
second. AVith Cliaucer, as the closing representative of this
transition jM^iod, we find two forms finally adopted as favor-
ites. One is the four-a(!('ont verse, or French " riming couplet;"
the other is a comparatively new form, intermediate between
this and the long seven accented Septenary from the Latin.
This new form (!onsists of five accents, and as the iambus had
now become settled as the prevalent English rhythm, we have
the lamlne I'l'iifmncfcr, destined to become the distifKjuUking
metre of Eurjlish jmetry.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 81

4. The third, or Modern period, extends from Chaucer to the
present time. It was characterized very early by the predomi-
nance of iambic rhythm, especially the pentameter. In its
earliest use it was accompanied by rhyme, and lias been fre-
quently employed in this form till the present day, notably by
Pope. The Earl of Surrey is the first known representative
of its use without rhyme, in his translation of the Second and
Fourth Books of Virgil's ^Eneid. In this form it is known as
heroic blank verse, and has become the acknowledged English
metre for epic and dramatic poetry. — For lyric poetry there
has arisen tlie widest variety of forms in rhythm, in length of
line, in the structure of the stanza. As to the predominant
rhythm, we have the judgment of Swinburne, that, " to Englisli
all variations and combinations of anapaestic, iambic, and
trochaic metre are as natural and pliable as all dactylic and
spondaic forms of verse are unnatural and abhorrent." — As
to length of line, any number of accents has been employed,
from two to eight. Although eight-accent lines have been
used by some of our best poets in a few of their poems, the pre-
vailing metres are the pentameter and tetrameter, with occa-
sionally the trimeter. — The stanza, originating with the use
of end-rhyme, and producing first the couplet, has developed
into a large variety of forms, as regards the number of lines
and their arrangement. — Increased attention has been given
in recent times to the quantity and quality of the vocal ele-
ments, in rhyme, alliteration, and tone-color ; and our English
verse, while retaining its vigorous accentual character, together
with the regularity and proportion derived from the Romance
languages, has developed more of richness in tone and grace
in movement.

A few examples of the different forms are here given, with
such fuller treatment of the iambic pentameter as its impor-
tance demands.

82 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

6. The Short Couplet:

A prest was in londe,

Laweman was (i) hole

He was Leucais sone

Lef him beo dribte.

{The Lord be gracious to ?iim.)

— Layamon's Brut.

Horn, tbu art wcl kene
And that is wcl isene ;
Tlai art gret and strong,
Fair and euene loiip;.

— A'«n<7 Uom.

Ich was in one suinere dale
In one sulhe ditbeie bale.
(In a very secret h(jUuic.)

— The Owl and the Nightingale.

In a croniquc this I rede;
Aboutc a king as niosle node
Tber was of knygbtes and squiera
Great route, and eke of oflicers.

— Gotcer*! Confettio AmantU.

For al niy chambre gan to ryngc,
Through syngyiige of her armonye;
For instrument nor melodyo
Was no-wher herd yet half so swctc,
Nor of accorde ne half so mete.

— Chaucer: The Boke of the Duchetu.

Thus I, Colin Clout,

As I go about,

AikI wandering as I walk,

I hoar tho poojilo talk;

Men say for silver and gold

Mitres are bought and sold.

— John Skelton.

' Shepherd.

DEVELOPMENT OP ENGLISH FORMS. 83

It was near a thicky shade,
That broad leaves of beech had made,
Joining all their tops so high,
That scarce Phoebus in could pry.
* —Robert Greene. .

Ilonie they brought her warrior dead,
yiie nor swooned nor uttered cry.

— Tennyson.

7. The Long Couplet:

(Povlter's Measure; alternate Alexandrine and Septenary.)

Thuse come, lo! ifingelond into Normannes honde;

And the Normans ue couthe speke || the bote her owe sp^che-

Ich w6ne ther n6 be man in world contreyes none.
That n^ holdeth to her knnde speche hot Engelonde one.

— Jiobert of GUmcester.
{The Same.)

Layd in my quiet bed, in study as I were,

I saw within my troubled head, a heape of thoughtes appeare.

— Surrey.
(Septenary.)

So many fires disclosed tlieir beams, made by the Trojan part
Before the face of Ilion, and her bright turrets showM.
A tliousand courts of guard kept fires, aud every guard allow'd
Fifty stout men, by whom their horse eat oats and hard white corn.
And all did wistfully expect the silver-throniid morn.

— Chapman.
(Alexandrine.)

The Naiads and the nymphs extremely overjoy'd,
And on the winding banks all busily eniploy'd.
Upon this joyful day, some dainty cliaplets twine.

— Ihrayton's Polyolbion.

(Septenary.)

There's not a joy the world can give like that it takes away,
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull decay.

— Jiyron.

84 ENGLISH VEKSIFICATION.

— Robert Drowning.

BALLADS AND LYRICS.

8. With tlie history of balhul poetry, we are not here coii-
cenied. Springing originally from unknown sources in very
early times, it took on instinctively that swinging rhythm, in
which the voice is accompanied by the alternate beating of
the foot. The accented syllables receive the chief attention,
witiiout much reference to the number or order of the unac-
cented, in English, as elsewhere, their origin is in obscurity,
but after the art of printing became well established, they
were reproduced in modern forms, and widi-ly circulated as
broadsheets among the people.

They are commonly in iambic rhythm, with linos originally
of twelve or fourteen syllables — or, more accurately, of seven
accents. These long lines are easily divided by the ciusural
pause, into two lines, one of four and the other of three
accents. They often employ the refrain or burden :

God prosper lone: our noble king, our lives and safeties lill!
A woeful hunting once there did In Chevy Chiisc befall.

— liallait of Chery Chiue.

O lip and sp:ike an eldorn kin'-^ht, sal lit the king's right knee;
Sir Tutrick Speiis is the best saih)r tliat (^vcr sailed the sea.

— lUiUail of Sir l\itrick Spent.

It will be here seen that forced accents are characteristic of
tin; ballad metre. So in the modern imitation of them ; as in
Longfellow's "Wreck of the Hesperus:"

It wiis the sclioouer Ili'-spenis
That sailed the wintry sea;
And the skipper had tjlken his little daughK^r,
f To bear him c<''nip.iny.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENOLLSII FOUMS. 85

The use of the refrain is common :

" Where are you going, Lord Lovel ? " she said,
" Oh, where are you going ? " said she;
I'm going, my Lady Nancy Belle,
Strange countries for to see, to see.
Strange countries for to see.

9. The Refrain, as is here seen, consists of one or more
words, or lines, repeated at the end of each stanza. It is
especially appropriate to lyric verse. It is in the nature of a
chorus, or response by the hearers, to the song of the leader ;
as in "Auld Lang Syne." It is also employed in poems of
a different character ; as in Mrs. Browning's " Eliyme of the
Duchess May," ^'Toll sloivli/ ;'' and in Poe's "Haven," '■'■Never-
moreJ'

10. Of a similar character to the ballad are following :

A cliieftain to the Higlilands bound

Cries, Boatman, do not tarry!
And I'll give thee a silver pound

To row us o'er the ferry.

— Campbell: Lord Uliin's DauyhUr.

Lars Porsena of Clusiuni,

By the nine gods he swore,
That the great house of Tarquin

Should suffer wrong no more.

— Macauhiy : Lays of Ancient Rome.

11. Of the great variety of lyric forms, it will be possible
to mention only a few of the most prominent types :

a. Iambic tetrameter :

The Passionate Sliephenl. — Marlov:c. In Mcmoriam. — Tcnni/snn.
II Penseroso. — Milton. His L' Allegro varies from iambic to trochaic
rhythm.

b. Trochaic trimeter, with added syllable :

Home they brought her warrior dead. — Timiu/snn. Take, oh take
those lips away. — IShakespeare. Iluin seize thee, ruthless king. — Gniy.

86 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

c. Trochaic tetrameter :
Hiawatha. — Longfellow.

d. Anaptestic tetrameter ; also with added syllable ; espe-
cially with iambus substituted for the first anapaest :

Locliiel's Warning. — Cumphell. The Old Oaken Ducket. — }\'oo(hcnrtfi.
Three Fishers. — Kinyslcy. The Destruction of ISenuacherib. — liyrun.

e. Dactylic dimeter ; with modificatious :

Uattic of Agincourt. — Drayton. Skeleton in Armor. — Longfellow.
Cliarge of the Light Drigade. — Tennyson.

lAMKIC PENTAMETER.

12. We have seen that from the time of Chaucer downward
the iambic pentameter has become established as the charac-
teristic form of English verse. In Chaucer, and in many
poets since, it was used with rhyme. In Surrey, we find its
first use without rhyme, and in that form it has received the
name of " English heroic blank verse."

13. Its prevalence is undoubtedly due to tlie fact that in
rliythm it is suited for all serious subjects, and that in metro
it falls into a hai)py medium between the short-breathed and
long-breathed length of line. " The tetrameter and pentameter,
which require the full breath, but do not exhaust it, consti-
tute the entire body of the cliief poetry of energetic nations ;
the hexameter, which fully exhausts tlie breath, is only used
by nations whose pleasure was in repose." — Huskin. " It
was almost inevitabh; that the line of five stresses, not so long
as to be necessarily broken up into two lines, and yet not too
short to atlmit of serious and weighty matter being expressed
in it; a line, too, of an uticren number of stresses, so that the
position of the divitliiig break was ea.sily variable; should be
that in which tlie fetters of rhyme sliould be thrown aside,
and the whole trust ph'uu'd, not on the metre as defined by
rule, but on the variations of pause and quantity." — IJodyson.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 87

14. First, then, what is the " metre as defined by rule " ?
Strictly, five iambuses, neither more nor less. Thus :

— Milton,

Here the accent -would fall on every alternate syllable. In
keeping the flow of it in the mind, it is convenient to think
of it as composed of two sections and a half, — each section of
four syllables. We then see that eight syllables would not
satisfy the requirement, and twelve syllables would be
redundant.

15. But this metre would never have gained the ascendency
it has, if the strict rule had been invariably followed. " The
normal line is too monotonous and formal for frequent use."

— Abbott. " Johnson was wrong in condemning deviation from
the ideal structure as inharmonious. It is precisely such devi-
ation that constitutes the beauty of blank verse." — Si/monds.

All the substitutions noticed in the chapter on Variety in
Rhythm may be employed, and all the changes in ca3sural
pause. <' Practically, many of the groups (feet) are allowed
to consist of three syllables, two of them being unaccented.
The number of sj'llables may therefore be greater than ten,
while the accents may be, and generally are, less than five." —
A. J. Ellis. "What combinations of the dissyllabic groups
(feet) can produce a blank verse which is good to the ear, is
not a matter for arithmetical computation, but for experience."

— Masson. "Milton, who first taught us what this kind of
verse ought to be, is careful to vary the movement by an
occasional inversion of the iambic accentuation in each of the
five places." — Patmore. "The writer in tliis kind of metre,
in order that he may be musical, must exhibit all the varia-
tions, as he proceeds, of which ten syllables are susceptible.
Between the first and the last, there is no place at which he

88 ENGLISH VKKSIFK'ATION.

must not occasionally pause, and the place of the pause must
be continually shiitoil." — Cowper. "It is the easiest of all
conceivable metres to write ; it is the hardest to write well."
— Hodgson. "No poet ought to think of beginning his career
with blank verse. It has little or no rhythm of its own, and
therefore the poet has to create the rhythm as ho writes." —
Patmorc.

16. In general, it may be said, that the chief care to be
taken, is, that the substitution of otlier feet than the iambus
should not be such or so f re<pient as to destroy the iambic char-
acter of the rhythm ; and that the number of accents should
not exceed five. It is true, that, in Shakespeare, what is con-
sidered as an Alexandrine (six accents) is occasionally found,
but this can hardly be regarded as coming within the scope of
this rule.

17. To ai)i)ly those principles somewhat in detail, we may
ncjtice the following:

a. Owing to the large number of particles in English, the
foot most commonly substituted for the iambus is the pyrrhic :

Brought iloath | Into | tlie \V('prI>! | and all | oiir wno. j

— Milton.

There are ten i)yrrlui;s in tlif first sixteen lines of " Taradiso
Lost."

Tlie pyrrhic may occur at any place in the line ; but rarely
do wc find two pyrrhics in immediate succession, as :

— Mlllim.
liarcly, also, at the end of the line:

— Shiikftpeare.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 89

Even here, there may be said to be a secondary accent on
the last syllable. Indeed, this secondary accent on the final
syllable of a trisyllable is regularly recognized in iambic
verse.

b. Occasionally a spondee may take the place of the iambus.
There are few, if any, natural spondees in English, but two
emphatic syllables may come together and produce a foot with
two accents :

Koll pu, I tliou deep | and dark | blue 5 | cean, roll. |

— Byron.

— Milton.

6u those I long rank | dark wood | walks drench'd | in dew. |

— Tennyson.

c. Even the trochee, which is the reverse of the iambus,
may take its place. This occurs oftenest after a pause ; as at
the beginning of a line :

Loud fis I from nam | hers with | out num | ber, sweet. |

— Milton: Paradise Lost, III. 3iC>.

Or after the csesural pause :

Feed, and ] regard | him not. | Are y5u | a man ? |

— Shakespeare: Macbeth, III. 4, 58.

It may be in the second foot :

— Macbeth, I. 4, 62.

Or in the third:

And yet | dark night | strangles | the trav' | ling lamp.

— Macbeth, 11.4,7.

Or the fourth :

— Macbeth, III. 0,41.

90 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Instances have been offered of the occurrence of a trochee
in the fifth foot, but I have seen none such in which the
accentuation was so clear as to be beyond controversy.

Very seldom two trochees may bo found together ; as, at the
beginning of the line :

rrusfint I thvis 10 | his Son, | audi | bly spoke. |

— miton.

Felt the I h'ght Of | licr eyes | into | his life. |

— Tinnyson.

NoW^d I down In | the book, | there; turn | and see. |

— llrowning.

A peculiar effect is produced by the succession trochee-
iambus (choriambus), twice in the first four feet of the line :

OvCr I thj- wounds | now do | I proph | esy. |

— Shakespeare.

Others I ttpdrt | siit On | ;1 hill, | retired. |

— Milton.

R<5adj' I to spring, | wjutlng | ft chiince | for this. |

— Tcntii/son: Guinet'cre.

N<'>t to I tc'll h('r, I nt'ver \ to Irl | her know. |

— 7'( niit/Bim : Enoch Ardcn.

It will bo seen that this divides the lino into the two aiul a
half sections, of which we have before spoken.

A pleasing combination is that of a trochee followed by a
spondee, as :

Fdd the I sjime fl6ck, | by foun | t.iin, shade, | and rill. |

— Milton.

— J 'ope.

d. An anapajst occasionally gives variety to the rhythm.
Some authorities would advocate slurring or omitting one of

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 91

the syllables in such a case ; but the more graceful way is to
use every syllable, only speaking them "trippingly on the
tongue : "

— Marlowe.

— Tennyson.

Here, it will be noticed, are three anapaests in succession,
to express rapidity of motion.

e. A dactyl is scarcely allowable, but is sometimes ad-
mitted :

— Marlowe.

P^ttililnt I she spoke, and at herself she laughed.

— Tennyson.

f. In some instances, the introduction of feet which would
be otherwise allowable, produces a combination which is objec-
tionable, on account of breaking up the iambic rhythm :

— Surrey.

Here the tendency is towards a dactylic rhythm :
I plenty Of | grisly | pictQres Of |

So, also,.the following :

— MUton.

Which becomes equal to :

Light frOm a | bove frOm the | fountain Of | life.

ff. Besides the occurrence of extra syllables in anapsests
and dactyls, others may come in as supernumeraries at the
end, or in the middle of the line.

92 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Tims, in the miildle :

— King Uar, 11. 4, 157.

Or at the end :

'Tis nol I alone | my ink [ y cloak, | good moth | Pr.

— Ifaml,t, I.i;, 77.

— Kinij Lear: II. -I, 2-10.

These unaccented syllables at the end are called feminine
endings. These seldom constitute a word by themselves :

-Henri! iHL, 111.2,441.

h. Even normal lines may have light, or weak endings.
Lifjht eiidhujs are personal and relative pronouns, auxiliaries,
etc., allowing a slight ]>ause after tliom. IJ'enk endings
are prepositions and conjunctions, allowing no pause after
them.

i. Lines in wliich the sense is complete at the end, with a
full pause, are called end-stopped lines; those in wliitdi the
sense is carried on to the succeeding lines, without i)ause, are
called run-nn lines.

j. The i)laee of the ca'sural jiauso in iambic pentameter is
not fixed. It probably occurs oftenest after the fourth or the
sixth syllable. The usage differs somewhat with the different
jioets. liut in the best jwetry it takes a wide range from the
iirst syllable to the ninth. "Though it is impossible to lay
down any rule regulating the pauses, yet it is j)robably true
that the pause after the fourth syllable, which is iambic, is
better fitted for didactic and severe epigram; while that after
the fifth, whicii gives a trochaic effect, is adajited for descrip-
tion, and the expression of sentiment, or for less serious
ej)igram." — English Lessons for English J'cojde.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 93

18. We give below a few quotations, indicating the names
of the earliest authors representing iambic pentameter:

I have mot with no spocimen of this metre among our English
rhythms, before the fourteenth century.

— Guest's Uistory of English Rhythms, p. 524.

The metre of five accefits, lolth couplet rime, may have jjot its
earliest name of "riding rime" from the mounted pilgrims of the

Canterbury Tales.

— Idem, p. 52G.

The unrimed metre of five accents, or as it is generally termed, blank
verse, we certainly owe to Surrey. ... I have seen no specimen of any
definite nnriined metre of five accents, which can date earlier than

Surrey's translation of the fourth iEneid.

— Idem,]). 527.

Marlowe brought the English unrliymod pentameter to a perfection of
melody, harmony, and variety, which has never been surpassed.

— Lowell: Among My Books, p. 157.

Adding to these the names of Sliakospeare and INIilton, as
the highest representatives of this form of verse, previous to
the modern poets, we will present a few of the characteristics
of each.

CHAUCER.

19. Nearly all the "Canterbury Tales," and the "Legend of
Good Women," are written in iambic pentameter, with couplet
rhymes. But by reason of a frequent unaccented syllable at
the end, the lines have oftener eleven syllables than ten.
Some critics maintain that a line may have only nine syllables,
the first foot consisting of an emphatic monosyllable. lUit
Fleay says that the "omission of the first syllable is not
allowed in this metre."

" Final e, a relic of early French and Saxon endings, usually
makes a light syllable, when the next word begins with a
consonant. It was probably sounded obscurely, as in final
unaccented e in French poetry. It is usually silent when the

Ot ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

next word begins with a vowel, and before a few words begin-
ning with h: as, Ae, his, him, hire, hem, hath, have, hadde,
hoiv, her (Jieer). In most other cases, it makes a light syllablo
before h. It is also often sounded when followed by the
cajsural pause, where it would otherwise be silent.

" With the exception of the article the, and the negative
particle ne, the e of monosyllables is commonly not elided.

" The great majority of words from the Norman are accented
ou the last syllable ; as, liconr, vertue, nature, cordye. Many,
however, are variable, being accented sometimes on the ulti-
mate and sometimes on the penult." — Corson : Iland-book of
Anglo-Saxon and Early Enylish.

The following example is from the Prologue to the "Canter-
bury Tales : "

8 U K It K Y .

20. To Surrey, as wo liavc seen, is assigned the honor of
first having used the iambic pentameter without rhyme. Ho
also has the praise of being the first wiio introduced the somn't
into our language, and he wrote besides iu a variety of
measures.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FOllMS. 95

He used the heroic blank verse in a translation of the
Fourth Book of the iEneid. There are differences of opin-
ion as to the merit of his style. Warton questioned whether,
in the qualities of being smooth and musical, our versification
had advanced since Surrey tuned it for the first time. In the
edition of Mr. Bell, while Surrey is praised for skilful variety
in the use of iambus and trochee, it is said that " crudenesses
of sundry kinds are by no means infrequent." Mr. Symonds,
on the other hand, says that Surrey is vevy averse " to any
departure from iambic regularity."

Prof. Mayor has made a somewhat careful analysis of
Surrey's blank verse, from which we select the following
examples of usage, which seem to indicate a primitive *' crude-
ness " not prevalent in later writers.

a. Two trochees in succession :

The old I temple | dedl | cate to | Ceres. |

Shall I I wait or | board them | with my | power. |

b. Trochee in fourth place :

c. Trochee in fifth place :

d. Harshness of csesural pause :

9G ENGLISH VEIiSlFICATION.

The following passage is a favorable example of his ordinary
metre :

Sweet spoils, wliiles God and destinies it would,
Receive this sprite and rid me of these cares:
I lived and ran the course fortune did grant;
And under earth my great ghost now shall wend:
A goodly town I built, and saw my walls;
Happy, alas, too happy, if these coasts
The Troyan ships had never touched aye.

M A It I. O W E .

21. AVe have already seen Lowell's tribute to the perfec-
tion of ^larlowe's verse. lie wrote the " first j^lai/ in blank
verse which w'as publicly acted, and fixed the metre of his
drama forever as tlie metre of English tragedy." His influence
wiis felt by Shakespeare, who quoted a line from his "Hero
and Leander," * and of whom it has been said that he " never
reached in his own narrative verse a music so spontaneous
and rich, — a music to which Marlowe miglit have applied liis
own words :

That calls my soul from forth his living scat

To move unto llie measures of delight."

Prof. Mayor tells us that the ihytlim of Marlowe is very
different from that of Surrey. "It is much more regular of
accentuation." Nevertheless, he gives us many examples
of nine syllables in a line, — the first foot being a monosylla-
ble,— and of halting rliythm in otiier respects, lint it is not
by such criticism in detail that ISlarlowe is to bo judged.
There is an unmistakable passionate loftiness of style whicli
gives vivacity and energy to his verse, well expressed in Urn
Jonson's j)hrase of " Marlowe's mighty line."

> I)e:ul shepherd, now I find tliy Hiiw of mlKht:
" Will* ever l<)Ved that lovrd not at (irst sifjht? "

— As You Like //.III 5.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 97

The following extracts will convey some impression of it :

Give me a look that when I bend tlic brows,

Pale Death may walk in furrows of my face;

A hand that with a grasp may gripe the world;

An ear to hear what my detractors say;

A royal seat, a sceptre and a crown ;

That those that do behold them may become .

As men that stand and gaze against the sun.

— Miissacre at Paris.
If all the pens that ever poets held
Had fed the feeling of their master's thoughts,
And every sweetness that inspired their hearts,
Their minds and muses on admired themes.

If these had made one poem's period,
And all combined in beauty's worthiness,
Yet should there hover in their restless heads
One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least.
Which into words no virtue can digest,

— First Part of Tamburlainc, V. 2.

SHAKESPEARE.

22. The great body of Shakespeare's plays is written in
unrhymed iambic pentameter. It is evident in the reading
of any long-sustained passage in the mouth of one of his
speakers, that the rhythmic sense of the author, and his com-
mand of the metre, is in no respect inferior to his powers of
expression in general. But the nature of dramatic poetry,
the interruptions of conversation, the changes of action, and
of emotion, and the dominance of passion, give rise to so many
kinds of license, that the student of his metre needs some
principles to guide him in the interpretation of his verse.

23. In the first place, we need to know if Shakespeare con-
fines himself strictly to five measures in the line. The excep-
tions are as follows :

a. He introduces occasionally lyric measures. — iambic di-
meter and iambic and trochaic tetrameter; as in the "Ti-m-

98 ENGLISH VEIISIFICATIOX.

post," " Midsummer Night's Dream," " As You Like It," and
" Macbeth."

b. Besides these, in the regular body of tlie play, short lines
of two or three iambuses occur, soiuotimos as brief sentences
in rapid dialogue, sometimes at the beginning or end of
speeches.

c. As to lines of only four iambuses, there seems to bo
dilTerence of opinion. Dr. Abbott' says that "lines with
four accents are very rare." Fleay ^ asserts that " where there
is an appearance of a four-foot line, it is either made up of
two shorter lines (.'i + 1, or 2+2), or is corrupt."

This does not deny the fact of rhymed lines of four feet.

d. The existence of occasional six-foot lines is generally
admitted. In some cases these are composed of trimeter coup-
lets ; that is, with the pause after the third foot ; in others,
they are true Alexandrines, with pauses after the second,
seventh, eighth, or tenth syllable.

e. It is quite in accordance with the rules of heroic blank
verse, that there should be one or even two extra syllables
(unaccented) at the end of a line ; these are called feminine
endings.

/. iSuch extra syllables may also occur in the middle of a
line, before the caesural pause.

24. The next consideration is as to the character of the
rhytlun. It is, of course, in large proportion, iambic, with
the occurrence of trochees, pyrrhics, spondees, as we have
el.sewhere noted, and frequent use of the anapiest.

liesides these, we have to observe the customary elisions

• Abbott's Sliakcsjioanan Omnunnr.

' ShakoHjieuro Manual, by F. G. Flcay, A.M. Lnmloii, .Maciiiillaii & Co.
1878.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 99

and slurrings, as in other writers, and, more than this, the
fact of many contractions and expansions which are peculiar
to the author or his times.

a. The common elisions : tK for the ; V tK for in the ; o' th'
for of the ; 's, for is, us, or his ; Hd for would ; 'dst for hadst;
and many others, /t' were for he were ; etc. Final er, el, and
le dropped before vowel or silent h.

h. Dropping of prefixes : 'hove for above ; ''come for become ;
^count for account ; ^larum for alarum; ^stonished for aston-
ished ; U7i'slsting for unresisting.

c. Slurri7ig or contraction : This occurs usually in the case
of unaccented vowels, between consonants that easily coalesce ;
or, in a few cases of consonants, that may be omitted without
destroying the character of a word. It always lies with the
taste of the reader whether to omit such syllables altogether,
or to give them a rapid enunciation like grace notes in music.

Thus, vowels near liquids: corpi'ral for corporal; confid-
ence for confierence ; icarr^nt for ivarrant ; perilous iov perilous ;
marH for marvel; easHij for easily (see deVcate for delicate,
in Tennyson.); en' my iov enemy; messengers for messengers;
innocent for innocent ; xinnat^ral for tinnatural ; iiiter^ gatories
for interrogatories. The word sp)irlt may be pronounced spirit,
or sprite.

A light vowel following a heavy vowel in the same word is
sometimes obscured : j^oiv^r, be^?ig, know^ing, proiv^ss.

Plural and possessive endings are frequently dropped when
the singular ends in s, se, ss, ce, or ge.

The e in ed oi past tenses is sometimes sounded and some-
times omitted, even in the same line :

— Romeo and Juliet, III. 3, 19.

Despis'd, | distress | ed, La | ted, nuir | tyr'd, kill'd.

— /(fern, IV. 6,59.

100 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Consonants are sometimes omitted ; as th in the middle of a
word ; whe'r for ichether, etc.

d. Expaiisions : which increase the number of syllables in
a word.

Liquids, and especially r, in dissyllables, arc frequently
pronounced as though an extra syllable were introduced
between them and the preceding consonant :

The parts | and gra | ccs of | llie wrest | (c)ler.

— As You Like It, II. 2, 13.

If you will tarry, holy pilg(e)rim.

— All's nell that Ends Well, III. r,, 3fl.

Monosyllables containing a long vowel and ending in an r
sound, are often pronounced in two syllables :

— King Uar, I. 4, 267.

Sometimes other monosyllables are thus divided:

Will you I be riiled | by uii3 ? |

A-y, I my Lord. |

— Ilumltt, IV. 7, CO.

er final seems sometimes to have been pronounced with a
kind of "burr," equivalent to an additional syllable :
A broth I er's mur | der-r. | Pray can | I not. |

— llitmUt, III. 3, 38.

Com. We'll teach | you.

Ktnt. Sir | -r, I'm | loo old | to Icani. |

— Kiny fyear, II. 1!, 121.

So Sir becomes Sirrah.

■ion is frequently pronounced as two syllables at the end of
a line. Also tion in a line, osj)ecially after c. So also final
ience, iant, ions, icje, etc. The c is sometimes sounded in
" ])k'asure," " gorgeous."

e mute is sometimes pronounced :

— Jtilittii Ciimr, \\\.>, V.Y1.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 101

The noun ache was pronounced aitch. (See notes to Rolfe's
"Tempest.")

Fill all I thy bones | with ach | es; make | thee roar. |

— Tempest, I. 2, 308.

The e in commandment, entertainment, which was originally
used, is sometimes retained :

Be val I ued 'gainst | your wife's | command | (e)ment.

— Mercluint of Venice, IV. 1, 442.

e. Accent. Some words in Shakespeare have the accent
nearer the end than at present. Thus : abject, Eich. III., I.
1, lOG; access, W. T., V. 1, 87; aspect, A. & C, I. 5, 33;
characters. Ham,., I. 3, 59 ; commerce, Tr. & Cr., I, 3, 105 ;
contrary. Ham., III. 2, 194 ; compact, J. C, III. 1, 215 ; edict,
M. N. D., I. 1, 151 ; exile, R. & J., V. 3, 211 ; instinct, 2 Hen.
IV., I. 1, 86; obdurate, M. of V., IV. 1, 8; opportune, T.,
IV. 1, 26; portents, Othello, V. 2, 45; sepulchre. Rich. II.,
I. 3, 194 ; sinister, Hen. V., II. 4, 85.

In some the accent is nearer the beginning than with us :
compelled, M. for M., II. 4, 57 ; complete, L. L. L., I. 1, 137 ;
detestable, K. J., III. 4, 29; distinct, M. of V., II. 9, 61;
enginer, so also miitiners and pioners ; obscure, M. of V., II.
7, 51 ; Observant, K. L., IL 2, 97 ; persever, 31. N. D., III. 2,
236 ; rheumatic, M. N. D., II. 1, 105 ; secure. Ham., I. 5, 61 ;
successors. Hen. VIII. , I. 1, 60.

In general, an adjective or participle of two syllables stand-
ing before a noun accented on the first syllable throws the
accent back, when, otherwise, it would have the modern accent.
Thus, complete becomes complete :

A maid of grace and complete majesty.

— Lovers Labour's Lost, I. 1, 137.

So in numerous instances of other words.
Words in izetl and ised throw the accent back :

As I I by friends | am well | advCir | tist'd. |

— JliclKird III., IV. 4, 497.

102 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

The French accent is sometimes retained; as in royal,
fortune, pardon, mere/. This, however, is not so common as
in Spenser, Surrey, and Chaucer,

/. llhyme is often used by Shakespeare as an effective
termination at the end of a scene, also to mark an aside.
I'rose is sometimes used in comic scenes and in letters, where
it is necessary to lower the dramatic pitcli, or to express
frenzy, madness, and higher flights of the imagination.

25. In general, the blank verse of Shakespeare was more
strict and constrained in his earlier plays, and more free and
untrammelled in the later. Several indications of this have
been used as tests to help to fix the time at which the various
plays were written. The following rules are based upon those
given in Fleay's Shakespeare Manual, before quoted :

a. Tlie difference between "end-stopped" and "run-on"
lines. In "Love's Labour's Lost," his first genuine play, the
percentage of run-on lines is only five and a half; in "Win-
ter's Tale," one of the very latest, it is forty-seven and one-
fifth.

b. Lines with feminine endings; that is, with extra unac-
cented syllables at the end. These increase in frequency from
four per cent in the earliest plays, to tliirty-one or thirty-two
per cent in the latest.

c. Lines with extra syllables before the ca-sural pause
increase from none in the earliest plays, to nearly four per
cent in the latest.

d. The proportion of light endings (pronouns, auxiliaries,
etc.), and of weak endings (prej)()sitions, conjunctions, etc.,
allowing no pau.sc), increa-ses during the latest plays.

e. Alexandrines not only increase in frequency, but assume
a freer form; being confined at first to a middle pause, but
in the later plays having pauses in various other jdaces in the
line.

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH FORMS. 103

/. The use of rhyme couplets diminishes gradually from a
proportion of two rhyme lines to one of blank verse, down to
an absolute absence of rhyme.

26. Without attempting to characterize the blank verse of
authors since the time of Shakespeare, we give below some
tabular results of an analysis, by Professor Mayor, of the
metre of Milton, Tennyson, and Browning. Of our American
poets, we may remark, that Bryant is distinguished above all
for the dignity and energy of his style in this special form of
verse. Longfellow seldom attempts it, and with indiiferent
success. Holmes reminds us of Pope in the ease of his
rhymed iambic pentameter.

CAESUKAL PAUSE.

27. The table shows the average in passages of two hundred
lines each, taken from the three poets named.

MH-TON. TENNYSON. BROWNING.

Pause after first syllablfi 1 8 11

Pause after Initial trocliee 1 3 2

Pause after initial iambus 13 11 7

Pause after third syllable 13 16 22

Pause after fourth syllable .... 25 33 25

Pause after fifth syllable 14 23 28

Pause after sixth syllable 42 24 18

Pause after seventh syllable .... 17 23 24

Pause after eighth syllable .... 15 14 7

Pause after ninth syllable 2 7 4

Pause final only 40 53 51

Pause internal only 74 58 45

Pause none 25 20 27

Feminine ending 11 9 1

These results are averaged from Professor Mayor's tables.
A wider range was taken for analysis in Tennyson than in
Milton or Browniner.

101 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

KINDS OF FEKT.

28. From the same tables we obtain the following propor-
tion of substituted feet in the same authors, iu two hundred
lines, or a thousand feet :

MILTON. TENNYSON. BBOWMINO.

Pyrrhic 54 60 31

Spondee 72 62 80

Trochee (inilial) 35 37 65

Trochee (not initial). ...... 18 7 9

Anapiest 31 30 68

Dactyl 2 2 2

This leaves iambus 788 812 755

IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES. 105

CHAPTER XII.
IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES.

1. Our masters of English verse, not content with the
range afforded them by the various metres in their native
language, have found an attractive field of experiment in the
well-known forms of Greek and Latin prosody.

2. As the sense of rhythm is a natural instinct, and is
based upon fundamental principles common to all languages,
the prosody of one nation must be always capable of repro-
duction, to some extent, in the language of another. At the
same time, there are peculiarities of age and race which pre-
vent a complete identification of one with the other.

3. In the classical metres, as we have shown in the chapter
on Quantity, the rhythm depends upon the length of the syl-
lables ; in the English, upon the accent. Therefore, even if
we should employ in English the same number of syllables in
the foot, and the same number of feet in the line, we should
not exactly reproduce the effect of the ancient metre, unless
we should employ also syllables corresponding in length to
those in the original. For these we lack the material. We
have, indeed, vowels naturally long, and we can furnish
syllables made long "by position," that is, with two conso-
nants after the vowel ; but to prolong these in exact time is
foreign to our habits of speech, and the most skilful arrange-
ment for this purpose would probably fail to find readers who
could produce the intended elTect.

lUG ENGLISH VilKSIFlCATlOX.

4. Therefore, while complete reproduction of the classical
metres is scarcely possible, there may be various degrees of
successful imitation. The ordinary method is simply to copy
the rhythm, by using accented syllables in place of the long
ones in the original. Or the attempt may go farther than
this, and aim at following the long quantit^i^pralso, as far as
possible. In other cases, the modern metre is scarcely more
than a suggestion of the ancient, without any pretence of
exact imitation.

li.VCTVLIC HEXAMETER.

5. In the classical form, this consisted of six feet, either
dactyls or spondees. The dactyl was the prevailing unit of
rhythm, and was especially needed in the fifth foot, to give
the typical character. This foot, however, was occasionally a
spondee, and then the line was called a sjiondaic verse. The
sixth, or last, foot was always a spondee or a trochee. This
metre was the recognized vehicle of epic poetry, as iambic
pentameter is in English.

Several attempts have been made to use it in English, for
the same piirpose. The number of feet and the dactylic
movement have been closely adhered to, by using accented
syllables to take the place of the long ones, but it has been
impossible to reproduce the dignity and melody of the
ancient verse. AVe have few spondees, produced by two con-
tiguous syllables of equal accent or emphasis ; and the result
is a great preponderance of dactyls, and the substitution of
trochees for spondees. This gives a light ami tripping move-
ment, which fails to be relieved by passages of weight and
dignity. Coleridge gives a favorable specimen of it, in a
translation from Schiller:

' IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METKES. 107

As noted examples, may be cited, Soutliey's "Vision of
Judgment," Coleridge's " Hymn to the Earth," Longfellow's
"Evangeline" and "Children of the Lord's Supper," Kings-
ley's " Andromeda," and Clough's " The Bothie of Tober-na-
vuolich."

for I get not, |

Yea, in the | measureless | distance wheel | round and a | gain they

be I hold thee ! |

— Cohridge : ITi/mn to the Earth.

This is the ] forest pri | meval. The | murmuring | pines and the |

— Longfellow : Evangeline.

carver;
Skilful but I feeble of | heart; for they | know not the | lords of

A I polio;

Fearing the | stars of the | sky, and the | roll of the ] blue salt |

water.

— h'iiigslei/ : Andromeda.

Here we find proper spondees in well-tilled, dar]<-halred,
broad-browed, and blue salt. The last makes a spondaic line.

108 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

— Clough : The Dothic of 'fi>ber-na-vuolich.

— IliHlijsun : Translation of ItUul.

— Ttuny.inn: The llijhcr Panfheitm.

ELEGIAC METUE.

6. This consisted of a dactylic hexameter line followed by a
(lacti/lic pentameter, so CiiWed. This ])pntameter was peculiar
in being composed of two sections, each of two and a half feet.
That is, there were two whole feet followed by a long syllable
before the ciesural i)au.se, and then two more whole feet
followed by a long syllable. Coleridge illustrates it, in a
translation from Schiller:

in the hex | aincter | rises the | fiauitain';* | silvery | criliiinn,
in the pen | tiimeter | aye || | falling in | nu'-Iotly | back. ||

In tliis metre are written Clough's "Amours de Voy.age,"
and a jioem entitled "Dorothy," by A. J. Munby. Swin-
burne's " Ilesperia" is nearly the same, although with a modi-
lied form of the pentameter.

Sh.ill I not, I 6, may I | not thus | yet re | fn'sh the re | meinbrancc |
What swcvtu I jiiyus I had | unce || and | what a | place I did | hold.

.S'tr I'hiUii Hnliuy.

IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES. 109

Unto the | siin and the | sky || and | linto the | perfecter | earth;
Come let us | go to a | land where | gods of the | old time |
wandered, |
Where every | hreath even | now 11 | changes to | ether di | vine. |

— A.J. Munby : Dorothy.
Out of the golden remote wild west, where the sea without shore is

Full of the sunset, and sad, if at all, with the fulness of joy.
As a wind sets in with the autumn that blows from the region of stories,
Blows with a perfume of songs and of memories beloved from a boy.

— Swinburne : Hespcria.

Tennyson gives us two examples of Elegiacs. One is an
imitation in quantity.

When did a frog coarser croak upoH our Helicon ?
Hexameters no worse than daring Germany gave us,

Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexameters.

Here it will be noticed that the first foot is a natural
spondee, both syllables being long by nature. The first syllable
in the third foot is made long by position (closing with two
consonants), and is accented arbitrarily to bring out the force
of a long syllable. The same is true of the last syllable in
exjyeriment. The verse must be read with these forced accents
to produce the effect intended.

The other example from Tennyson is written with the
ordinary accent, without special regard to quantity.

110 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

HENDECASYLLABICS.

7. This word means eleven-syllable metre. The verse is
composed of a spoudee, a dactyl, and three trochees. In the
following specimen by Tennyson, the tirst syllable of each
foot is intended to be plainly accented, even where it would
not be naturally accented, in order to carry out the eifect of
syllables long in quantity. Thus, the syllable lent of the
fourth foot in the first line must be accented, and such obscure
syllables as is and of, when they occupy the first place in
their respective feet. We shall then see "JIow fantastical is
the dainty metre ! "

6 yoti I cliorus of | in(!o | k'nt ro | virwcrs, |

Irrr I spousiblo, | indo | K'lit re | viewers,

L<')ok, I I come to the | test, a | tiny | poem,

AH com I posetl in a | nu'lre | of Ca | tiillus;

All in I quantity, | careful | of my | motion, |

Lt'st I I fall una | wares be | fore tlie | p<'ople.

Shoulil I lloundcr awhile without a tumble,

Thro' this motrificalion of Catullus,

Tliey should speak to me not witliout a welcome,

All that chorus of indolent roviewers.

Hard, liard, hard is it, only not to tumble,

So fantastical Is the dainty metre.

The next example is from Swinburne :

Coleridge also furnishes an oxainpU* of hendocasyllabios so
called ; but by the substitution of a dactyl for the opening

IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES. HI

spondee, tlie original rhythm is modified, and the number of
syllables becomes twelve instead of eleven :

In Charles Lamb's well-known poem, "The Old Familiar
Faces," we have a suggestion of this metre, retaining the three
trochees at the end, and varying between spondees and dactyls
in the first part of the line :

Another modification of this form is seen in Browning's
"One Word IMore." Instead of retaining the dactyl in the
second foot, he uses all trochees, making ten syllables instead
of eleven :

The first and third lines in this stanza of Matthew Arnold
suggest also the same modification :

*DO^

Raise the ] light, my | pige, that | I may | see her, |
Thou art come at last, then, haughty Queen!

In all these examples, a peculiar character is often given to
the rhythm by a weakened stress upon the fourth foot in tho
line.

112 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

ALCAICS.

8. Tlie scliome of this metre, as used by Horace, may be
marked thus :

o| — o] — w| — o^l \J \J \

i_)| — u| —-1^1 — i_/u| — uwl

<J \ — u| <J \ Vj| >->|

— <J 1-1 I — owl — w I — 1^ I

Tennyson finely reproduces this, in quantity, as well as
accent, in his verses on Milton :

lie has also two distinct modifications of it, one in his lines,
" To the llev. F. D. Maurice : "

u| — o] — o I — w| —

u|_ w I —v^l _o| _ I

u| W \ w| <J \ <J \

— w i-* I — o w I VJ I

Or later, pay one visit here,
For those are few we hold as dear ;
Nor pay but one, but come for many.
Many and many a happy year.

The other is " The Daisy : "

w| — w I — o I — u| —

o I — o I — o I —o 1 —

IMITATION OF CLASSICAL METRES. 113

SAPPHICS.

9. This consists of three lines of the following scheme ;

followed by one line marked thus :

This is closely reproduced by Swinburne, in quantity :

The more common English form follows only the accentual
pronunciation of the Latin. Thus, from Southey :

Swift through the sky the vessel of the Suras
Sails up the fields of ether like an angel.
Rich is the freight, O vessel, that thou bearest,
Beauty and virtue.

SEPTENARIUS.

10. In classical Greek and Latin, this metre was composed
of seven trochees, with an added syllable. This is exactly
reproduced in Longfellow's "Psalm of Life."

In later Latin, this became modified, and formed, as we
have seen, the basis for the English Septenary.

Ill EXGLLSn VERSIFICATION.

S A T U i; N 1 A N .

11. This is a very ancient Latin form, in wliicli accent and
even rhyme seem to liave had part:

o| — w \ — v-"! — u| II — u] 1^1 \J

The I king was | in the | parlor, || | counting | out his | money:
The I queen was | in the | kitchen, || | eating | bread and | honey.

— Mother Goose.

C II O K I A M U I C .

12. A spondee, three choriambus, and an iambus :

I O >_( I O l_l 1 U 1-1 — I u

Love, what | ailed thee to l(?ave | life that was ni;iile | hWely wc

tlioughl I witli love ?

Whdt sweet | visions of sleep | liired thee away | d<')wn from the light |

above ?

— Sicinbumc

G A I. L I A M B I C .

13. This is the metre of the Attis of Catullus. The effect
is as follows :

— |o — |>-» — |u — I*-"!! — I*-" — l^u — |u —

So I in ire | she spake, | adjust | ing ||dis | uni | tedly thdn | her yoke. |
At I his own I rebuke | the li | on Udolh | his heart | to a fu | ry spur.
With I a step, | a roar, | a burst | ing, || un | arrest | cd of an | y brake.

— Jtohiiiton Ellis : Transltition of the Attis.

Tlie same metre is suggested by Tennyson in his " Boadicea."

While about the shores of Mona those Neronian legionaries
IJurnt and broke the grove and altar of the Druid ami Druidess,
Far in the east Boadicea, standing loftily charioted,
>Ia<l and maddening all who heard her in her fierce volubility,
(Jirt l)y half ih'- tribes of Hritain, near the colony Cami'lodnne,
Yell'd ami sliriek'd between lier daughters o'er a wild con.spiracy.

FOKEIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 115

CHAPTER XIII.
FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE.

1. English verse, like the language it uses, is hospitable
to all forms. We have seen it emerge from its crude begiu-
nings, of brief Saxon couplets, modified by the more sonorous
Norman metres, and gradually take on an established style,
in accordance with its own genius. This style, precise in
heroic measures, and flowing in the lyric, is characterized by
a certain careless grace, in which the sentiment rather clothes
itself than is " clothed upon " by any formal rules of art.

The plastic materials, however, can easily be moulded into
other shapes, and in the absence of the higher inspiration,
the fancy amuses itself with the possibilities of artistic form
and finish.

With what success our poets have imitated the rhythms of
the classic languages, has been shown in the preceding chapter.
We have now to consider a phase of imitative work which is
of quite recent origin.

2. In the Cornhill Magazine, for July, 1877, appeared an
article by Mr. E. W. Gosse, entitled a " Plea for Certain
Exotic Forms of Verse." These forms, not native to our
language, are chiefly of French origin, and some of them can
be traced back to the time of the Troubadours. They were
composed by French writers, in great variety, in the four-
teenth and fifteenth centuries, and were revived again in the
seventeenth. Previous to the year 1873, they had attracted

116 ENGLISH VEIISIFICATIOX.

but small attention, comparatively, from English writers.
Cliaucer had made some use of tlie IxtlUide ; Gower had written
fifty of that kind in French; Sir Philip Sidney has a ditty
suggesting the rondel ; Drummond of Ilawthornden wrote a
sestina ; and a volume entitled "The Trivial Poems, and
Triolets," of Patrick Carey, was published in England, in
IGol. The son7u-t, not included in this list, as being ot
Italian origin, has been naturalized in English from the
earliest times.

3. ]]ut since the publication in England, in 1872, of Mr.
Andrew Lang's " Lays and Lyrics of Old France," or arising
simultaneously with it, a rapid growth has taken place of this
style of metrical composition. Mr. Austin Dobson, Mr.
E. W. Gosse, and Mr. W. E. Ileidoy were the earliest com-
posers of these forms, but the number of their followei-s has
now widely multiplied both in England and in America.

4. The following rules and e.xamjjles of the various forms
are given on the authority of Mr. Gosse, in the artic^U^ men-
tioned, and of Mr. Gleeson "White, in his book of ''IJallades
and Kondeaus," ' published by D. Appleton & Co., New York,
1888.

Tin: nAMwVDK.

5. This, in its strict form, consists of three stanzas of eight
lines each, followed by a verse of four lines, called tho
Envoy ; or three stanzas of ten lines each, with envoy of
five, each of the stanzas and tlio envoy closing with tiie same
refrain.

The same sot (jf rhymes used in the first stanza must bo
repeated in the other stanzas, and in the same order. No
word once used as a rhyme must be used again as sucli,

' RonidoB bnllndoH and rondcniis, tlio book contniiiR nil the forms mon-
tioued ill tliiH cliai>tcT, uboiit tlinu litiiitlrcd i'x:iiii|il('8 in ull.

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. ' 117

throughout the poem. Tlie envoy has the same rhymes, and
in the same order, as the last half of the preceding stanza.
The rhyme formula is a b a b b c b c,fov the eight-line stanzas,
and a b a b b c c (1 c d, iox the ten.

TUE BLITHE BAI,I,ADE.

Of all the songs that dwell

AVhere softest speech doth flow,
Sonic love the sweet rondel,

And some the bright rondeau,

AVith rhymes that tripping go
In mirthful measures clad;

But would I choose thorn ? No;
For me the blithe ballade !

O'er some, the villanelle,

That sets the heart aglow,
Doth its enchanting spell

With lines recurring throw;

Some, weighed with wasting woe,
Gay triolets make them glad ;

But would I choose them ? No;
For me the blithe ballade!

On chant of stately swell,

With measured feet and slow,
As grave as minster bell.

As vesper tolling slow,

Do some their praise bestow;
Some on sestinas sad;
But would I choose them ? No;

Forme the blithe ballade!

Envoy.

Piince, to these songs a-row.

The Muse might endless add;
But would I choose thejn ? No;
For me the blithe ballade I

— Clinton ScoUcard.

lis ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

As in a clifferent style, I give the first verse of a ballade, by
Mr. Swinburne, which Mr. Gosse praises as ''an excellent type
of all that a ballade should be."

A DALLAD OF DKEAMLAND.

I hid my heart in a nest of roses,

Out of the sun's way hidden apart;
In a softer bed than the soft wliitc snow's Is,

Under the roses I hid my heart.

Wliy would it sleep not ? Why should it start,
Wlien never a leaf of the rose-tree stirred ?

What made sleep flutter his wings and part ?
Only the song of a secret bird.

— A. C. SwinburtK. (See Appendix.)

TIIK KONDEL.

6. This consists of fourtoen lines, the nnmber of syllables
in a line not fixed in modern usage. The first and second
lines are repeated for the seventh and eighth, and also for the
thirteenth and fourteenth. There are but two rhymes. The
rhyme order is not fixed.

Too hard it is to sing

In these untuneful times,
When only coin can ring,

And no one cares for rhymes.

Alas! for him who climbs
To Aganippe's spring!
Too hard it is to sing

In these untuticful times!
His kindred clip his wing,

Ilis feet the critic limes;
If Fame her laurel bring,

01<I age his forehe.id rimes;
Too hanl it is to sing

lu Ihesu untuneful times!

— .iusdn Dohmm.

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 119

THE RONDEAU.

7. This is a later form of the rondel. It is composed of
thirteen lines of eight or ten syllables each. It is written in
three stanzas, of five, three, and five lines respectively.
There are but two rhymes. A refrain, made of the first word,
or words, of the first line, is added after the second stanza,
and also after the third. The usual rhyme-order is a a b b a,
a a b, a a b b a.

AN ACROSTICAL VALENTINE.

Fast in your heart, O rondeau rare,
Rich with t)ie wealth of love, I dare,

Alas to send, but not to sign.

Nestles my name. The fetters fine
Kissed by her lips, may break, — beware!

Delight is dizzy with despair.
Suppose she fain would answer, — there!
How shall she find this name of mine

Fast in your heart ?

Enough if secrecy you swear;
Red lips can't solve the subtile snare
My tricksy muse weaves with her line;
And I am caught, vain Valentine!
N. B. — Say, should she ask you where ?
Fast in your heart.

— Frank Dempster Sherman,

THE ROUTIDEL.

8. Mr. Swinburne seems to have given currency to this
form, wliich is a modification of the rondeau. He writes it in
three stanzas of three lines each, with a refrain after the first
and the tliird. Tlie lines are of any length from four to six-

120 ENGLLSn VERSIFICATION.

teen syllables. There are only two rhymes, in the order aba,

b a b, a b a,

A baiiy's hands.

A baby's hands, like rosobmls furled,

Whence yet no leaf expands,
Ope if you touch, though close up-curled,

A baby's hands.

Then, even as warriors grip tlieir brands.

When battle's bolt is liurled.
They close, clenched hard like tightening bands.

No rosebuds yet, by dawn inipearled,

Match, even in loveliest lands.

The sweetest flowers in all the world,

A baby's hands.

— A. C. .'ywinUtirtie.

TTIK KYRIELLE.

9. The kyrielh; is a familiar form, known in all our hymn-
books. It is a poem in four-line stanzas, having the last lino
of each stanza the same.

THK PAVn.IO.V.

In tlie tent the lamps were liright;
Out beyond, the siirunier night
Thrilled and quivered like u star;
M't' hineldh were IcJ't so fur.

From the depths of blue profound
Never any sight or sound
Came our loneliness to mar;
We beneath were left no far.

IJut against the snuimer sky
Only you Htood out and I ;
Frouj all other things th.at arc
We hcnealfi ictrc left so fur.

— A. Mitry F. RobintoHt

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 121

THE PANTOUM.

10. This is not of French, but of Malay origin. It may
have any number of stanzas, of four lines each. The second
and fourth line of each stanza form the first and third of each
succeeding one, until, to close the whole, the second and fourth
lines of the last stanza are made from the first and third, or
third and first, of the first stanza. The rhymes are ah ah,
b c b c, c d c d, till the last, z a z a.

EN KOUTE.

Here we are riding the rail,

Gliding from out of the station;

Man though I am, 1 am pale,
Certain of heat and vexation.

Gliding from out of the station,

Out from the city we thrust,
Certain of heat and vexation.

Sure to be covered with dust.

Out from the city we thrust;

Rattling we run o'er the bridges;
Sure to be covered with dust,

Stung by a thousand of midges.

Ears are on edge at the rattle,
Man though I am, I am pale,

Sounds like the noise of a battle.
Here we are riding the rail.

— Brander Matthews.

THEVIRELAI.

11. The number of stanzas is not fixed, or the number of
lines in a stanza. The rhyme order is a ah, a a b, a a h, in
multiples of three, for the first stanza ; then, b b c, h b c, h h c,
in the second stanza; c c d, c c d, c c d, in the third, and so on.

122 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Tlie last stanza (if we take seven stanzas, for example) would
have g g a, g g a, g g a. Each rhyme appears twice, once ia
the couplets and once in the single lines.

SPHINO SADNESS.

As I sat sorrowing,

Love came and bade nie sing

A joyous song and meet ;
For see (said he) each thing
Is merry for tlie Spring,

And every bird doth greet
The break of blossoming,
That all tiie woodlands ring

Unto the young hours' feet.

Wlierefore put off defeat.
And rouse thee to repeat

Tlie cliiines of merles that go,
With fhilini;s shrill and sweet,
In every green retreat,

The tune of streams that How,
And mark the fair hoius' beat
Willi running ripples licet,

And breezes soft and low.

So for the sad soul's ease.
Remembrance treasures these

Against Time's harvesting,
That so when mild Death frees
The soul from Life's <liseasc

Of strife and sorrowing,
In glass of memories.
The new liope looks and sees

Through death a brighter Spring.

— John Payne.

THE VIRKI.AI NOUVKAU.

12. This Jias but two rliynics, the order not fixcul. Tlio
first stanza is a couplet, which serves also as a refrain for the
later stanzas, the first line ending the second stanza, and the

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 123

second line ending the third stanza, and so on alternately.
The stanzas vary in number of lines, from five to seventeen.
(See Appendix.)

THE RONDEAU BEDOUBL^.

13. This is written in six stanzas of four lines each, with but
two rhymes. Its peculiarity is that each line of the first
stanza is used again in the same order to serve for the last
line of stanzas two, three, four, and five. The last line of the
sixth has a new wording for itself; but has, in addition, a
refrain consisting of tlie first half of the first line of the poem.
The rhyme-order is a b a b in the first, and b a b a in the
second, and so on.

My day and night are in my lady's hand;
I have no other sunrise than her sight;

For me her favoa* glorifies the land;
Iler anger darkens all the cheerful light.

Her face is fairer than the hawthorn white,
When all a-flower in May tlie hedgerows stand;

While she is kind, I know of no affright;
My day and night are in my lady's hand.

All heaven in her glorious eyes is spanned;
Iler smile is softer than the summer's night,

Gladder than daybreak on the Faery strand;
I have no other sunrise than her sight.

Come weal or woe, I am my lady's knight,
And in her service every ill withstand;

Love is my Lord in all the world's despite,
And holdeth in the hollow of his hand

My day and night.

— John Payne.

124 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

THE SICILIAN OCTAVE.

14. Mr. White gives but two examples of this form, both
by the same author, describing and exeini)lifyiiig it. It is
one stanza of eight lines, with but two rhymes, abababab.
We give one example :

To thee, fair Isle, Italia's satellite,

Italian harps their native measures lend;
Yet, wooing sweot diversity, not quite

Thy octaves with Italia's octaves blend.
Six streaming lines amass the arrowy might,

In hers, one cataract couplet doth expend;
Thine hike-wi.se widens, level in the light.

And like to its beginning is its end.

— Jiichard Uantett, LL.D.

THE SESTINA.

15. The sestitia has six stanzas, -each of six lines, of equal
length.

a. The lines of the six stanzas end witli the six same words,
each line having a ditTi-nuit word, and these words not
rhyming together.

b. The ending words are repeated in each succeeding stanza,
after the following scheme: Hist stanza, 1, 2, .'{, 4, 5, G. Sec-
ond, G, 1 , 5, 2, 4, 3. Third, 3, G, 4, 1, 2, 5. Fourth, 5, 3, 2, 6, 1, 4.
Fifth, 4, 1, 5, 3, G, 2. Sixth, 2, 4, G, r>, 3, 1.

c. After the six stanzas comes a three-line stanza, using tho
same six words over again, three at the end of the lines and
three in the middle.

To show tlie form, we give the first two stanzas and tho
last of a sestina by Mr. Gosse :

In fair rr<)venr«', the land of lute ami ro.se,
A maul, great master of liic lore of love,
First wrought scslines to win his lady's heart;

FOREIGN" FORMS OF VERSE. 125

For she was deaf when simple staves he sang,
And for her sake he broke the bonds of rhyme,
And in this subtler measure hid his woe.

"Harsh be my hnes," cried Arnaut, "harsh the woe,
My lady, tliat enthron'd and cruel rose,
Inflicts on him that made her live in rhyme !"
But through the metres spake the voice of Love,
And like a wild-wood nightingale he sang,
Who thought in crabbed lays to ease his heart.

Ah! sovereign Love, forgive this Avcaker rhyme!
The men of old who sang were great at heart.
Yet have we too known woe, and worn thy rose.

THE VILIiANELIiE.

16. The original model contains but nineteen lines. It has
five stanzas of three lines each, and a sixth of four lines.
The method of using the refrain is peculiar. The first line of
the first stanza is used as the last line of the second stanza,
and of each alternate stanza afterwards. The last line of the
first stanza is used as the last line of the third stanza and of
each alternate one afterwards. Then, the two together, that
is, the first and last lines of the first stanza, become the last
two lines of the last stanza. There are only two rhymes, a h a,
through the whole. Mr. Gosse, however, does not limit the
villanelle to nineteen lines, but says it may be of any length,
if only it retain the number and length of rhymes ;

A dainty thing's the Villanelle;

Sly, musical, a jewel in rhyme.
Its serves its purpose passing well.

A double clappcrod silver bell.

That must be made to clink in chime;
A dainty thing's the Villanelle.

126 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

And if you wish to flute a sixill,

Or ask a meeting 'neath the lime,
It serves its purpose passing well.

You must not ask of it the swell

Of organs gramliose and sublime;
A dainty thing's the Villanelle,

And filled with sweetness, as a shell

Is niled with sound, and launched in time;
It serves its purpose passing well.

Still fair to see and good to smell
As in the quaintncss of its prime,

A dainty thing's the Villant'lle;
It serves its purpose passing well.

— IF. E. Ilenley.

(For another example, see Appendix.)

TUE TllIOLET.

17. *< The triolet," says Mr. White, " may be regarded as
almost an epitome of the other forms." It is composed of
eight lines, the number of syllables not fixed. The first lino
is repeated for the fourth, and the first and second are
repeated for the seventh and eighth. The rhyme order is
a b a a a 0 a h.

I intended an Ode,

And it turned into Triolets.
It hogan h In vintle :
1 intended an Ode,
IJul Hose crossed the road

With a l)Unch of fn-sh violets.
I inti-nded an Ode,

And it turned into Triolol.s.

— Auitin l>>>hstm.

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 127

CHAIN VERSE.

18. In the chain verse of French origin, a word in one line
"was repeated in a new form in the next. This seems to have
suggested two similar forms in English. In one, the last word
of a line is repeated as the first word in the next line :

Nerve tliy soul with doctrines noble,

Noble in the walks of time,
Time that leads to an eternal,

An eternal life sxiblime :
Life sublime in moral beauty,^

Beauty that shall ever be ;
Ever be to lure thee onward,

0)iw;ar(Z to the fountain/ree:
Free to every earnest seeker.

Seeker for the fount of i/outh,
Youth exultant in its beauty.

Beauty of the living truth.

In the other form, the last line of a stanza becomes the
first line of the next stanza :

My spirit longeth for Thee

Within my troubled breast,
Although I be unwortliy

Of so divine a guest.

Of so divine a guest,

Unworthy though I be,
Yet has my heart no rest,

Unless it comes from Thee.

Unless it comes from Thee,

In vain I look around;
In all that I can see

No rest is to be found.

No rest is to be found

But in thy blessed love;
Oh, let my wish be crowned,

And send it from above.

— John Hyrom.

128 ENGLISn VEKSIFICATION.

THE CHANT nOYAL.

19. *• The chant royal," says Mr. Gosse, "is the final tour-
de-force, the ne ])Ihs ultra of leijjitiniate difficulty in the
construction of a poem. Henry de Croy derives the title of
this form from the fact that persons excelling in the compo-
sition of chants roi/aux were worthy to be crowned with j,'ar-
lands like conquerors or kings. It is a moot point among
students whether tlie ballade or the chant royal be the earlier
and original poem. It was always dedicated to more stately
and lieruic themes than the baUade. The chant royal was
reserved for the celebration of divine mysteries, or for the
exploits of some heroic race."

20. It is composed of five stanzas of eleven lines each, to
which is added an envoi of five lines. The final line is the
same in each of the stanzas and in the envoy. Only five
rhymes are used ; the order for each stanza \?, a b a b c c d d e
d e, and for the envoy d d e d e. The envoy begins with an
invocation as in the old ballades.

We close this cliaj)ter with an exami)lo of the chant royal
composed by Mr. Co.sse:

TUK I'HAI.SK OF niONYSUS.

IJcliolil, altovo llic mountains there is light,
A slrt'ak of p>M, a line of KatherinR firo.
Ami the tliiii Kast hath sndilcnly prown bright
Willi pah- at'iial flame, that drives up liigher
The lurid mists that, of the night aware,
IJreasted the dark ravines and coverts bare,
liolinld, beiiohl! the granite gates unclose,
And down the vales a lyric people flows,
Who dance to mu.sic, and in dancing fling
Their frantic ro])es to every wind that blows,
And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

FOREIGN FORMS OF VERSE. 129

Nearer they press, and nearer still in sight,
Slill dancing blithely in a seemly choir;
Tossing on high the symbol of their rite,
The cone-tipped thyrsus of a god's desire.
Nearer they come, tall damsels flushed and fair,
With ivy circling their abundant hair,
Onward, with even pace, in stately rows,
With eye that flashes and with cheek that glows,
And all the while their tribute songs they bring.
And newer glories of the past disclose.
And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

The pure luxuriance of their limbs is white.
And flaslies clearer as they draw the nigher,
IJathed in an air of infinite delight,
Smooth without wound of thorn or fleck of mire.
Rome up by song as by a trumpet's blare,
Leading the van to conquest, on they fare;
Fearless and bold, whoever comes or goes.
Those shining cohorts of Bacchantes close.
Shouting and shouting till the mountains ring.
And forests grim forget their ancient woes.
And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

And youths are there for whom full many a night

Brought dreams of bliss, vague dreams that haunt and tire,

Who rose in their own ecstasy bedight.

And wandered forth through many a scourging brier,

And waited shivering in the icy air,

And wrapped their leopard-skins about them there,

Knowing, for all the bitter air that froze,

Tlie time must come, that every poet knows.

When he shall rise and feel himself a king,

And follow, follow where the ivy grows.

And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

But oh! within the heart of this great flight,
Whose ivory arms hold up the golden lyre ?
Whose form is this of more than mortal height?
What matchless beauty! what inspired ire!

130 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

The briiulled panthers know the prize they bear,
And harmonize their steps with stately care;
Bent to the morning like a living rose,
The immortal splendor of his face he shows,
And where he glances, leaf and flower and wing
Tremble with rapture, stirred in their repose,
And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

Envoy.

Prince of the flute and ivy, all thy foes
Record the bounty that thy grace bestows,
But we, thy servants, to thy glory cling;
And with no frigiil lips our songs compose,
And deathless praises to the vine-god sing.

— E. W. Uoate.

COMIC FORMS. 131

CHAPTER XIV.

COMIC FORMS.

1. It may well be questioned whether any special arrange-
ment of rhythm, metre, or rhyme has an exclusively comic
effect. For, in the large majority of cases where the humor
of a poem seems to be partially dependent on the metrical
expression, it will be found that the same form has been used
in poetry that is undeniably serious.

2. Still, there are combinations which seem naturally
suited to express ideas of the ludicrous, sometimes by a slight
modification, it may be, of forms ordinarily employed in more
dignified composition ; just as the comic strut is but a burlesque
of the tragic stride.

3. Thus the same rhythm and metre which are characteristic
of the ballad, as springing most directly from the popular
instinct, serve also as the vehicle of a simple and rude humor.
So in Burns's poem of " John Barleycorn : "

There was | three kings | int6 | the Edst, |

Three kings both great and high;
And they hae sworn a solemn oath,

John Barleycorn should die.

Or, in the " Society upon the Stanislaus," by Bret Harte :

I reside at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful James,
I am not up to small deceit or any sinful games.

132 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

4. This style sometimes breaks down into a mere recitative,
without much regard to rhythm or metre, as in the well-known
old poem entitled " The Old and Young Courtier : "

An old song made by an aged old pate,

Of an old worshipful gentleman, who had a great estate,

That kept a brave old house at a bountiful rate.

And an old porter to relieve the poor at his gate;

Like an old courtier of the queen's,

And the queen's old courtier.

Or, " Our Village," by Thomas Hood :

Oiu" village, that's to say, not Miss Milford's village, but our village of

Bullock Smithy,
Is couie into by an avenue of trees, three oak pollards, two elders, and a

withy.
And in the middle there's a green, of about not exceeding an acre and a

half;
It's common to all, and fed off by nineteen cows, six ponies, three horses,

five asses, two foals, seven pigs, and a calf!

5. In general, a greater freedom of rhythm helps to produce
the desired comic effect, whether in the overflow of syllables,
or by forced accent, or the running over of unaccented sylla-
bles at the end, like a fling of the foot of the dancer. The
rhythm is trochaic rather than iambic, and triple rather than
double.

6. Thus, short trochaic :

RIDINO ON TMK ItAIL.

Singing through the forests,

l{attling over ridges.
Shooting under arches,

Kuinbling over bridges.
Whizzing thrvugh the mountains,

Ituzziiig o'er the vale.
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Riding on the rail!

— J. (1. Saxe.
Or:

Yankee Domllo came to town
On u slrip<'d pony.

COMIC FORMS. 133

7. Dactylic, with anacrusis :

There | ouce wis ft | doctor
(NO I foe to the I proctor,)
A I pliysIc-cOn I c6ct6r,

— Hood.

8. Trochaic trimeter :

Summer's | gone and | over!

Fogs are | falling | down;
And with russet tinges

Autumn's doing brown.

— Hood.
Trochaic tetrameter :

Thrash a | way; you'll | hev to | rattle |

On them kittle drums of yourn ;
'Taint a knowin' kind o' cattle,

Tliet is ketched with mouldy com;
Put in stifif, you fifer feller,

Let folks see how spry you be; —
Guess you'll toot till you are yeller,

'Fore you git ahold o' me.

— Lotoell ■■ Biglow Papers.

9. Dactylic :

Guvener B. is a sensible man ;

He stays to his home, and looks artcr his folks,
He draws his furrer ez straight ez he can,
An' into nobody's tater-patch pokes;
But John P.
Kobinson he
Sez he wunt vote for Guvener B.

— Lowell : Biglow Papers.

13^1 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

10. Anapaestic :

Miss Flora McFlimsey, of Madison Square,
Has made three separate journeys to Paris,

And her father assures me, each time she was there,
That she and her friend Mrs. Harris

Spent six consecutive weeks without stopping,
In one continuous round of shopping.

- >r. A. DutUr.

In his bed, bolt upright,

In the dead of the nii,'lit,
The Frencli Emperor starts like a ghostl

Hy a dream lield in charm.

He uplifts his right arm.
For he dreams of reviewing his host.

- Hood.

11. A semi-huinorous rhythm is frequently found in Irish
songs, of which tlie following is an example :

I've heard bells chiming full many a clime in.

Tolling sublime in cathedral shrine,
While, at a glibe rate, brass tongues would vibrate,

Hut all their music spoke nouglil like thine.
For memory dwelling on each proud swelling

Of thy belfry, knelling its bold notes free.
Made the l)ells of Shandon sound far more grand on

The pleasant waters of the river Lee.

Did you hear of the Widow Malone,

Ohone!
Who lived in the town of Athlone,

Alone!
Ob, she melted the Iicarts
Of the swains in them i)arts:
So lovely the Widow Malonn,
Ohone!
So lovely the Widow Malone.

— C/uirtcs Liver.

COMIC FORMS. 135

12. Mr. Lcanier, in liis "Science of Verse," calls attention
to a rhythm which " humorous verse-makers in English find
most to their hand." It mimics very closely "a popular
dance of the negro minstrels, preserving even the vigorous
slam at the end, where the dancer brings the entire sole of
his foot down on the board with all the possible leverage
of his leg." He represents it thus :

« A A A A

■7^m0\m0»m\0»»0\» 0 \ 0

i '• I' I ' '• 1/ 1/ 1 1/ ' I' ^ 1 1 r 1 1

Tick-y tack-y, tick-y tack-y, tick-y slam bam bam!

So in the well-known song in the comic opera of " Pina-
fore : "

I I nevCr thought Of | thinking fOr my | sdlf 6X | dll | .

See also "The Battle of Limerick," by Thackeray.
With I rdge and imu | lation iu their | black hearts | core. |

Mr. Lanier cautions against the use of this rhythm for
serious sentiment, and criticises tlie following verse, for
attempting so to use it:

But, as we have already seen, the same rliythms are fre-
quently used both for comic and for pathetic poetry, and in
the verse last given the scheme marked by Mr. Lanier is
essentially modified. In the first full measure there is no
longer one long syllable succeeded by three short ones, as in
I tack-y tick-y | , but a long and a short syllable alternat-
ing, making really two trochees, and alTocting sensibly the

136 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

character of the rhythm ; | autumn ddys fiide | . Tlic three
long syllables at the end of the line are not necessarily comic.
Certainly, one can hardly feel any incongruity of the
metre with the tender pathos of tlie sentiment in the little
poem, made on the same scheme, of which we quote the first
verse (see Appendix) :

The proper place for coiirtins,

l'>y llie story book's reporliiig,
Is some lane or iiieadow pathway out of sight of town,

With the sweetness blowing over

From tlie fields of beans and clover,
And the skylark dropping westward as the sun goes down.

13. The sense of the ludicrous is aided not only by the
rhythm, but also bij the metre, and tlie combination of lines,
and tlie use of the rrfniin. This is noticeable in tlie examples
already given in "The Widow Malone," by Charles Lever,
and "Governor B.," by Lowell. In Hood's poem of "Miss
Kilmansegg and her I'recious Leg," we find a succession of
anapestic lines, broken by shorter ones with feminine ending:

To trace the Kilmansegg pedigree,
To the very root of the family tree,

Win- a task as rash as ridiculous;
Tlirough antediluvian mists as thick
As London fog, such a line to pick
Were enough in truth to puzzle Old Nick,

Not to name Sir llarris Nicholas.

See also, in the same metre, " Miss MacBride," by Jolin G.
Saxo.

14. A favorite form, which has become appropriated by a
series of "Nonsense Verses," may be thus marked :

»-»|'l-Hj|'<_>\j|'<_»

I ' 1-1 w I ' »_; o J ' >j

COMIC FOKMS. 137

There was a young woman named Hannah,
Who slipped on a piece of banana;

She cried out, " O my ! "

And more stars did she spy
Than are seen in the star-spangled banner!

A gentleman ran to assist her;

He picked up her muff and her wrister.

" Did you fall, ma'am ?" he cried.

"Do you think," she replied,
" I sat down for the fun of it, mister ? "

15. The ccesiiral jmuse and rhyme are sometimes made to
come, grotesquely, iu the middle of a word :

Wliene'er with haggard eyes I view
This dungeon that I'm rotting iu,
I think of those companions true.
Who studied with me at the U-
niversity of'Gottingen,
Diversity of Gottingen.

— George Canning.

Also:

Yankee lasses are the u-

nivarsal airth bcwitchin';
Good and true and party tu.

In parlor or in kitohin.

This is as old as Horace :

Labitur ripa Jove non probante u-
xorius amnis.

16. The character of the rhymes has much to do with pro-
ducing a comic effect. They may be odd and unexpected :

" The birds can fly.

An' why can't I ?

Must we give in,"

Says he with a grin,

"That tlie blackbird and phoebe

Are smarter 'n we l)e ? "

— J. T. 'J'roicbritlye : Darius Green.

138 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

The hubs, of logs from the " Settler's olliim," —
Last of its timber, — tliey couldn't sell 'em.

— Holmes: The Deacon's Masterpiece.

A c.ilf an alderman, a goose a justice,
And rouks committee-men and trustees.

— Butler's JIudihras.

Especially, penultimate and antepenultimate :

Some such pious divine as
St. Thomas Aquinas.

Not to name others, 'niongst whom are few so
Admired as John Bunyan and Kobinson Crusoe.

Of Ilarkhiytz, — how sadly those Dutch names do sully versel
I'urchas's, liawkworth's, or Lemuel Gulliver's.

A fig for their nonsense and chatter! — sufTicc It, her
Charms will excuse one for casting sheep's eyes at herl

When a m;iii has dcciilod

As Captain M'lJride did.
And once fully made up his mind on the matter, ho
Can't be too prompt in unmasking his battery.

— Barham : Ingoldsby Legendi.

O ye immortal gods! what is Iheogony ?
O thou loo immortal man! what is philanthropy?

0 world that was and is! what is cosmogony ?
Some people have accused me of misanthropy,

And yet I know no more than the mahogany

That forms this desk, of what they mean: lycanthropy

1 roinprehond; for, without transformation,

Men become wolves on any slight occasion.

— Tti/ron.

lUit double and triple rhymes are not nece.ssarily humorous,
as may ha .seen in Hood's " IJridgo of Si^'h.s."

COMIC FORMS. 139

17. The refrain is sometimes peculiarly used, as in the
well-known " Echo Verses : "

Now, Echo, on what's religion grounded ?

Roundliead.
Who's its professor most considerable ?

Rabble.

Or:

Echo! mysterious nymph, declare
Of what you're made, and what you are.

Air!

But come, thou saucy, pert romancer,
Who is as fair as Pha3be ? Answer!

Ann, sir.

18. Finally, it comes within the sphere of verse to mention
the Parody, in which a humorous result is produced by the
imitation of the metre and style of a serious poem, as the
vehicle of a light and trivial sentiment. See "The Rejected
Addresses," by Horace and James Smith, and "Eolopoesis,
or American Rejected Addresses." Also, as independent of
any considerations of rhythm or metre, a source of humorous
verse is found in the use of various dialects ; as in the well-
known " Hans Breitmann Ballads," by Charles G. Leland.

APPENDIX.

DEFINITIONS OF TERMS.

Acrostic. — A composition, usually in verse, in which
certain letters in the various lines, taken successively, spell
a word or words, forming a name or sentence. Usually,
the first letter of each line is taken; sometimes the first
letter of the first line, the second letter of the second line,
and so on. See examples on page 145.

Antipiione. — The response which one side of the choir
makes to the other in a chant. This is the most ancient form
of church music. See page 146.

Antistrophe. — That part of a song or dance around the
altar which was performed while turning from the left to
the right. It was preceded by the strophe, and followed by
the epode.

Bouts Rimes. — Rhymed endings. An exercise in verse,
in which the rhyming words are given, to be filled out into
lines, at the will of the writer.

Cantata. — A musical composition comprising solos and
choruses, arranged in a somewhat dramatic manner.

Canto. — The most comprehensive division of a poem ; as in
The Lady of the Lake.

Cento. — A composition formed of lines or passages from
different authors arranged so as to be read connectedly ; a sort
of literary patchwork. See i)age 147.

141

142 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Dramatic Poetry. — A form of ppetry in which human
action, instead of being narrated, as in epic poetry, is exliib-
ited in the persons of those concerned. It is made up of the
speeches of those engaged in it.

The old rules required that there should be unity of action,
unity of time, and rtnity of place. These were called the three
unities. The last of these is now practically disregarded.

The two principal forms of dramatic poetry are trayedy and
comedy. A tragedy represents some signal action performed
by illustrious persons, and generally having a fatal issue. In
comedy, the complication has a cheerful issue, and the tone
is light and humorous. A farce is a comedy of the broadest
form of humor. A melodrama is characterized by exaggerated
effects in sentiment or situation.

Eclogue. — A pastoral poem, in which two or more shep-
herds are introduced, as conversing with each other. An
example, in English, is Spenser's " Shepheard's Calender."

Elegv. — This term is usually employed, in English, to
designate a plaintive poem, as " Gray's Elegy."

Elegiac, in classic usage, had reference to the metre, which,
as has already been shown, was written in alternate dactylic
hexameter and pentameter.

Epic Poetry. — An epic poem narrates, usually at consid-
erable length, the adventures of heroes and illustrious per-
sons, as based on old legends or traditions. It includes
descriptions of nature, as well as narrative of events. Its
metre is simple and uniform. Episodes are frequently intro-
duced. Ilei)ctition of passages occurs, especially in the re-
l)orting of messages, which are often given in tlie exact words
of the sender. Milton's "Paradise Lost" is an example in
English.

APrENDIX. 143

Epigram, — Originally, an inscription on a tomb. Now-
applied to a brief form of expression, usually in verse, in
which a truth or sentiment is uttered in a lively and ingenious
manner. Example (written on a glass with a diamond pencil
belonging to Lord Stanhope) :

Accept a miracle in place of wit:

See two dull lines by Stanhope's pencil writ.

Epilogue. — A speech or short poem addressed to the spec-
tators, by one of the actors, after the conclusion of a play.

Epithalamium. — A nuptial song or poem, in praise of the
bride and bridegroom, and praying for their prosperity.

Epode. — That part of a song or dance which was performed
before the altar ; as the conclusion of an ode. It is also a
species of lyric poem in which a longer line is followed by
a shorter one ; as the " Epodes " of Horace.

Hovering Accent. — Division of stress between the word-
accent and the verse-accent ; as

And Ry | pheus | that met | us b^ | moonlight.

— Surrey.

Idyl. — Originally, a short pastoral poem. It is now
applied, rather vaguely, to a short, simple poem, more descrip-
tive than narrative. The so-called "Idyls of the King," by
Tennyson, are more properly epic than idyllic.

Lampoon. — A personal satire, often in verse.

Lyric Pop:try. — This differs from epic or dramatic poetry
in the fact that it usually expresses the individual emotions
of the poet. It naturally takes a form fitted to be sung, but
is found in a wide variety of metres.

Madrigal. — A brief love poem, not so subtle as an epi-
gram, nor so regular as a sonnet, containing some simple and
tender thought.

144 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Oi'KUA. — A musical drama, consisting of airs, choruses,
and recitations, and representing some passionate action.

Oratorio. — A sacred composition, consisting of airs, reci-
tatives, duets, trios, choruses. Its subject is usually taken
from the Sacred Scriptures.

Palinode. — Literally, a song repeated, or taken back.
A satirical poem, retracting or apologizing for what was said
in a fornaer one. See page 150.

I'AKonv. — A writing, usually in verse, in which the metre
and style of an author are clo§ely imitated, while the subject
matter is changed into something humorous. E.xample :
" Rejected Addresses," by Horace and James Smith. Also,
" Eolopoesis, or American Rejected Addresses."

Pasquinade. — Another name for lampoon.

Prologue. — A short poem spoken before a dramatic per-
formance.

I'.sALM. — A sacred song used in worship. Originally
applied to those in the Bible, used in the Jewish Temple.

Strophe. — That part of a song or dance which was per-
formed while turning from the right to the left, around the
altar. It Wius succeeded by the antistroj)he and the epode.

Travestv. — A burlesque translation or imitation of a work.
Exainple: the travesties of mythological legends, by J. G.
Saxe.

Vers i>e Soci£t/:. — Light poems, playfully dealing with
themes of fashionable life.

Wrexchkd AcrKNT. — This term is used when the metrical
stress is thrown upon a syllable which would not ordinarily
be acc6ntcd.

Sir I'al I ri(*k Spt'iis | is llic bcsl | sailur |
Tliat over Hailol Iho si-a.

APPENDIX. 145

ACKOSTICS.

In this example, the first letters of the line, read in order,
form the name of tlie subject :

Friendship, tliou'rt false! I hate thy flattering smile!

Return to uie those years I spent in vain.

In early youth the victim of thy guile,

Each joy took wing ne'er to return again, —

Ne'er to return; for, chilled hy hopes deceived,

Dully the slow-paced liours now move along;

So changed the times when thoughtless I helieved

Iler honeyed words, and heard lier siren song.

If e'er, as me, she lure some youth to stray.

Perhaps, before too late, he'll listen to my lay.

In the next, read the first letter of the first line in connec-
tion with the second letter of the second line, the third letter
of the third line, and so on to the end.

A VALENTINK.

For her this line is penned whose luminous eyes,

Brightly expressive as the twins of Lceda,
Shall find her own sweet name, that, nestling, lies

Upon the page, enwrapped from every reader.
Search narrowly the lines ! — they hold a treasure

Divine, — a talisman, — an amulet
Tliat must be worn at heart. Search well the measure,

The words, the syllables! Do not forget
The trivialest point, or you may lose your labor 1

And yet there is in this no Gordian knot,
Which one might not undo without a sabre,

If one could merely comprehend the plot.
Enwritten upon the leaf where now are peering

Eyes scintillating soul, there lie pcnhis,
Tliree eloquent words oft uttered in the hearing

Of poets, by poets, — as the name is a poet's too.
' Its letters although naturally lying

Like the knight Pinto — Mendez Ferdinando,
Still form a synonym for Truth. Cease trying!

You will not rvad the riddle lliough you do the best yon con do.

— E. A. I'oe.

110 ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

ALLITERATION.

An Austrian army, awfully arrayed,

Boldly by battery besieged Belgrade.

Cossack commanders cannonading come,

Dealing destruction's devastating doom.

Every endeavor engineers essay,

For fame, for fortune fighting, — furious fray!

Generals 'gainst generals grapple, — gracious God I

How honors Heaven heroic hardihood!

Infuriate, indiscriminate in ill,

Kindred kill kinsmen, kinsmtMi kindred kill.

Labor low levels loftiest, longest lines;

Men march 'mid mounds, 'mid moles, 'mid murderous mines;

Now noisy noxious numbers notice nought

Of outward obstacles, opposing ought;

Poor patriots, partly purchased, partly pressed,

Quite quaking, quickly "Quarter! Quarter!" quest.

Reason returns, religious rite redounds,

Suwarrow stops such sanguinary sounds.

Truce to the Turk! Triumph to thy tnun,

Unjust, unwise, uumerciful Ukraine!

Vanish, vain victory! vanish victory vain!

Why wish we warfare? Wherefore welcome war?

Xerxes, Ximenes, Xanthus, Xavier?

Yield, yield, ye youths! ye yeomen, yield your yell!

Zcno's, Zarpater's, Zoroaster's zeal,

And all, attracting, against arms appeal,

— Anonymous.

A NT I PHONE.

CIIOIUS.

Let all the world In every corner sing,
My God and King.

VKU8K.

The heavens are not ton high.
His praise may thither Hie:
Tin- tarth is not loo low,
His praises there may grow.

APrENDIX. 147

CHORUS.

Let all the world in every corner sing,
My God and King.

VERSE.

The church with psalms must shout,
No door can keep them out:
But above all, the heart
Must bear the longest part.

cnoRus.

Let all the world in every corner sing,
My God and King.

— George Herbert.

CENTO VERSE.

One kiss, dear maid, I said and sighed, — Coleridge.

Out of those lips unshorn ; —Longfellow.

She shook her ringlets round her head, —Stoddard.

And laughed in merry scorn. — Tennyson.

The laughing bridal roses blow, — Patmore.

To dress her dark-brown hair; —Bayard Taylor.

My heart is breaking \vilh my woe, —Tennyson.

Most beautiful! most rare! -Head.

I shut it inside the sweet, cold hand, — lirowning.

The precious golden link ! — Smith.

I calmed her fears, and she was calm; — Coleridge.

"Drink, pretty creature, drink." — Wordsworth.

And so I won my Genevieve, —Coleridge.

And walked in Paradise; -Uervey.

The fairest thing that ever grew —Wordsworth.

Atween me and the skies. — Osgood.

— From Bryant's Library of Poetry awl Song :
Fords, Howard, dc Hulbcrt, IsSO.

14i> ENGLI.S1I VEILSIFICATION.

COURTING IN THE CITY.

The proper place for courting,

By the story book's reporting,
Is some lane or meadow pathway, out of sight of town ;

AVith tlic sweetness blowing over

From the fiekls of beans ami clover,
Ami the skylark dropping westward as the sun goes down.

But I've met my little Sally

At the month of Dawson's Alley,
And we've walked along together toward the Dome of Paul's;

'Mid the jostling crowd that passes

'Neath the flaring lamps and gases,
And the shouting of the drivers, and the newsboys' calls.

And tlie lily of the valley

That I gave my little Ijally,
Was the faded penny bouquet that a flower-girl sells:

She has never seen one growing,

As it's easy to be showing,
For its birthplace is the Dreamland that's beyond Bow Bells.

Oh! It pains me in our walking —

All the oaths and shameful talking,
And the folks that brush her passing, and th(! glances bold!

But though evil things may touch her.

They can never hurt or smutch her,
For she turns tlic dirt to sweetness as a lluwer the mould.

Nay; it's not In country places,

'Mid the fields and simple faces,
Out of sight and sound of evil, that a pure heart grows;

It is ht!re in London city.

In the sin and &hame ami pity;
For the pure heart draws its pureness from the wrong It knows.

When my Sally's sweetness found me,

I was like the mun around me;
I was coarse and low and selflsli as the beast that dies;

But licr grace began to win me,

And my heart was changed within me,
Anil I learned to pray from gazing In my darling's eyes.

— Anonjimnut.

ArrENDix. 141)

A PASTORAL.

I sat with Doris, the shepherd maiden ;

Ilor crook was laden witli wreathed dowers;
I sat and loooed her, through sunlight wheeling,

And shadows stealing, for hours and hours.

And she, my Doris, whose lap encloaes
Wild summer roses of faint perfume,

The while I sued her, kept hushed and harkened,
Till shades had darkened from gloss to gloom.

She touched my shoulder with fearful ^njjrer;

She said, " We linger; we must not stay;
My flock's in danger, my sheep will loander;

Behold them yonder, — how far they stray."

I answered, holder, " Nay, let me hear you.
And still he near you, and still adore;

No wolf nor stranger will touch one yearling;
Ah! stay, my darling, a moment more."

She whispered, sighing, "There will be sorroio,
Beyond to-morrow, if I lose to-day;

My fold unguarded, my flock unfolded,
I shall be scolded and sent away."

Said I replying, " If they do miss you,

They ought to kiss you, when you get home;

And well rewarded, by friend and neighbor,
Should be the labor from which you come."

" They might remember," she answered meekly,
"That lambs are weakly, and sheep are wild;

But if they love me, it's none so fervent;
I am a servant, and not a child."

Then each hot ember glowed quick irilhin me,
And love did loin me to swift reply;

" Ah! do but prove me, and none shall blind you.
Nor fray nor find yon, until I die."

l."»0 EXr.MSII VERSIFICATION.

She bluslied and started, and stood (iwaiting,

As if dehatiiKj, in dreams divine;
But I did hrate them, I told her plainly,

" She doubted tainli/, she uiiist be mine."

So wo twin-hearted, from all the valley

Did rouse and rally her nibbling ewes;
Anil liomeward drute them, we two tofjcther.

Through blooming heather and gleaming dews.

That simple duty such grace did lend her,

My Doris tender, my Doris true,
That I, lior warder, diil always bless her.

And often j^ress her to take her due.

And now in beauty she fills my dwellin(f,

With love excelliwi and undejlled ;

And love doth yunrd her, both fast a\v\ fervent.

No more a servant, nor yet a chiltl.

— A. J. Muiihij.

In the forefToing poem, the rhymes occur as follows : the end
of the second line with the end of the fourth line, in qux'\\
stanza; the end of the first line with the juiddle of the sec-
ond, and the end of the third with tlie middle of the fourth,
in each stanza; the middle of the first line in the first stanza
with the middle of the first line in the second stanza, and the
miildle of the third line of the first stanza with the middle of
the third line of the second stanza, and so on.

!• A I> I N <> I) K {rcrmiUitiou).

" Who is Lydia, pray, and who
Is Ilypatia ?" Softly, dear;
Let mc breathe it in your ear:
They are you, and only you,
" And those other nameless two
Walking in Arcadian air —
She that was so very fair ?
She that had the twilight hair?"
They were you, dear, only yau.

APl'ENDIX. 151

If I speak of night or day,
Grace of fcni or bloom of grape,
Hanging cloud or fountain spray,
Gem or star or glistening dew,
Or of mythologic shape,
Psyche, Pyrrha, Daphne, say^ —
I mean you, dear, you, just you.

— T. D. Aldrich.

POEMS WITHIN POEMS.

It has been a favorite custom with poets to introduce shorter
poems within longer ones, or to combine several into one
whole. Examples of the former are the numerous songs and
ditties interspersed in the plays of Shakespeare, and the shorter
lyrics occurring within the idyls of Tennyson. Of the latter,
we may mention the " Canterbury Tales," of Chaucer ; " The
Temple," by George Herbert ; " The Wayside Inn," by Long-
fellow ; and Whittier's " Snow Bound."

QUEER DEVICES IN VERSE.

Poems have sometimes been written and printed to take
the shape of the object they describe. Thus, " The Altar," by
George Herbert.

A broken altar. Lord, thy servant reares,
Made of a heart and cemented witli teares;
Wiiose parts are as thy hand did frame;
No workman's tool hath touched the same.

A heart alone

Is such a stone

As n oth ing but

Thy pow'r doth cut.

Wherefore each part

Of my hard heart

Meets in this frame.

To praise thy Tiame:
That if I chance to hoM my peace,
These stones to praise thee may not cease.
Oh, let thy blessed sacrifice be mine,
And sanctifit'. this altar to l)i' thine.

152 ENGLISH VEi:i51FKATlUN.

Also " Easter Wings," by the same author :

Lord, who crealcdst man in wealth and store,
Though foolishly he lost the same,
Decaying more and more.
Till he hecame
Most poor:
With thee
O let me rise,
As larks harmoniously.
And sing this day thy victories:
Then shall the fall further the llight in me.

My tender age in sorrow did bcginne,
And still with sicknesses and shame,
Tliou didst so punish siune,
That I became
Most thiune.
With thee
Let me combine,
And fed this day thy victorie.
For if I imp «uy wing on tliiiie,
AUliction shall advance the Iliglit in me.

VIKKLAI NOrVKAlI.

Gooil-bye to Ihe Town! good-bye!
Hurrah! for the sea and the sky!

In the street the flower-girls cry;
In the street the water-carts ply;
And a lluter, with features awry,
riays fitfully, "Scots, wha hae" —
And Ihe throat of that lluter is dry;
C;ood-bye to the T«)wnl good-bye!

Anil over the roof-tops nigh

Comes a waft like a «lream of the M.iy;

And ft lady-bird lit on my lie;

And a cockchafer came with Ihe tray;

APPENDIX. li^^

And a butterfly (no one knows why)
Mistook my Aunt's cap for a spray;
And " next door" and "over the way"
The neighbors take wing and fly :
Hurrah for the sea and the sky !

To Buxton, the waters to try,

To Buxton goes old Mrs. Bligh;

And the Captain to Iloniburg and play

Will carry his cane ami his eye;

And even Miss Morgan Lefay

Is flitting— to far Peckhaiu Rye;

And my Grocer has gone — in a " Shay,"

And my Tailor has gone — hi a " Fly."

Good-bye to the Town! good-bye!

And it's O for the sea and the sky!
And it's O for the boat and the bay!
For the white foam whirling by,
And the sharp, salt edge of the spray!
For the wharf where the black nets fry,
And the wrack and the oar-weed sway !
For the stroll when the moon is high
To the nook by the Flag-house gray !
For the risus ab anyulo shy
From the Some-one we designate "Di!"
For the moment of silence, — the sigh!
"How I dote on a moon!" "So do I!"
For the token we snatch on the sly
(With nobody there to say Fie!)
Hurrah! for the sea and the sky!

So Phillis, the fawn-footed, hie
For a liansora. Ere close of the day
Between us a " world" must lie;
Good-bye to the town! Good-uye!
Hurrah! for thu sea and the sky!

— Austin Dobson.

ir>4 ENCiLlSlI Vi:i:SIFlCATlUX.

BALLADE.

Mr. Gosse quotes the following "as an excellent type of all
that a ballade should be : "

IIAM.ADK OF DKKAMLAND.

I hill my lioart in a nest of roses,

Out of tlie sun's way, liidilen apart;
In a softer bed than tlie soft while snow's is,

Under the roses I hid my heart.

Wliy sliould it sleep not ? Why shouM it start
Wlien never a leaf of the rose-tree stirred ?

What made sleep flutter his wings and part'?
Only the song of a secret bird.

Lie still, I said, for the wind's wing closes,

And mild leaves mullle the keen sun's dart;
Lie still, for the wind on the warm sea dozes,

Ami the wind is unquiettr still than thou art.

Doth a thought in thee still as a thorn's wound smart?
Does the pang still fret thee of hope deferred ?

What bids the lids of thy sleep dispart'?
Only the soug of a secret bird.

The green land's name that a charm encloses.

It never was writ in the traveller's chart;
And sweet as the fruit on its tree that grows is,

It never was sold in the merchant's mart.

The swallows of dreams through its dim (ields dart,
And sleeps are the tunes in its tree-tops heard;

No hound's note wakens the wild-wood hart,
Only the song of a secret bird.

Envoy.

In the world of dreams I have chosen my part.

To sleep for a season ami liear no word

Of trtu; love's trutii or of light love's art.

Only the song of a secret bird.

— SiciiiOurne.

APPENDIX. 155

VILLANJELLE.

Wouklst tlioii not be content to die,

When low-hung fruit is hardly clinging,
And golden Autumn passes by ?

If we could vanish, thou and I,

While the last woodland bird is singing,
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?

Deep drifts of leaves in the forest lie.

Red vintage that the frost is flinging,
And golden Autumn passes by.

Beneath this delicate rose-gray sky,

While sunset bells are faintly ringing,
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?

For wintry webs of mist on high,

Out of the muflled earth are springing,
And golden Autumn passes by.

O now when pleasures fade and fly,

And Hope her southward flight is winging,
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?

Lest Winter come, with wailing cry.

His cruel icy bondage bringing,
When golden Autumn hath passed by,

And thou, with many a tear and sigli.

While Life her wasted hands is wringing,
Shalt pray in vain for leave to die,
When golden Autumn hath passed by.

— E. W. Gosse.

15G E\(;LIt>II VEKSIFICATION.

Examples of stanzas of unusual length arc the following:

Ten line : The Primrose. — Donne.

Eleven line : The Ita\ en. — Pue.

Twelve line : A Word for the Nation. — Sicinburnc.

Thirteen line : Fly not yet. — Moore.

Sixteen line : Ode to Winter. — Campbell.

Twenty-four line : The Last Oracle. — Swinbnrnc.

Tail-Riivmk Stanza. — A .stanza of whicli tlie rliynie-order
is a a b c c b. Tlie b b is tlie tail-rliyme, and the lines contain-
ing it are usually, but not always, shorter than the others.
There may be more tlian two lines of each of the sections a a
and bb; and the lines may lu* written in a {,'reat variety of
forms of rhythm and metre. I'.ut the typical form, according
to Schipper, consists of six lines, — namely, four cliief lines of
four feet, and two tail-riiyme lines of three feet. He gives the
following example :

Those lyric pieces, short and few,
Most worthy Sir, 1 send to you ;

To read them he not weary ;
Thoy may hecome John llewcs his lyre.
Which oft at I'owlsworlh hy the (ire

llath made us {gravely merry.

— Drill/ton,

INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

Note. — The numerals refer to pages. The letter/after a miinerul signilies that
the subject is contiuued ou the iblluwiug pages.

ACCKNT, 1, 6, 08, 101.

— hovering, 14."{.

— wrenched, 144.
Acrostic, 141, 145.
Acrostical Valentine, 119, 145.
Alcaics, 112/.

Alexandrine, 14, 38, 39, 80, S3, 88,

98, 102.
Alliteration, 3, 4, 51, 80, 81, 140.

— disguised, 54.
Amphibrach, 9, 10, 16, 21.
Aniphiinacer, 9, 10, 21.
Anacrusis, 20, 133.
Anaptest, 9, 20, 74, 90.
Anai)testic, 10, 17, 36, 134.

— nionoiucter, 16.

— dimeter, 16.

— trimeter, 10.

— tetrameter, 16, 80.

— pentameter, 17.

— hexameter, 17.

— heptameler, 17.
Anglo-Saxon, 51, 52, 79.
Antiplione, 141, 146.
Antistrophe, 42, 141.
Assonance, 4, 45, 48.

Hall AD, 84.
Ballade, 110/., 154.
Blank Verso, 43, 81, 80/.
Bouts Rimes. 141.

C^suRAL Pause, 71, 89, 92, 103,

1.37.
Caesura of the Foot, 28.
Coesina of the Line, 28.
Cantata, 141.

157

Canto, 141.
Catch, 26.

Cento Verse, 141, 147.
Chain Verse, 127.
Chant Royal, 128.
Chief Letter, .52.
Choiianibic, 114.
Choriambus, U, 10, 17, 90.
Classical Metres, 105/.
Comedy, 142.
Comic Foinis, 131/.
Common Metre, 34.
Couplet, 33, 46, 81.

Dactyl, 9, 10, 20, 91.
Dactylic, 17, 133.

— monomeler, 17.

— dimeter,- 17, 80.

— trimeter, 17.

— tetrameter, 18.

— pentameter, 18.

— hexameter, 18, 106/.
Dimeter, 12.

Double Rhythm, 9.
Dramatic Poetry, 142.

Echo Verses, 139.

P:<'l()gue, 142.

Eights and Sevens, 35.

Eights, Sevens, ami Four, 35.

Elegiac, 108/., 142.

Elegy, 142.

Elevens, 36.

Elision, 22, 99.

Emphasis, 1, 2, 7, 08, 70, 75, 76.

Enclitics, 7.

Endings, Feminine, 74, 92, 08, 102.

158

i:\(;lisii vkiisikkation.

Endings, light, 92, 102.

— weak, 92, 102.
Kii.l-ihymc, 4. 4.3,51,80, 81.
Kml-stupped Linos, ;]1, 92, 102.
Kn;,'lisli Heroic Blank Verse, 8G/.
Envoy, 110, 1:J0.

Ej>ic roelry, 142.
Epigram, 143.
Ei'iloi^uc, 143.
Epitli:ilaniitun, 143.
Epode, 42, 143.
Exjiansions, W.

Extia-rhvilinucal Syllables, 20, 98,
i02.

Fakcf., 142.

Fci't, kinds of. 101.

F.-miiiinu Endings, 74, 92. 98, 1(I2.

Foot, 8.

Foreign Forms, 115/.

Forms, 79.

Foiir-fool Lines, 98.

(iAI.I.IA.MItir, 114.

IlAi.i.Kr.LMAii Mktisk, 3C.
I Icndecasyllabics, 1 10/.
Heplameter, 12.
H.-roic Verse, 13, 81, 86/.
Hcxanioter, 12.
llov.Ting Acpent, 14.3.
Hymn .Metres, 34.

Iamiuc, 13, 14, 20, 23, 34, 35, 30.

— Mionomeier, 12.

— dimeter, 13, 97.

— trimet<!r, 13.

— letrameter, 13, 85, 97.

— pentameter, 12, 13, 80, 80/

— iiexametcr, 14.

— heptameter, 14.
Iambus, 9, 10, 20, 74.
Idvl, 143.

Indent, .34.

Irish Uhytlim, i:il.

Kixo IIoKX, 82.
Kyrielie, 120.

Lami'oon, 143.

Li:,'lil Endings, 92, 102.

Line, 4.

Long Chaucerian, 39.
Long Metre, 35.
Long Syllables, 59.
Lyric I'oetry, 84, 143.

MAnniOAi,, 143.
.Melodrama, 142.
Metre, 3, 4, 12/, 33/
Monometer, 12.

XoNSKNSK Vkksks, 130/
Norman Induencc, 79.

Octamktkic, 12.
Octave, 40.
Ode. 41.

Onomatopfi'ia, 02.
Oper.a, 144.
Oratorio, 144.

I'AI.IN-ODK, 144, 150. ,

I'antoinn, 121.

I'arody, 139, 144.

Pasfjuinade, 144.

Pastoral. 149.

Pause, 2S, 71.

Pentameter, 12.

Pli rasing, 25.

Piers tiie Plowman, 52.

Pindaric, 41.

Poems wilbin Poems, 151.

Position, 105.

Poulter's Measure, 80.

Prefixes, 9J».

Proclitic, 7.

Prologue, 144.

Psalm, 144.

Pyrrhic, 9, 20, 74, 88.

QrANTiTY. \,r,Of., 105, Knt, 112.
(Juatrain, 34, 40.
Queer Devices, 151.

Hkadino Vkkhk, 08/

Ilecilative, 132.

Kefrain. s5.

Kests, L'7.

Khyme. 3. 4. 43, 81, 102, 137.

— com|)licaleil, 49.

— double, 44.

— feminine, 44.

— idcnlii-al, 44.

INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

159

rvhymc, 3, 4, 43, 80, 101, 137.
— masculine, 44.
— proper, 43.
— single, 44.

Khyule-order, 34, 38, 39, 40.
lUiyllun, 1, 4, 5, I'J.
Kliytlnnical Prose, 2, 3.
Itiuie-Koyal, 38, 47.
Killing-rime, 93.
lliniing-couplet, 80.
IJondeau, 119.
liondeau Redouble, 123.
llondel, 110, 118.
llonndel, 119.
Uun-on Lines, 31, 92, 102.

Sapphics, 113.

Saturnian, 114.

Septenarius, 113.

Septenary, 80, 83.

Sestette, 40.

Scstina, 110, 124.

Sevens, 35.

Sevens and Sixes, 30.

Short Cliaucerian, 38.

Short Couplet, 82.

Short Metre, 35.

Short Trochaic, 132,

Sicilian Octave, 124.

Sixes and Four, 36.

Six-foot Lines, 98.

Slurring, 23, 99.

Sonnet, 40, 41.

Spenserian, 38, 39.

Spondee, 9, 10, 20, 74, 89, 107.

Stanza, 3, 4, .33/., 37, 38, 39, 41, 81

— four-line, 37.

— five-line, 37.

— six-line, 37.

— seven-line, 38.

— eight-line, 38.

— nine-line, 39.

— of more than nine lines, 150.

— tail-rhyme, 150.

Stress, 1, 6.

— unequal, C9.
Strophe, 42, 144.
Sub-letter, 52.
Substitution, 19.
Supernumerary Syll.ablcs, 91.

Taii-ritymk Stanza, 39, 150.

Tens, 30.

Terza llima, 50.

'I'etrameter, 12.

Tone-color, 4, 01/., 81.

'I'ragedy, 142.

Travesty, 144.

Trimeter, 12.

Trimeter Couplet, 98.

Triolet, 120.

Triple Kliythm, 10.

Triplet, 33, 46.

Trochaic, 14, 35.

— monometer, 14.

— dimeter, 14.

— trimeter, 14, 85.

— tetrameter, 15, 80, 97, 133.

— pentameter, 15.

— hexameter, 15.

— heptamoter, 15.

— octameter, 15.
Trochee, 9, 10, 20, 21, 74, 89.
Trochee-spondee, 90.

Unitif.s, the Three, 142.
Unit of Ilhythm, 8, 19, 21, 33.

Vej:s pe Soci6t6, 144.
Verse, 1, 4, 33.
Villanelle, 125, 155.
Virelai, 121.
Virelai Nouveau, 122, 152.

Wkak-km)1NOs, 92, 102.
Wrenched Acceut, 144.

INDEX OF AUTHORS.

Abbott, E. A., 87, 08.
Al(lricl), T. B., 151.
Arnold, Matthew, 15, 111.

Barliain, R. H., 138.

Baniig-GouKl, S., 10.

Boker, G. H., 18.

Boiiar, H., 35.

Browning, Mrs., 14, 15, 29, 40,

49, 85, 90, 103, 111.
Browning, Robert, 10, 17, 21,

48, 54, 65, 84.
Bryant, v, 30. 37.
Burns, 13, 39, 45, 131,
Butler, Samuel, 138.
Butler, W. A., 134.
Byroni, John, 127.
Byron, 10, 14, 17, 20, 24, 27, 29,

75, 83, 80, 89, 138.

Campbell, 16, 17, 37, 85, 8G.

Campion, 14.

Canning, George, 137.

Carey, Patrick, 110.

Cary. Phrebe, 10.

Catullus, 114.

Chapman, 83.

Chaucer, 13, 38, 39, 52, 53, 79,

81, 82, 86, 93/., 116, 151.
Clmrchill, 53.
Clougli, A. IL, 108, 109.
Coleri.ige, 11, 21, 41, 45, 46, 47,

lOG, 107, 108, 110, 147.
Corson, II., 94.
Cowper, 13, 16, 88.

Daniel, 40.

Dante, 130.

Dickens, 2.

Dobson, Austin, 116, 118, 126, 15

Dr.iytoii, 16, 17, 64, S3, 86, 15(i.

39,

80,

73,

Dnunniond of Hawthorndcn, 116.

Drydcn, 14, 30, 65, 70.

Eliot, George, 17, 40.
Ellis, A. J., 87.
Emerson, R. W., 5, 47.
Everett, Edward, 2.

Fitzgerald, Edward, 47.
Flcay, F. G., 93, 98.
Franklin, v.
Furness, W. U., 35.

Garnett, Richard, 124.

Goldsmith, 46.

Gosse, E. W., 41, 115, 124, 128, 155.

Gower, 82, 116.

Gray, 9, 42, 85.

Greene, Robert, 52, 83.

Guest, 93.

Harte, Bret, 131.

Heber, 18, 25.

Hemans, Mrs., 15,

Henley, W. E., 116, 126.

Herbert, George, 37, 48, 147, 151.

Herbert of Cherbury, 47.

Derrick, 13.

Hodgson, S. n., 10, 77, 78, 86, 88,

108.
Hogg, 10.
Holmes, 103, 1.38.
Hood, 12, 26, 27, 48, 132, 134, 1.36,

138.
Horace, 1 1 2.
Hunt, Leigh, 15.

Irving, 2.

.lonpon, Ben, 15, 42, 17, 96.

161

102

ENGLISH VERSIFICATION.

Ke.iLs, 30, -10, 40. Go.

Kiiigsley, Charles, 16, 27, 80, 107.

Lamb, 111.

Laiin, Aiulrew, 110.

laaiiiiT, Sulney, 1.35.

Lavaiiion, !S2.

LlIhiuI, Ciiarlos G., 130.

LfVfr, Charles, 134.

Lockhart, J. G., G.'j.

Lon-fellow, 13, 10, 17, IS, 4.''>, 47,

i)S, (W, 84, 8(}, 103, 107, 113, 147,

1.->1.
Lowell, J. K., 41, 44, GO, 93, VVi.
Lyle, 11. F., 30.

Macaulay, i-i.').

Marlowe, 13, 29, 44, 85, 91, 93, 00/.

Massoii, S7.

Mattliews, Brainier, 121.

Mayor, J. IJ., 20, O'j. 90, 103.

Milton, 13, 24, 28, 29, 30, 32, 40, 44,

;■).'), (W., 70. 7(5, 85, 87, 88, 89, 90,

91. 93, 103.
Monl;,'oiiiery, J., 30.
Moore, 10. 14. 10,
Motlicr Goose, 1 14.
Miiiiby, A. J., 49, 108, 109, 150.

Omar Khayyam, 47.

I'atinoro. Covnitry. 87, 88, 147.
I'ayne, .lolin. 122, 123.
rierpoiit, .)., lii}.
riii.lar, 41.

To.-. 4. 15. 48, .W, 07. 85, U."}.
rope, 22. 2:i, 24, 29, 33, 44, .59, 70,
81, IK), 10:5.

Ilea.l, T. n., 34, .52, .54, S3, 117.

Keeil, Henry, v.

Kr)bl.ins. .S. I)., 7.5.

Ifobert of (Jlotieeslor, 80, 8.3.

I.'oblnson, A. Mary F., 121.

llulfe, W. J., vii, 101.

Rosetti, 13.

Ruskin, 09, 70, 77, 78, 88.

Saxe, .1. ^ 1.32. 130.

Scliiller. Wh, lOS.

Sciiipper, 79, 1.50.

ScoUanl. ( lintou, 117.

Scott, 10, 10, 20, 27, 28.

Sh.akespeare, 20, 21, 24, .30, .37, 40,
41, 4S, 53, 54, 04, (',5, 00, 70, 8;5,
88, 89, 90. 92, 93, 90, 97/., 151.

.Sbellev, 10, 20. 50.

.Sh.Tman. F. I). 119.

.Sidn.-y, .Sir Piiilip, 108, 109, 110.

Skelion. 82.

.Smith. Horace, 1.39.

.Snjitli, .James. 139.

Sniitli, S. F., 30.

.Soulbey, 14, m. 107. 113.

Spenser. 14, 30, .39, 40.

Siol.laril, U. H.. 147..

Story, W. W., IX.

.Surrey. 40, 8;). 81. K^. 80, 91. 93, 94/.

Swinburne, 10. 15, 17, .54. SI, 108,
110, 113, 114. 118. 120, 154.

Symonds, J. A., 87, 95.

Taylor, llavanl, 41, 147.

'leiinyson,:!, 13, 15, 17. 20, 24, 27,
2S, 2.1, .30. 33, 34. 37. .38, 41, 44,
45. 40, 47, 4S, :,2, 54. 04. 05. 07,
83. S5, SO, S9, 90, 91, KCl, 10«,
10,), 110, 112, 114, 147, 101.

Thack''rav. 135.

TrovvbrJilge, J. T., 137.

Virgil, 57, 81.

Warton. 95.
Watts, lsa:ic, 34, 30.
Wesley, C, 3.5.
Wiiite, (;leeson, 110.
Wliittier, 151.
Williams. W.. 35.
Wood worth, S., 10.80.
Wor.lsworlh, 3, 14, 29, 30, 40, 41, 42,
147.
I Wv.ili. 40.

Umersily ol CaMoma. Los
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