rhythm both admit of a momentary interruption of the latter. The pause cannot be made in the middle of a word; but, with this exception, it may fall at any part of the verse. Besides the pause in the course of the line, there is generally one also at the end of the line, as there the sense is usually interrupted. Not always, however; e. g. : 26 'Nor content with such Audacious neighbourhood."-Milton. "What cannot you and I perform | upon The unguarded Duncan? | What not put upon 156. Measures, understanding by that term the character given to verse by the combination of similar feet in it, are of two kinds according as the accent follows or comes before the interval, or holds the first place or the second place in the foot; áx and xá; áss and ssá. 157. The oldest as well as most common measure in English verse is that in which the accent succeeds the interval, rá. This we shall call REGULAR MEASURE, calling that in which the accent precedes the interval (ax), IRREGULAR MEASURE. (2.) **It appropriately bears this name on other grounds. The tendency of a weak syllable to drop off at the end of a line is obvious from the frequently defective character of this irregular measure. Weak syllables have also a tendency, though less decided, to drop off at the beginning. It therefore seems warrantable to deduce the irregular from the regular measure as follows:-An excessive regular verse (1) x axa|xa|xa|x|, loses the first syllable and becomes (2) a xaxaxax, a complete irregular verse. The last syllable being weak, however, easily drops, and the verse becomes (3) axaxaxa — │, a defective irregular verse, and one of the most usual form. We may make a concrete example of this from the following three lines:— (1) That life is but an empty dreaming. Life is but an empty dreaming. 'Life is but an empty dream.": (3.) 66 = = Excessive Regular. Chapter II.-Regular Measure. 158. Of this measure, which, as has been stated, is at once the oldest and commonest in English poetry, there are two varieties (§ 145) : 1. Simple Regular measure; x a, x a, &c. 2. Complex Regular measure, s s a, s s a, &c. 1. Simple (xa). 159. Simple Regular Pentameter is the Heroic Measure of English poetry. In its rhymed form it is the measure of Chaucer and Spenser, of Dryden and Pope, of Cowper, Campbell, and Byron; e. g. : "True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, r."-Pope. In its unrhymed form it is the stately and solemn blank verse of Shakespeare and Milton, as of Wordsworth and Tennyson; e. g.; "Now came still Evening on, and Twilight gray Silence accompanied; for beast and bird, They to their grassy couch, these to their nests, Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ; She all night long her amorous descant sung."-Milton. 160. Four lines of simple regular pentameters rhyming alternately, form the Elegiac Stanza of English poetry; e. g. : 66 Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear; Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air."-Gray. 161. Nine lines, the first eight of simple regular pentameters, and the ninth a hexameter (or Alexandrine *), form the Spenserian Stanza, first used by Spenser, and more recently by Thomson and Byron. The nine lines contain only three rhymes disposed thus, b, c, b, c c, d, c, d, d; e. g.: "It fortunéd, out of the thickest wood And with the sight amazed, forgot his furious force." Spenser. 162. Fourteen lines of simple regular pentameters (the last sometimes an Alexandrine) form the Italian Stanza or Sonnet, introduced into English poetry, in the 16th century, by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, who also was the first to adopt blank verse in English. Great licence is allowed in the order of the rhymes; e. g.: Surrey uses only two rhymes; making the sonnet seven couplets. Spenser uses five rhymes; the first nine lines being a Spenserian Stanza, and the last five corresponding with the last five of the same stanza. Shakespeare uses seven rhymes, making his sonnet equal to three elegiac stanzas and a couplet; as, be bede de fg fg | hh Wordsworth uses three rhymes, of which one runs throughout the whole sonnet thus: "Weak is the will of man, his judgment blind, Remembrance persecutes, and hope betrays; A mournful thing, so transient is the blaze! And colour life's dark cloud with orient rays. So called from a twelfth century romance in that measure, called the "Alexandreis." Imagination is that sacred power, "Tis hers to pluck the amaranthine flower Wordsworth. 163. The Simple Regular Tetrameter, is the Romantic Measure of English poetry. In it wrote Wace, Barbour, Wyntoun, Harry the Minstrel, and many other of our old Chroniclers and Romancists, and it was revived in modern poetry by Sir Walter Scott. Though not equal in dignity to the Pentameter, it has been employed in almost every kind of poetical composition, except the very highest. 164. Rhyme is almost invariably employed in this measure, the line being too short to admit of the stateliness indispensable to the rhythm of blank verse. Its original form was that of rhymed couplets; e. g.: "Ah, Freedom is a noble thing! Freedom makes men to have liking; Is yearned oure all other thing."—Barbour. 165. To get rid of the monotony which a continuous flow of such couplets produces, Dunbar (see "Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins ") had recourse to a stanza consisting of four such couplets, each followed by a Trimeter in the same measure, the four Tetrameters having the same rhyme. Scott, in his poetical romances, adopts the same principle, but uses it with less regularity, frequently making the four and three feet lines alternate, e. g.: "He was a man of middle age; In aspect manly, grave, and sage, The flash of that satiric rage, And broke the keys of Rome. On milk-white palfrey forth he pac'd; From his steed's shoulder, loin, and breast, SCOTT's description of Sir David Lindsay, 166. In songs and ballads it is frequently used in stanzas of four lines, rhyming alternately; for example, in Scott's "Cadzow Castle." The most impressive form of this measure is the Tennysonian Stanza, first used to any considerable extent in the Laureate's "In Memoriam." In this stanza, two rhyming verses come between other two; e. g. :— "I held it truth with him who sings To one clear harp in divers tones, Or reach a hand thro' time to catch 167. The Simple Regular Trimeter is very rarely used by itself, though there are some examples of it in Shakespeare's lyrics; e.g.: "Blow, blow, thou winter wind, Thou art not so unkind As man's ingratitude; Thy tooth is not so keen, Although thy breath be rude." As you like it, II. 7. It is most frequently found, as stated above (§ 165), in combination with Tetrameters. These two alternating form the most common of our lyrical measures, that of our ballads and popular songs, as well as of our metrical psalms. Sometimes both the Tetrameters and the Trimeters rhyme; as:— |