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 Milton's 
 
 irosody 
 
 3 1924 013 194 125 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013194125 
 
MILTON'S PROSODY 
 
 by 
 
 Robert Bridges 
 CLASSICAL METRES 
 
 IN ENGLISH VERSE 
 
 by 
 
 William Johnson Stone 
 
 Oxford 
 1901 
 
 D 
 
Henry Frowde, M,A. 
 
 Publisher to the University of Oxford 
 London, Edinburgh, and New York 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 Of this bcx)k the first part, my own, has happily 
 outlived its prefaces : it began as a simple tabulation 
 of Milton's practice in Paradise Lest, to which an 
 account of the prosody of Samson Agmistes was added, 
 and in 18^3 eight appendices or notes on various 
 points. To this I now (1501) add an analysis of 
 stress-prosody, and a chapter on the structure /of the 
 English accentual hexameter. My intention throughout 
 has been to provide a sound foundation for a grammar 
 of English prosody, on the basis of Milton's practice, 
 which is chosen not as the final model, but as a con- 
 venient norma, a middle and fixed point, to which 
 all other practice may be referred for comparison. 
 I believe that little beyond what I have written is 
 necessary for the purpose proposed : if I were tempted 
 to add anything, it would be the examination of 
 Chaucer's prosody, whidi in his part of the Homauat 
 of the Rose would, compared with the French orig- 
 inal, show the origin and rationale of our ti'aditional 
 elisions. 
 
 The second part of this book, that by my friend 
 Mr. Stone, must prove of great value to students. It 
 was privately printed in 1 898, and being written without 
 
iv Introduction 
 
 knowledge of my opinions was the cause of my first 
 acquaintance with the author. When the Delegates 
 of the Press asked me to prepare a new edition of 
 my book, I thought myself very fortunate in obtaining 
 their consent and Mr. Stone's to the association of his 
 tract with mine ; and I availed myself of his readiness 
 to recast it from its original form (which was rather 
 that of a plea for the introduction of classical metres into 
 English poetry) and to make it a history and grammar 
 of the subject. As his Essay is an independent con- 
 tribution, and on a different subject from mine, I should 
 have had nothing to say about it here, had not his sudden 
 and lamentable death left me with an immediate re- 
 sponsibility J which I willingly undertake, if I may be 
 explicit about a few matters concerning which we were 
 not in agreement. 
 
 First, then, as to the general thesis. Mr. Stone was 
 ^ convinced advocate for the introduction of classical 
 rules of prosody into English. Upon the advisability 
 or even the possibility of their introduction I do not 
 myself express any opinion. Secondly, as to principles 
 and details, I am in every point in agreement with 
 Mr. Stone's teaching ; except that I am not convinced 
 (though I acknowledge his judgement on such a point 
 to be better than my own) concerning the exclusion 
 (from classical metres in EngUsh) of elisions similar to 
 the Latin : for I do not find the intruding w and y 
 between light syllables to be so consonantal and for- 
 
Introduction v 
 
 bidding as he did. Again, I am not so hopeful as 
 he was about the subjugation of the indeterminate 
 vowel to classical rules of quantity. Use would perhaps 
 convince : and it seems to me — and Mr. Stone would 
 have agreed — ^that on any controverted point the re- 
 ception of any rule for English verse on classical 
 models, such as he contemplated, would have to depend 
 on the results of actual trial and practice j and that 
 there can be no accepted grammar of the method until 
 some poet has written such poetry as can be, with or 
 without minor developments or corrections, approved 
 and accepted. 
 
 Whether or no such poetry be ever written, the 
 practical value of Mr. Stone's paper remains very great 
 for students, as also for those who would write any kind 
 of verse : for the discrimination of English syllables into 
 long and short on classical analogy and phonetic values 
 is not only a useful exercise in itself, and an inquiry 
 of such a sort as must aid any examination of English 
 words as sound-units ; but, if we consider how familiar 
 classical poetry is to English poets, and how much it 
 influences their practice, this definition of the English 
 syllables is a necessary study fbr those who, through 
 habits of English pronunciation, consciously or uncon- 
 sciously misread classical verse; fbr nothing else can 
 enable them to understand it correctly : and it can do 
 this, because it wUl enable them to see and to remove 
 their chief hindrance. 
 
vl Introduction 
 
 The history given by Mr. Stone is also of unique 
 value, for I do not suppose that any one with the same 
 critical intelligence and instinct in these matters can 
 ever before have had the patience to read attentively 
 all the inconsequent notions which have been thrown 
 out on the subject. The rare insight and keen 
 enthusiasm which his essay displays will be always 
 winning from among his readers fresh mourners of 
 his early death: for my part, though I may not 
 here speak to the full, I shall not deny myself the 
 opportunity of recording the tenderness of my aflfection 
 and grief, and my pride in having any work of my own 
 associated with the name of one so very dearly and 
 deservedly beloved. 
 
 R. B. 
 
 1901. 
 
iti. MILTON'S PROSODY 
 
 An examination of the rules of blank verse 
 
 in Milton's later poems with an account of 
 
 the versification of Samson Agonistes & 
 
 general notes by 
 
 ROBERT BRIDGES 
 ^IM.B., F.R.C.T., Hon. Fellow ofC.C.C, Oxford 
 
 A new edition 
 
 Containing a Chapter on the theory of Stress 
 
 Prosody i£ an account of the Prosody of the 
 
 English accentual hexameter 
 
ON THE ELEMENTS 
 
 OF MILTON'S BLANK VERSE IN 
 
 PJKJDISE LOST 
 
 A TYPICAL blank verse may be described as obeying three 
 conditions, (i) It has ten syllables, (z) It has five stresses, 
 (j) It is in rising rhythm, that is, the stresses are upon the 
 even syllables *. 
 
 I shall examine the verse of Paradise Lost in three separate 
 chapters imder these three heads, giving the exceptions — 
 
 (i) To the number of the syllables being ten. pp. 1-12. 
 (z) To the number of the stresses being five. pp. 12-14. 
 (3) To the stressesfalling en the even syllables, pp. 1J-17. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 OF SUPERNUMERARY SYLLABLES t. 
 A. EXTRAMETRICAL SYLLABLES. 
 
 I. At end of line. An extra syllable sometimes 
 OCCURS at the end of the line, more rarely in Milton 
 than in most writers, e.g. 
 (i) Of rebel Angek, by whose aid aspi(riiig). i. 38 and ex, (zj) (^j). 
 
 * For an explanation of the teriss rising arid falling and mess, and for the ob- 
 jeaions to using the terms of quantitative for accentual feet, see Appendix G. 
 
 "f In Chaucer the line is occasionally deficient in the number of syllables, 
 see pp. 3 3-3 j", 86, 1 1 1 . There is no instance of this in Parodist Lost. 
 BRIDGES B 
 
2 The Verse of 
 
 Sometimes there are two such syllables, e.g. 
 
 (i) Imbued, bring to their sweetness no sati(ety). viii. ai6. 
 (3) For solitude sometimes is best soci(ety). ix. 14.9. See p. 4.1. 
 
 II. In other parts of the line. In Shakespeare it 
 
 is common to find an analogous syllable in the midst of the 
 
 line. See App. A. And thus in Comus — 
 
 (4.) To quench the drouth of Phoe(bus); which as they taste. 66. 
 (j) And as I passed I wor(shipped). If those you seek. 30a. 
 (6) And earth's base built on stub(ble). But come let's on. ^99. 
 {7) But for that damned magi(cian), let him be girt. 6oi. 
 
 (8) Root-bound that fled Apol(lo]. Fool, do not boast. 66%. 
 
 (9) Crams and blasphemes his fee(der). Shall I go on ? 779. 
 
 In p. l. Milton disallowed the use of this syllable. 
 In the following lines, where the rhythmical effect is partly 
 preserved, the extra syllable is accounted for by Elision. 
 See B. II. on next page. 
 
 (10) Departed from (thee) ; and thou resemb'lst now. iv. 839. 
 
 (11) Before (thee); and not repenting, this obtain, x. yj. 
 
 (la) Of high collateral glo(ry): Him thrones and powers, x. 86, etc 
 etc. 
 
 B. Other supernumerary syllables fall under Elision 
 (which term is here used as a convenient name, but not to 
 imply that anything is cut offj or lost, or not pronounced). 
 See App. B. 
 
 I. The Elisions of common speech. As in the first 
 line, 
 
 (13) Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit, 
 where the ;e in 'disobedience' is neither a diphthong nor 
 a disyllable. [In his earlier poems Milton has sometimes 
 used the older full pronunciation of such words, e.g. Comut : 
 
Paradise Lost 3 
 
 (14.) with all, the grisly legi-ons that troop. 603. 
 
 (15) Or ghastly furies' appariti-on. 64.1. 
 
 (16) By a strong siding champion consci-ence. iiz. 
 
 and thus Delusi-on, conditi-on, complexi-orij visi-oiij con- 
 templati-on, etc. There is no example of this in P. X.] 
 
 II. Poetic Elisions. These, which were common in 
 Shakespeare, Milton in P. L. reduced, and brought under 
 law. His rules are four. 
 
 a. The first is the rule of open vowels. All open 
 
 VOWELS MAY BE ELIDED, WHETHER LONG, SHORT, DOUBLE, OR 
 COMBINED; AND WHETHER BOTH THE VOWELS BE IN THE 
 SAME WORD, OR DIVIDED BETWEEN TWO: AND h IS NO 
 
 LETTER. Such words as the following fall under this rule : — 
 Being, doing, flying, riot, violent, Israel, Abraham, atheist, 
 hierarchy, variety, obsec^uious, vitiated, etc. and the italicized 
 vowels in the following lines ; e.g. 
 
 (17) Above thf Amaxa mount, while it pursues, i, i ;. 
 
 (18) To set himself in glorji above his peers, i. 39. 
 
 (19) Strange horror seize th«, itnd pangs unfelt before, ii. 703. 
 
 (20) Virtue in her shape how lovely ; saw, and pined, iv. 84.8. 
 (2.1) Not in themselves all their known virtue appears, ix, no, etc. 
 (12) No /ngratefiil food : and food alike those pure. v. 4.07. 
 
 (23) For still they knew, and ought to ^ve still remembered, x. 12. 
 (24.) And rapture so oft beheld: those heavenly shapes, ix. 1082. 
 (2;) Though kept &om man, and worthy to be admired, ix. 746. 
 {2£) He effected. Man he made and for him built, ix. i;2. 
 (27} As lords, a spacious world, to our native heaven, x. 467. 
 (28) Little inferiour, by ray adventure hard. x. 468. 
 {29) Thou didst accept them : wilt thou enjoy the good. x. 7/8. 
 (30) For God is also in sleep; and dreams advise, xii, 611. 
 (31} With spattering noise rejected : oft the)> assayed, x. 567 and ex. 
 (10,11,11). 
 
 B 2 
 
The Verse of 
 
 In such words as Higher, though, the silent g DOES NOT 
 FORBID, e.g. 
 
 (32) Not hg*CT that hill, nor wider looking round, xi. 381. 
 
 (33) For he who tempts, tho;^ m. vain, at least asperses, ix. ajff. 
 
 And w may be disregarded as a vowel : as in the words 
 Power, bower, flower, shower, sewer, toward, follower, 
 narrower, etc., and thus the following : — 
 
 (34.} Of sorrow unfeigned, and humiliation meek. x. 109Z. 
 
 And when mh is pronounced fe, e.g. 
 
 (3 j) To mhora thus the portress of Hell-gate replied. li. 74^, 
 (3S) Two onlj', nho yet by sovran gift possess, v. 366 and (1+8). 
 
 [+ In the list of words just ^iven there are two, Sewtr 
 (a drain) and toward, which have come down to us contracted 
 each of them in two diiferent ways j Toward either as to'ard 
 (both to'ard and tii'ard) or t'ward, and Sewer seems to have 
 had a form shore, which is not quite obsolete. There may 
 be room therefore for difference of opinion as to how these 
 words would have 'heea pronounced by Milton, but as he 
 spells them they belong to the class .of words sufiering 
 elision by virtue of w considered as a vowel.] 
 
 p. The second rule, pure R. Of unstressed vowels 
 separated by r the first may be elided, as in the 
 words Nectarous, weltering, suffering, glimmering, etc., 
 mineral, general, several, every, artillery, desperate, de- 
 liberate, emperour, amorous, timorous, torturer, disfiguring, 
 measuring, etc. 
 
 (37) Invoke thy aid to my advent»re«s song. i. 13 and (iz) (jiV 
 
Paradise Lost j 
 
 Also WHEN THE WRITTEN VOWEL IS COMPOUND, as Conqueror, 
 labouring, savoury, neighbouring, honouring, endeavouring, 
 etc., and thus are to be explained such verses as the follow- 
 ing, where the elision is between two words : — 
 
 (38) A pillar of state : deep on his front engraven, ii. 301. 
 
 (39) ^y <^^y ^ cloud, by night a pilUr^f fire. xii. 203. 
 
 (40) All judgement, whether in heaven, or earth, or hell. x. 57. 
 (4.1] Celestial, whether among the thrones, or named, xi. 296. 
 (4.2) Carnation, purple, azun, or specked with gold. ix. 4.29. 
 
 (43) With spots of gold & purple, azure and green, vii. 479. 
 
 (44) The savo»r of death from all things there chat live. x. 269. 
 
 t Note on the word SPiKjT. 
 Milton uses the word spirit (and thus its derivatives) to 
 fill indifferently one or two places of the ten in his verse 
 (e. g. I. 17 and 10 1). The first vowel cannot suffer elision 
 under the lule of pure r, because it is stressed. The word 
 is an exception. It commonly suppresses one i, the question 
 is which. It might be the first, for the old French esjiirh, 
 whence our word immediately derives, has become esfrit, 
 and we have a form sfrhe. But Milton would have written 
 this J and we may be confident that he suppresses the 
 second vowel, following the Italian use, which in poetry 
 both writes and pronounces sfirito and sfirto, e.g. 
 
 Mentre che 1' uno spir'to qnesto disse. Inf. v. 139. 
 
 J There is a local burring pronunciation of r (heard some- 
 times when Americans say American) which, when the first 
 of the separated vowels is stressed, disguises the second : and 
 it has been suggested that this is the account of Milton's pro- 
 nunciation of sfirit, and even supposed that the same burr 
 
S The Verse of 
 
 caused the contraction of words like general, mineral, towards 
 
 gener'l, miner'L But Milton printed gen'ral, and the line, 
 
 ix. 1116, 
 
 cho thus of lace 
 Columbus found the Ame-ri-can so girt, 
 
 and the consideration of Milton's choice Italian, and of the 
 fact that in his verse Merit, prosperity, and like words never 
 show any sign of loss of length, will be sufficient to establish 
 the proper reading of the word spirit in P. L. and discredit 
 this ugly suggestion altogether. See App. E. 
 
 tt The pure r occurring in adjectives in able, as tolerable, 
 does not allow elision, the a taking the stress-place, see 
 under next rule : and misery is always three syllables. 
 y. The third rule of pure L. Unstressed vowels before 
 PURE / MAY BE ELIDED, as in the words Popular, populous, 
 articulate, credulous, groveling, perilous, or even when the 
 / is written double, as in Devillish, e. g. 
 (+y) -As one who long in pop«.'i7«s city pent. ix. 44j-. 
 
 [t Of these words, perilous should not be considered as 
 losing its i in the burr of the r (parlous). See above, on 
 preceding page, J.] 
 
 The CHIEF EXERCISE OF THIS ELISION IS IN THE TERMINATION 
 
 OF WORDS, ESPECIALLY ADJECTIVES IN ble, the k being treated 
 as pronounced el or 7, e. g. 
 
 (4.S) His temple right against the temp/« of God. i. 4.02. 
 (.1.7) Arraying with reflected purpfc and gold. iv. S96- 
 
 (4.8) Wandering shall in a glorious temp/f tnshrine. xii. 33+, etc. 
 
 (4.9) Impenetrabfe, impaled with circling fire. ii. 64.7. 
 (j-o) The portal shone, inimitabfe on earth, iii. jo8. 
 (j-i) Son, in whose ftce invisible is beheld, vi. 681. 
 
Paradise Lost 7 
 
 (f i) InextricaWe, or strict necessity, v. ;%%. 
 
 (j-3) To none communicab/e in. earth or heaven, vii. 114.. 
 
 {1-4.) Invisib/e else above all stars, the wheel, viii. 1 35'. 
 
 (j;) Foe not informidab/r ! exempt from wound, ix. ^.%6. 
 
 (f6) Inhospitable appear and desolate, xi. 30S. 
 
 {fj) Distinguishab/e >n member, joint, or limb. ii. 66^. 
 
 J Adjectives in ble which seem to offer an alternative 
 
 elision in the middle of the word, as miserable^ suffer the 
 
 elision of the termination preferably to the other, however 
 
 opposed to present taste or use this may be, e. g. 
 
 (5-8) Innumerab/e. M when the potent rod. i. 338. 
 
 (5-9) Of depth immeasurab/e. ^non they move. i. ^4.9. 
 
 (So) More tolerab/e: if there be cure or charm, ii. 4^0. 
 
 (61) To be invulnerab/e in those bright arms. ii. 8ia. 
 
 (Sx) Hung amiab/e, Hesperian fables true. iv. ij-oj cp. (71), (78), 
 
 (86), (93)- 
 (53) Invulnerab/e, impenetrably armed, vi. 4.00. 
 (64.) So unimaginab/e, as hate in Heaven, vii. 54.. 
 (6j) Innumerab/e; and this which yields or fills, vii. 88. 
 
 (66) They viewed the vast immeasurab/e abyss, vii. 2.11. 
 
 (67) First man, of men innumerab/e ordained, viii. 197. 
 
 (68) Abominab/e, accurst, the house of woe. x. 465-. 
 
 {Sg) Scarce tolerab/e; and from the north to call. x. 6j'4. 
 
 (70) O miserab/eof happy ! is this theend. x. 72.0. 
 
 (71) By Death at last ; and miserab/e <t is. x. 981. 
 (71) His heart I know, how variab/eand vain. xi. 92. 
 
 (73) Deeds to thy knowledge answerab/e; add faith, xii. ^8i. 
 
 (74) Abominab/e, mutterab/e, and worse, ii. 626. 
 
 5J The evidence that this is the intended elision is as 
 follows : that such words only occur either 
 First with foil value of all the syllables, and this very fre- 
 quently, e. g. 
 
 (7y) Thy praises, with th' innumferablJ sound, iii. 14.7. 
 
 (76) Me misSrablfe I which way shall I fly. iv. 73. 
 
 (77) InsupJrabtt height of loftiest shade, iv. 138. 
 
8 The Verse of 
 
 (78] Rafael, the sociable spirit that deigned, v. 211, 
 
 (79) InnumSrabli as the stars of night, v. 74^. 
 
 (80) Among innumerable false, unmored. v, 898. 
 
 (81) If answirablfe style I can obtain, ix. ao. 
 
 (82] Kone arguing stood ; innumerable hands, vl. ^'oS. 
 
 (83) Things not reveal'd, which th' inv/siblfe King. vii. liz; cp.{97). 
 
 (84) Of men innumerable, there to dwell, vii. ij6. 
 (ij) With fiy innumerable swarm, and shoals, vii. 400. 
 
 (86) To make her amiable ; on she came. viii. 484 5 cp. (62). 
 
 (87) Ye cedars, with innumerable boughs, ix. 1089. 
 
 (88) Inseparable, must with me along, x. 2/0. 
 
 (89) Not unagreeable, to found a path. x. %;6. 
 
 (90) On all sides, from innumerable tongues, x. 5-07. 
 
 (91) More miserable! both have sinned; but thou. x. 930. 
 
 (92) Unutterable, which the spirit of prayer, xi, 6. 
 
 (93) That I should fear 5 nor sociably mild. xi. 234. 
 
 (94) O miserable mankind, to what fall. xi. joo. 
 
 And thus : — 
 
 (9J-) Than mi|sera|bie to' have | eter|n3l being, ii. 98. 
 
 {g6) Shoots in|visl|bie vir|tue even to | the deep. iii. j86 j see p. 3S. 
 
 (97) To hulman sense | the' invi|si-bie | exploits, v. jSj 5 cp. (83), 
 
 {S6), and p. 38. 
 
 (98) Of some I thing not | unsea|s&na|bie to' ask. viii. 201. 
 
 Or Secondly, before a vowel, as in examples (yg) to (74). 
 Or Thirdly, at the end of a line, where they can make an 
 extrametrical syllable [see p. r, A. I.], e. g. 
 
 (99) Fall'n Cherub ! to be weak is miserable, i. 1^7. 
 
 In which verse the alternative would make an inferior 
 rhythm. 
 
 (100) Bristled with upright beams innumerable, vi. 82. 
 (loi) Where boldest, though to sight unconquerable, vi. 1 18, 
 
 (102) Of all our good, shamed, naked, miserable, ix. 1139, etc. 
 which are all like this nnelidible, 
 
 (103) obscured, where highest woods, impenetrable, ix. 1086. 
 
Paradise Lost 9 
 
 t+ There is only one (?) exception, viz. the following 
 line, 
 
 (104.) Innumerable before the Almighty's throne, v. jij. 
 
 in which the word standing contracted before a consonant 
 
 must suffer in the other place. See App. C. 
 
 ttt Note on the word evil. In Shakespeare the 
 word evil is sometimes contracted, and it has been asserted 
 that this contraction was due to loss of the -v and a pronun- 
 ciation eel. But with regard to Milton's use, the facts are 
 that Evil occurs some forty times uncontracted, and about 
 eight times besides at the end of lines (uncontracted), while 
 of the eight times that it suffers contraction or elision seven 
 are before a vowel, and thus bring the word under the rule 
 of final /. Besides this, Milton has written knowledge of good 
 and ill, instead of good and evil, where the required elision is 
 forbidden by a consonant. It will therefore be more regular 
 to consider the following line, 
 (10/) Both good and evil; good lost and evil got. ix. 1072. 
 
 as an exception, or an error of the pen or printer for evil and 
 good, which gives a better verse. 
 
 * And Milton did not use the v contraction of E-ven, e'en, 
 for he prints Ev'n, as he does Heav'n ; and thus Eev'ning and 
 Eev'n, and Searv'n for seven, see next rule. 
 
 8. The fourth rule is of the elision of unstressed vowels 
 before n. 
 
 E before final n does not require the n to be pure, 
 e. g.j Heaven, even, seven, etc. such words seem to follow 
 
10 The Verse of 
 
 the analogy of the contracted (rather than elided) participle 
 
 in e»j see C. II. a. on next page. 
 
 OTHER VOWEtSj AND E BEFORE N NOT FINALj REQUIRE 
 
 THE N PURE : e. g. Business, hardening, original, opening, 
 countenance, luminous, ominous, threatening, brightening, 
 deafening, libidinous, unreasoning, etc. And this rule 
 governs the following examples : — 
 
 (log) whom xeasm hath equalled, force hach made supreme, i. 248. 
 
 (107) For those rebellious ; here their prison ordained, i. 71. 
 
 (108) Of massy iron, or solid rock, with ease. ii. 878. 
 
 and final en is often thus found, 
 
 (109) Earth, and the garden of God, with cedars crowned, v. 260, etc. 
 (no) Our own begotten, and of our loins to bring, x. 983, etc. 
 
 There are only (?) two exceptions, viz. the virords prison 
 and iron are each of them contracted once before a conso- 
 nant, 
 
 (in) Out of such prison, though spirits of purest light, vi. 660. 
 iron, iii. ^94, might have its usual pronunciation iern. 
 
 * Derivatives of seven, etc. follow the use of the simple 
 words, e. g. sevenfold, heavenly. 
 
 t. The only (;) exception to the above four rules of 
 ELISION IS THE WORD capital, which is contracted, ii. 924 ; 
 xi. 343 5 and its related Cafitoline be. J08. 
 
 C. Of Contractions (treated of here for convenience), 
 these, like elisions, are either — 
 
 I. Of common speech. Such as the perfect tenses and 
 participles in ed, which Milton often writes t as pronounced : 
 and these need no comment, but note 
 (112) Confus'dly, and which thus must ever fight, ii. jii). (sic). 
 
Paradise Lost 1 1 
 
 II. Poetical contractions. (Such as common use 
 has made distinct words are not reckoned, e. g. o'er, e'er.) 
 
 a. First of these the contraction of the perfect participle 
 IN en. E. g. Fall'nj ris'n, driv'n, chos'n, giv'n, eat'n, fbrbid- 
 d'n, etc. (see elision imder n, and App. B). 
 
 /3. Second. Milton prefers the contracted form of 
 the termination of the second person singular of 
 VERBS ; writing not only Thinkst, seekst, spakst, sawst, 
 dwellst, etc., but eatst, foundst, commandst, which are 
 ugly ; and preferring Rememberst to Rememb'rest, Openst 
 to Op'nest, as his theory compelled Revisitst for Revis'test. 
 
 y. Third. The superlative termination similar in form to 
 the last was not unfrequently contracted by Shakespeare. 
 Milton does not contract this : in P. Z. i. 201 he forbids it 
 by printing th' for the. There is one exception in P. i{. 
 (113) Severest temper, smooth the rugged'st brow. P. R. ii. 154.. 
 8. Fourth. The contraction of in the, of the, etc., common 
 in Shakespeare, is not made use of in P. L. The exception 
 /' th' midst, i. 224, xi. 432, stands alone. 
 
 Summary of foregoing rules. 
 
 All the poetical elisions and contractions in P. L. may there- 
 fore be reduced to the following four rules : — 
 
 1. Open vowels (as interpreted). 
 
 2. Vowels separated by the liquids /, n, r (as defined). 
 
 3. Final en. 
 
 4. The 2nd pers. sing, of verbs. 
 
12 The Verse of 
 
 The only exceptions are — 
 
 I. The word capital ) „ ... 
 
 „, , . . \ See p. 14, under short 1. 
 
 z. The word sfvnt J 
 
 3. The words Iron, frlson^ and e:;/^ each once. 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OF VARIETY IN NUMBER OF STRESSES. 
 
 A. The typical line has five full stresses, e. g. 
 
 (114) Raised impious wfr in Heiv*!!, and bittle proud. 1. 4.3. 
 
 + Stress has perhaps a natural tendency to be weaker in 
 the alternate places, like music in common time, and typi- 
 cally the stronger stresses would be in the odd places, see 
 (i 2 j), (i ^Oj (' *7)* ^•'^ ^ ^ five-foot metre (and this is one 
 of its advantages) it is evident that the odd foot will contra- 
 dict this and set up varieties : and all possible combinations 
 of these are used. 
 
 B. Lines with only four stresses. It is common 
 for one stress in the line to be absent, or to be so much 
 weaker than the others that it may be considered as ^ling. 
 In the following examples the two syllables of the foot from 
 which the stress is absent are marked thus \J\j. This does 
 not imply that these syllables are always classically short in 
 quantity, though they are almost always light. 
 
 I. The omitted stress may be the first, e.g. (13*), 
 (133), and 
 
 (iij) And 5fn luxurious cities, wWre the noise, i. 498. 
 (116] As fr8m the center thrice to th' utmost pole. i. 74, 
 
Paradise Lost 13 
 
 t Note, the effect of this is always to weaken the line. 
 It is therefore rare, and it is only in long poems that it can 
 be used at all freely with good effect. 
 
 +t Initial weak feet are, like the examples above, almost 
 always made up of two monosyllables, and a slight accent 
 will be given in reading to the first of them, so that the foot 
 is really inverted ; see p. i y on inversions, and on inversions 
 of the firstfoot. Thus in ex. iif a slight stress falls on the 
 conjunction and none on the preposition. As to whether 
 the prepositions had more stress value in Milton's time, so 
 as to forbid this rhythm, see App. E, 
 
 +tt The conjunction and often occurs in stress-places in 
 Milton's verse, where stressing it would make the verse 
 ridiculous. See Par. g£g. Knes 99-109. 
 
 II. The stress may be omitted in the second place, e. g. 
 
 (117) Served dnlj? to discover sights of woe. i. 64.. 
 
 (118) Scill glorious, bSfore whom awike I stood, viii. 4.64.. 
 
 t This last is perhaps an example of the Rule OF THE 
 RECESSION, OR RETREATING OF ACCENT, L e. when a disyllabic 
 accented on the last was followed immediately by another 
 strongly accented syllable, the accent of the former was 
 sometimes in speaking shifted back, and before whom may 
 have been read bef-or wh6m. But it is better to consider 
 that there is no recession of accent in Paradise Lost. See 
 for exceptions App. D, 
 This rhythm may give very beautiful verses, e. g. 
 
 (119) Nor se'rved it tS relfx their serried ffles. vi. jgy. 
 
 (120) Our little life [ Is rodndSd with a sleep. Shakespeare. 
 
14 7 he Verse of 
 
 III. Or the stress may fail in the third place, e. g. 
 
 (lai) A dungeon hdrribl? on all sides round, i. 6i. 
 
 t The failure of the middle stress divides the line into 
 
 two equal parts ; which rhythm was much used by Pope for 
 
 the exhibition of antithesis, etc. Thousands of monotonous 
 
 lines since run in this maimer, 
 
 (i2i) The fr/ar hdoded Snd the monarch crowned. Est. on M. 
 
 „ c(5bbler £pron „ „ pirson gown. ii. 
 
 „ ints' republic „ „ r^alm of b^es. ii. 
 
 „ ript'rous moment „ „ plicid hour. Bj/rm. 
 
 „ fowl domestic „ „ hodsehold dog. Wordsn. 
 
 IV. Or the fourth place may fail. This is very com- 
 mon, e. g. 
 
 (113) Sole reigning, holds the tyrSnnjr of heaven, i. 124.. 
 
 V. Or the fifth place may be weak; but here the 
 
 CLOSE of the line WILL GIVE A CONVENTIONAL STRESS, e. g. 
 (124) No light; but rither darkness vfsibl6. i. 63. 
 
 C. Some lines have only three full stresses, e. g. 
 
 (i2/) His mi'nJstSrs of v^ngeSnce 5nd pursiiit. i. 170. 
 
 (126) The sojourners of Gdshen wh8 beheld. 309.* 
 
 (127) Transfix iis tS the bottom 8f this gulf. 329. 
 
 Iq many cases a weak place in such lines is balanced or 
 accounted for by strengthening (even to stressing) the 
 normally unstressed syllable, which is attached to the 
 next following stress. See again App. D. 
 
 * This line exhibits a long vowel (who) in the stress-place refusing to 
 carry any kind of emphasis. 
 
Paradise Lost if 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 OF INVERSION OF RHYTHM. 
 Blank verse is typically in rising rhythm ; i. e. the stress 
 is regularly on the even syllables, as in ex. (i 14). 
 But the rhythm is sometimes falling; i.e. the stress 
 MAY BE shifted on to the odd syllable in any place in the 
 line. It is then described as inverted. 
 
 + Of inverted stress. Inversions of stress in all 
 places except the first disturb the rhythm so as to call atten- 
 tion to the word which carries the irregular stress : they are 
 therefore used primarily in relation to the sense (see the 
 following examples (a)). But in a long poem like P. L. the 
 more common inversions soon become as familiar to the ear 
 as is the typical rhythm ; they then fall into the condition of 
 the inversion of the first foot, and enliven the rhythm with- 
 out taxing the sense (see the following examples (b)). 
 
 +t Inversion is most common in the istfoot, next in the 
 3rd and 4th, very rare in 2nd, and most rare in Jth. 
 
 I. Inversions of the first foot. This inversion does not 
 affect the sense, but it freshens the rhythm, e. g. 
 (iz8) Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace, i. 6;. 
 
 + As a general rule, when the first foot is weak [see p. 1 2 
 B. I.] it will strengthen itself by a slight conventional 
 inversion in spite of the sense, e.g. 
 (izj) We shall be free. i. i/9 and (146), (147). 
 
 i't This behaviour of the initial foot accounts also for all 
 inversions which follow periods in the sense. 
 
i(j The Verse of 
 
 II. Inversion of the second stress, e. g. 
 
 (130) (a) A minJ nit to be changed by time or place, i. ^s%^ 
 
 (131) (a) Me, me inly, just object of his ire. x. 93S. 
 
 (i3z) To the garden of bliss, thy seat prepared, viii. 199. 
 (133) In the wrtoB* of God. It was a hill. xi. 377. See p. 36. 
 
 III. Inversion of third stress, e. g. 
 
 (134.) (a) For one restraint, /onir o/ihe world besides, i. 31. 
 
 (•35) W Which, tasted, works kainle^e of good and evil. vii. /4.3. 
 
 IV. Inversion of fourth stress, e. g. 
 
 (136) (a) Illumine; what is low, wi/e a«<i support, i. 23. 
 
 (137) (a) As when two polar winds, USmng adverse, x. 185. 
 
 (138) Before thy fellows, amb/nW to win. vi. 160. 
 
 (139) (b) .From noon, and gentle airs, die at their hour. x. 93. 
 
 V. Inverted fifth stress. This is very rare, and does not 
 so much emphasize the word which carries it, as it imparts 
 strangeness to the sentence, weJI used in the following ex- 
 amples : — 
 
 (14.0) Beyond all past example and future, x. 84.0. 
 
 (14.1) Which of us who beholds the bright surfece. vi. 4.72. 
 
 t Some poets say that this rhythm is impossible, and was 
 not intended ; and would accent iiiture and suriQce on the 
 last J and so they must accent f rostrate in 
 
 (14.2) Of Thrones and mighty Seraphim prostrate, vi. 84.1. 
 though Milton always uses fhme and prostrate, and there is 
 said to be no other example o£ surface in literature. If it be 
 argued that these words, being compounds or Latin, do not 
 forbid the distortion, it may be that they were chosen to 
 give such readers an option ; and this would cover 
 
 (14.3) Spoiled Principalities and Powers, triumphed, x. 186. 
 
Paradise Lost 17 
 
 for this verb is accented either way. See Comus 974. But 
 141 is a very beautifiil inversion, and 141 is descriptive. 
 It would have been strange if Milton had never used this 
 rhythm, for there are several ways by which it is naturally 
 arrived at (e. g. seefitomip. 83), especially from our reading 
 classical iambic verse. 
 
 tt The above inversions, as all other variations of 
 rhythm, owe their value to the presupposed metrical type 
 from which they vary : but they must not be disguised by 
 reading a conventional stress in the regular place. The 
 rhythm is determined by them, and the metre is not falsified 
 for two reasons ; first, because the interruption is not long 
 enough, the verse immediately returning to the original 
 rhythm ; the second, because a majority of verses enforce 
 the impression of the type. 
 
 VI. There may be more than one inversion in the 
 
 SAME LINE. 
 
 a. Examples of inversion of ist and 2nd. See p. 35. 
 
 (144) (a) Universal reproach, fer worse to bear. vi. 34. 
 (i+y) B^ the witers of life, where'er they sat. xi. 79. 
 
 /3. Of 3rd AND 4tL 
 
 (146) (a) As a despite done against the Most High. vi. 90$. 
 y. Of 2nd AND 4th. 
 
 (147) (b) In their triple degrees 5 regions to which, v. 7^0. 
 
 In these last two examples the weak first foot is also inverted. 
 See above, I. + on p. ly. 
 
 BRIDGES C 
 
1 8 The Verse of 
 
 Note. 
 
 There are two points to observe in Milton's manner of using 
 
 his rules of elision. First, that the rules being in every case 
 
 only permissive, he indicates no rule for their use ; their 
 
 application is arbitrary. We read on the same page : — 
 
 (14.8) To whom Mi|chael thus, | he al|-so moved, | replied, xi. 4-/3. 
 (14.9] To whom I thus Mi|cha-el} | Death thou | hast seen. ^6. 
 
 Again, after 
 
 The imjage of | a brute, 
 
 we have 
 
 (ijo) Th' image | of God | in man, | crea|ted once. xi. j-o8 and cp. 
 vii. j'17. 
 
 Again, the substantive Being suffers elision, 
 (i^i) That gave | thee being, | still shades | thee, and | protects, ix. 166. 
 while the less important participle has sometimes its full 
 value, 
 
 (ij-i) His vifolence | thou fearst j not, be|-ing such. ix. 2.82, etc. etc. 
 Second, that Milton came to scan his verses one way, and read 
 them another. The line quoted above (ijo), and add IV. 
 80 J, must be read, The im\age of God \ like The sa.\vour of 
 Death \ (44), and .yffil\lar of state \ (38). 
 Again, the line 
 
 (i J3) Of rain|bows and | starry eyes. | The wa|ters thus, 
 must be read. 
 
 Of rain|bows and stirjry eyes. | The wi|ters thus. vii. 446. 
 In example (95) there scanned, we must read 
 
 Shdots inlvfsible | virtue | ^ven to | the deep; 
 compare also what is said on Samson, pp. 43, 44. 
 
Paradise Lost 19 
 
 We may say generally that Milton's system in Par, Lost was 
 an attempt to keep blank verse decasyllabic by means of 
 fictions : or (if we suppose that he admitted the principle 
 of metrical equivalence, — i. e. the principle by which a place, 
 which can be occupied by a long syllable, may admit two 
 short ones in its stead, see App. F), it may be said that he 
 formulated the common conditions of those syllables which 
 experience showed were oftenest and best used for trisyllabic 
 places ; and then worked within the line which he had thus 
 drawn. 
 
 On the caesura or break in the verse. 
 
 Like the classic metres which have the caesura fixed 
 by rule, a blank verse in English tends to divide itself into 
 two balancing parts ; and a natural rhythmical division may 
 generally be felt in lines which contain no grammatical 
 pause. But where there is any grammatical pause it is that 
 which determines the break. 
 
 Now since blank verse is a system of short sentences of 
 all possible variety of length, fitted within the frame of a five- 
 foot metre, the tendency of the break towards the middle 
 part of the verse is easily lost ; and when the verse is handled 
 in a masterly manner the break may occur well in any part 
 of the line. It is necessary, therefore, to discard the word 
 caesura, with its precise signification, and call this division in 
 blank verse the break. 
 
 In the following illustrations consider the verse as of ten 
 C 2 
 
20 The Verse of 
 
 syllabic units, and the break to occur between the two 
 
 components of ten which are given tO Represent the verse ; 
 
 thus, — 
 
 iz 34,5-6 7 89 to 
 (i j-4) Of mail's first dis-o-be-dience, and the fruit 
 
 is a 7 + 3 line : i. e. the break occurs between the 7 th 
 
 and 8th syllables : seven before it and three after. 
 
 Here is arl example of the relation between sentences and 
 
 metre in an elaborate passage. The following sentences : — 
 
 • * * Harmonious numbers ; $ syllables. 
 
 As the wakeful bird sings darkling, 8 
 
 And in shadiest covert hid, 7 
 
 Tunes her nocturnal note. 6 
 
 Thus with the year seasons return j 8 
 
 But not to me returns day, 7 
 Or the sweet approach of even or morn. 9 
 
 make the verses, 
 
 (lyj) Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful bird [6 + 5] 
 
 (156) Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid, [3 + 7] 
 
 (1/7) Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year [a + 4] 
 
 (iy8) Seasons return; but not to me returns [4 + 6] 
 
 (1/9) Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn. iii. 38 st^. [1 + 9] 
 
 The above and the following will give examples of all the 
 
 NINE SINGLE BREAKS: 
 
 (160) Jbin voices all ye living souls: ye Birds, v. 197. [8 + 2] 
 
 • * • Firm they might have stood 
 
 (161) Yet fell: remember ajid fear to trah'sgress. vi-end. [2+8] 
 
 * • * Such as in their souls infixed ■/: 
 
 (161) Plagues: they astonished all resistance lost. vi. 838. [1 + 0] 
 (163) And bush with friziled hair implicit : Last [9 + 1] 
 
 Rose as in dance the stately trees, etc. vii. 313. 
 
 Observe in the last three examples how the break emphasizes 
 the sense 
 
Paradise Lost 21 
 
 t The. qarly defenders of Par. Zqst, when still fewer tl}ari 
 fit, were scandalized by the verse 1+9. This should be 
 remejnbere^ in pqssibly analogous cases by those who now 
 sit in their critical seats. 
 
 doublb breaks. 
 
 There are sometimes two or more breaks in a line : 
 the frequence of these, with the severity of the breaks, is a 
 distinction of Milton's verse. The following are some exam- 
 ples. It is not always possible to say whether a verse has one 
 or two breaks ; readers would differ. 
 
 {164.) Hail Son of God, Saviour of men ! Thy name. iii. 4.11. 
 
 [4 + 4 + 2] 
 (i6j) Instruct me, for thou knowst ; Thou from the first, i. 19. 
 
 [3 + 8 + 41 
 
 (166) Shall grieve him, if I fail not, and disturb, i. 167. [3 + 4 + 3] 
 
 (167) of God, as with a mantle, didst invest, iii. 10. [2 + 5 + 3] 
 Ex. (iz8)is [5 + 3 + 2] 
 
 These are indications of the varieties, which are number- 
 less ; for when the metrical components of a verse are parts 
 of sentences the other parts of which go to the composition 
 of the next verses before and after, the breaks of such 
 verses cannot be considered apart : and were these varieties 
 exhausted, the variations of these as affected by the position 
 of weak or inverted stresses would remain to reckon, before 
 the changes possible in the mere formal rhythm, apart from 
 all that is introduced by the language, were enumerated. 
 There are few who will pursue this path any further. 
 
 P.S. — If should be added that any consideration of Milton's rhythm 
 or versification in P. L. should exclude those passages where he follows 
 the Authorised Version of the Bible — especially where the speaker is 
 
22 The Verse of Paradise Lost 
 
 the Deity. Reverence for the text has made him insert it almost un- 
 altered, the lines are often as bad as thejr can be, and one of them does 
 not scan. Their justification does not lie in prosody. The occasional 
 intrusion of a foreign force refractory to the main current has the eSecc 
 of powerfully enhancing the value of the normal. Dante got this effect 
 by the use of Latin quotations in his carefiilly versified poem; and 
 I think that Milton's liberties might have been more powerfiil if he could 
 have used the Vulgate instead of the vernacular version. 
 
ON THE 
 
 PROSODY OF PAKJDISE I^EGAINED 
 
 AND SAMSON AGONISTES 
 
 Paradise ^gained and Samson .yfgonhtes were written some 
 time after the completion of Paradise Lost, and the examination 
 of their metre and rhythm is therefore of great interest, as it 
 must divulge to us whether Milton was satisfied with the rules 
 by which he had bound himself in his long poem j and, if he was 
 not, in what direction he was inclined to alter them. Such an 
 inquiry will show that Milton did not think it worth while to 
 keep strictly to his laws of elision,' but that he approved of the 
 great rhythmical experiments which he had made, and extended 
 these. 
 
 In examining these two poems, I shall arrange the matter in 
 two chapters ; in the first I will give all the examples which show 
 departure from the rules of prosody tabulated from Paradise 
 Lost — this must be somewhat tedious, but it is necessary, and 
 fortunately not a very long affair — ; in the second I will give an 
 account of the metrical and rhythmical system o£ Samson, which 
 contains Milton's most elaborate and artificial versification. 
 
24 MiltorPs latest Verse 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 On the relaxation which is found in Paradise I{egained 
 AND Samson ^gonistes of THE LAWS OF 'ELISION* SO 
 CALLED IN Paradise Lost. 
 
 There are altogether only about a score of exceptions to the 
 old rales: a number so small that they might be attributed 
 to a less careful practice : but this supposition is untenable in 
 itself, and is not supported by the character of the exceptions. 
 None of the following lines would have been admitted into 
 Paradise Lost : 
 
 (i) The worst of all indigniVies yet on me. S. A. 134.1. 
 
 (i) The rest was magnanimity to remit. 14.70. 
 
 (3) And he in that calamiVous prison left. 14.80. 
 
 (4.) Thy poUVic maxims or that cumbersome. P. R. iii. 4.00. 
 
 (j-) With youthfiil courage and magnanimous thoughts. S. A. ^14.. 
 
 (6) She 's gone, a mamyest serpent by her sting. 997. 
 
 (7) But provWence or instinct of nature seems. 1 54.J. 
 
 (8) And all the flourwWng works of peace destroy. P. R. iii. 80. 
 
 (9) Wilt thou, then, serve the PhiltVrines with that gift. S. A. jjj, 
 
 (10) Soaked in his enemies blood; and from the stream. 1716. 
 
 (11) Present in temples at idolafrous rites. 1378. 
 (iz) Drunk with idolitfry, drunk with wine. 1670. 
 (13) The close of all my mysjries and the balm. 6;i. 
 
 Of the abovejthe first four examples are all of them instances 
 of short i being admitted into the fiction of elision before t, as 
 in the word capital, which was the only exception in Paradise 
 Lost (see p. 10, e, and note also that the word spirit, see p. j, 
 might be reckoned in this class of words) : and capital itself 
 occurs contracted again in Samson, lines 394 and 1 22 j. In the 
 following line, moreover, the it elision is made between two 
 
Milton? s latest Verse 2f 
 
 words, just as in Paradise Lost liquid terminations were ' elided ' 
 befcre initial vowels (see p. f , exx. 3 8-44 and p. 6, exx. 4^, 
 et seq.), 
 
 (14.) In slavish haWf, ill-fitted weeds. S. A. I2i. 
 The examples y to 9 are a further extension ; the short i stand- 
 ing before other consonants than t : and in 9, where it stands 
 before two consonants, the contraction of the syllable is so 
 harsh as to make one doubt if it be intended. 
 
 The examples 10 to iz are all bora Samson, and they look at 
 first as if the vowel and liquid elision theory had been quite 
 discarded. But this conclusion would not be justified, for if 
 exx. y and 10 be taken together, all may be explained by 
 supposing that Milton now recognized the claim of m to be 
 a liquid admitting elision ; and that the word idolatry, which 
 alone remains to be accounted for, is an exception. It has 
 been suggested to me that that word had very probably 
 acquired among the Puritans a fixed and recognized pronuncia- 
 tion which Milton would have had pleasure in adopting. But, 
 in any case, these examples point to the conclusion that Milton 
 was less strict with himself and they reduce the condition of 
 his trisyllabic feet very near to the common use. 
 
 Example 13 contradicts Milton's consistent pronunciation 
 of misery. Elsewhere he always insists on all the three syl- 
 lables, which is the more expressive pronunciation of the 
 word. 
 
 [The first of the examples given above is quite exceptional 
 in Milton's verse, for it has an uncertainty both of rhythm and 
 scansion. Besides that suggested, there are two other possible 
 explanations of its prosody. The first of these is that the line 
 
2d Milton's latest Verse 
 
 has an extrametrical syllable at the end, and an inverted fifth 
 foot, thus — 
 
 The worst | of all | indig|nities | yet on (me). 
 This is good rhythm, and best supported by the sense ; for the 
 stress is awkward on on, and is not really wanted on me. The 
 whole passage is powerful, and well carries this unusual rhythm, 
 which was suggested to me independently by two readers. It 
 must be remembered also that it is not unlikely that the exist- 
 ence of an alternative rhythm may be in favour of an unusual 
 one (see above, p. i6). The second alternative is the rhythm 
 which is most likely to be given to it — 
 
 The worse | of all | indig|nities { yec 6a (me). 
 
 As stated before, the assertion of the enclitic accent here 
 
 seems unworthy, but there are these lines in favour of it — 
 
 (i/) That fault I lake not 6a me, but transfer. 24.1. 
 (ifi) Oriather flight, no great advantage on me. 1 1 1 8. 
 
 The reader may choose for himself.] 
 
 The following lines are examples of an initial^ being treated 
 
 as a vowel, as was allowed with w (see p. 4, ex. 3 f , etc.) : 
 
 (17) Jusilj.jet despair not of his final pardon. 1171. 
 
 (18) Some way or other j'et further to afflict thee. iiji. 
 
 (19) Whose offspring in his territory j'et serve. P. R. iii. 37 j-. 
 
 In the last of these lines it has been suggested that Milton 
 intended an ' eKsion * of the of territory. But it is not his 
 practice to neglect the length of a vowel — (comp. his respect 
 for the a of miserable, etc., p. 7, etc.) — and it cannot be 
 supposed here. 
 
 There are left only two lines which exhibit novelties : the 
 first is — 
 
 (3.0) To s(jme|thing ^x|tradr{din^|ry my eh(Sughts | 1383. 
 
Milton's latest Verse 27 
 
 This is the evident rhythm of the line, and if it were the 
 scansion it would be unique ; but since the last edition of this 
 book I have been persuaded that the most reasonable fiction 
 is the elision of the aa in extraordinary, which gives 
 
 To s(5me|thing e'x|triMrdi|nir)r | my thdughts 
 
 that is an inversion in the third and fourth places (see p. 17) : 
 but the verse though thus reduced to rule seems exceptional in 
 rhythm, and there can be little doubt that the sense provoked 
 it. It may at first seem childish to assert that 'something 
 extraordinary' in the sense determined something extraordinary 
 in the prosody : yet to deny this requires the acceptance of an 
 unlikely alternative ; we must believe that at the crisis in the 
 poem where Samson declares that he feels within him the 
 divine impulse, which leads to the catastrophe of the tragedy, 
 there occurs, by accident, an unusual movement in the author's 
 verse. This improbability is much increased when we consider 
 how Milton's rhythm is always ready to follow his thought 5 
 a habit with him so essential to his style and so carefiiUy 
 trained, that a motive, like that which this passage carries, 
 could hardly have been passed over without some exceptional 
 treatment. 
 
 The other and last novelty is the blank verse— =• 
 
 (21) Out, out, I Hys(na) I | these are | thy won|ced arts. 748. 
 
 and here apparently is the extrametrical syllable returned to its 
 place (see p. 2, II, and Appendix A) ; at least so the rhythm 
 will read, however the prosody be explained. But the system 
 of prosody in Samson plainly forbids extrametrical syllables in 
 the midst of the line, and there is certainly no other example. 
 
2 8 Milton^ s latest Verse 
 
 Unless, therefpre, we suppose th^t there js here such an extra- 
 metrical syllable admitted by oversightj or allowed as TOlikely 
 to introduce any uncertainty into the prosody (which it does 
 not), we must receive on? qx other of the following scansions 
 to justify the verse ; either 
 
 Out out I Hyzna | ihise are | thy won|te4 arts, 
 
 i. e., with ind and 3rd feet inverted, and 'eUsion* of the first 
 syllable of Hy^na, or 
 
 Out out I Hyx|na these | are th/ won{ted arts, 
 
 with ' elision ' of^ before vd in the fourth foot. The extreme 
 lengths to which such fictions of scansion are pushed in Samson 
 independently of the rhythm (see later on, p. 44) would admit 
 the first of these explanations. But whatever scansion be taken 
 it is of no importance, the line is not in the condition of ex. i, 
 in which both rhythm and scansion are in doubt, for the rhythm 
 here is unmistakable, the doubt is only how it is intended 
 to be justified in prosody. 
 
 The above are, I believe, all the exceptions in these poems 
 to the laws which govern the trisyllabic places in Paradise Lost. 
 The reader may therefore draw his own conclusions. I will 
 state my own, which have changed somewhat since I came to 
 tabulate them. 
 
 I conclude that after writing Paradise Lost, Milton — 
 
 First, extended his rule of liquids to include m. 
 
 Secondly, that as he used caftal and spir't in Paradise Lost, 
 he now generally regarded a short i before pure t as specially 
 short and elidible, and even once allpwed this ' elision ' be- 
 tween separate words. 
 
Miltor^s latest Verse 29 
 
 Thirdly, that he admitted the short i occurring before other 
 consonants into trisyllabic places. 
 
 Fourthly, that he treated initial ^ as a vowel. 
 
 Lastly, if these extensions of his rules be admitted, there are 
 only two exceptions, one the use of idolatrous and idolatry, of 
 which an explanation is suggested (and see later, p. 45) : the 
 other the probable occurrence of an extrametrical syllable 
 within the line. 
 
 To these should be add^d the exception^ ex. 113, on p. 11. 
 
 On the other hand it may be said with truth, that, taking 
 Milton's poems together, they do not differ much on these 
 points ^cafsa the poems of other good writers ; that in all the 
 best blank verse the trisyllabic feet are made up almost 
 exclusively of open vowels, or vowels separated by liquids ; 
 and that, after these, the most frequent condition is that of 
 short i. But if my statements are true, I think it impossible 
 to doubt that in PdtAdisi Lost Milton purposely excluded all 
 trisyllabic feet but thoie made by open vowels and three liquids, 
 and that he afterwards relaxed this rule to admit m and short i : 
 and if he did not consciously exclude other short vowels"^ 
 a supposition which his early verse does not support-^his 
 practice must then have been guided solely by his 'ear, in which 
 case it is still more woithy of attention. 
 
 Here are a few example's of the licences which Milton re- 
 Jected-^- 
 
 Like to a Vagii/boiid flag Upon the stream. Mnt. Cleof. i. 4.. 
 To try rhy eloquence, now 'tis time : dispatch, iii. 10. 
 Even in the visions of her eloquent sleep. Shelley, blam. 
 Of flowering parasites, did spring love to dress. Shtllg. Islam. 
 
30 The Verse of 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 An Account of the Metrical System of Samson 
 ^gonistes. 
 
 The opinions which critics have venmred on the versification 
 of the choruses in Samson .yfgonistes would be sufficient proof 
 that they had met with something not well understood, even if 
 they had never misinterpreted the rhythm. It is not less than 
 an absurdity to suppose that Milton's carefully-made verse 
 could be unmusical : on the other hand it is easy to see how 
 the fer-sought effects of the greatest master in any art may 
 lie beyond the general taste. In rhythm this is specially the 
 case ; while almost everybody has a natural liking for the 
 common fundamental rhythms, it is only after long familiarity 
 with them that the ear grows dissatisfied, and wishes them to 
 be broken ; and there are very few persons indeed who take 
 such a natural delight in rhythm for its own sake, that they 
 can follow with pleasure a learned rhythm which is very rich 
 in variety, and the beauty of which is its perpetual freedom to 
 obey the sense and diction. And this also is true, that some 
 knowledge of the structure, or laws which govern such rhythms 
 is necessary to most persons before they will receive them as 
 melodious ; and they will accept or reject a rhythm to which 
 they are unaccustomed, according as they can or cannot 
 perceive, or think they perceive, its structure. This attitude 
 towards beauty of any kind is not the bes^ but I am not 
 concerned with that, or its cause j my undertaking, however, 
 in this particular case, is to indulge it, and to put the reader 
 into such a comfortable and assured state of mind with regard 
 
Samson Agonistes 3 i 
 
 to the structure of the verse in Samson, as will enable him to 
 encounter its rhythms with a good conscience. The rhythms 
 themselves I do not intend to discuss, that is, I shall not try 
 to throw light on such questions, as why such a rhythm is 
 beautiful in itself or why it fellows such another. But if 
 I enable the reader to scan the verses, and, if he choose, count 
 and name the metrical units, I may expect that he will then 
 feel himself free to admire the rhythms. If he still cannot 
 do so, that may be my fault or his, but it cannot be Milton's. 
 
 The present chapter will therefore be an account of the 
 elemental structure of the verse o£ Samson Agonistes. I shall 
 begin by getting rid of what I believe to be the chief source 
 of misunderstanding. 
 
 No one has ever found any difficulty in the metre or rhythm 
 of the poems 1/ Allegro and // Pemeroso : they are 'universally 
 crowned with highest praises,' and are held to be masterpieces 
 of musical writing. In these poems, setting aside their ir- 
 regular openings, there are two kinds of line, one the eight- 
 syllable line with rising stress (so-called iambic), the other the 
 seven-syllable line with falling stress (so-called trochaic), this 
 latter being exactly like the former with the first syllable 
 omitted. But if we examine a passage from one of these poems, 
 we shall find that there is also a third kind of line, which inter- 
 mediates between the other two types, and that this is made 
 by the simple device of inverting the first foot of the eight- 
 syllable line ; thus, — 
 
 And oft, I as if I her head | she bowed. 
 
 Scooping I through a | fleecy | cloud. 
 Oft, on I a plat | of ri|sing ground, 
 I hear | the far | off curjiieu sound. 
 
3 2 The Verse of 
 
 Over I some wide- | watered | shore. 
 Swinging | slow with | sullen | roar. 
 
 Of these six lines the first and feurth are regular eight- 
 syllable lines with rising stress ('iambic'), and the second, 
 fifth, and sixth are regular seven-syllable lines with falling 
 stress (' trochaic ') j but the third is an eight-syllable line with 
 the first stress inverted, or felling, and it begins as if it were 
 going to te a seven-syllable line (trochaic) throughout, and it 
 reads equally well (for the two tilings are identical) as a line 
 of falling stress (trochaic) with a trisyllabic foot (so-called 
 dactyl) in the firat place. Its structure is 
 
 Oft' on I a plat | of ri|sing ground, 
 but by the inversion of the first foot it reads as if it were 
 
 scanned thus 
 
 Oit' on a | pliCc of | rising | ground. 
 
 Such an example as the above offers no difficulty, and it has, 
 
 as I have said, never given rise to any difference of opinion 
 
 as to its metrical device j but it is clear that if there was an 
 
 optional elision in the first foot, it would not only be possible 
 
 to take it in these two ways, but impossible to say whicli was 
 
 the better explanation. If, for instance, we substitute such 
 
 a disyllable as Softly for the words Oft on, thus 
 
 Softly a plat of rising ground, 
 it is clear that, according as we admit or refiise an elision of 
 the open jr before the a, we have a seven-syllable line with 
 falling stress throughout, or an eight-syllable line of rising stress 
 with the first foot inverted ; that is either 
 
 Soitl)> a I plat of I rising '| ground, 
 
 or 
 
 Softly I a plac | of ri|5ing ground. 
 
Samson Agonistes 33 
 
 I wish the reader to perceive that a verse in this condition is 
 under no uncertainty of rhythm : here is an actual example. 
 
 Warble his native woodnoces wild, 
 there is no doubt how the verse is to be read and stressed, but 
 there are two possible ways of explaining its metrical structure : 
 and it is merely a matter of convenience in classification which 
 one we take. 
 
 Now this condition occurs in Samson complicated by these 
 ' further conditions, that the inversions are not confined to the 
 first foot of the line, and the lines are of various lengths : and 
 Milton has purposely used these liberties together, on account 
 of their rhythmical resources, in order to introduce what are 
 called dactylic (that is true trisyllabic verse-) rhythms into his 
 verse, which is all the while composed strictly of disyllabic 
 feet. 
 
 In such verse as I have quoted from // Penseroso, where the 
 eight-syllable and seven-syllable systems are mixed together, 
 it is the method of some metrists to regard all the lines, whether 
 rising or falling, as being composed of the same metrical units, 
 and differing only by the insertion or not of an unaccented 
 initial syllable. This way is very simple, and if rhythmic stress 
 in poetry be regarded as equivalent to accent in musical 
 rhythm, and the metrical units be counted as measured bars 
 or half-bars, it may be used as an explanation. In Chaucer's 
 ten-syllable verse the first syllable .is sometimes omitted (just 
 as it is in L' Allegro and Jl Penserosoy : and those who prefer to 
 look at the matter in this way, will thus explain the odd- 
 syllable verse o£ Samson. But just in proportion as the line is 
 invaded by inversions, the explanation ceases to be satisfactory, 
 
 BRIDGES O 
 
34 The Verse of 
 
 and I shall in this chapter always distinguish falKng rhythms 
 ('trochaic') from rising ('iambic') rhythms with inversions. 
 The distinction is of more importance in analysis than the 
 theoretic likeness. 
 
 Now in Samson ^gonistes, if all the lines of falling rhythm 
 (so-called trochaic,, or Unes which lack the initial syllable) be 
 recognized and separated from the rest, — and there are only ig 
 in all the i/yS, — it will be found that the whole of the poem, 
 with those exceptions, is composed in rising rhythm, of regular 
 disyllabic feet (so-called iambs) with free liberty of inversions, 
 and weak places, and ' elisions,' and extrametrical syllables at 
 the end of the Une, all such as we found in Paradise Lost. The 
 whole of the ' dactylic ' and ' trochaic ' effects are got by the 
 
 acing of the inversions, elisions, etc. ; and where the ' iambic ' 
 system seems entirely to disappear, it is maintained as a fic- 
 titious structure and scansion, not intended to be read, but to 
 be imagined as a time-beat on which the free rhythm is, so 
 to speak, syncopated, as a melody. 
 
 Firstly, these are the 19 lines in falling rhythm : they are all 
 of them in the choric or lyric verse : — 
 
 (i) Le'c us I ndc break | in u|pdn him. 116. 
 
 (1) Thft he|rdick | thic re|ndwned. iz/. 
 
 (3) Or the I sphere of | fiSrtune | riises. 171. 
 
 (4.) 6 that 1 Torment j shoilld not | b^ con|&'ned. 606. 
 
 (;) Td the | body's | woiinds and | sdres. 607. 
 
 (6) But must I secret | passage | find. 610. 
 
 (7) As on I Entrails | joints and | h'mbs. 614. 
 
 (8) As a I h'nger|ing dis|ei(se. 618. 
 
 (9) L&e a I stsCtely | ship. 714,. 
 
 (10) And cejl^stial | vigour | ^rmed. 1180. 
 11) Gr^at a|m6ng the | heathen | round. 1430 
 (ii) In the I cimp of | Din. 143S. 
 
 (pi; 
 
Samson Agonistes 3 f 
 
 (13) WWle their | hearts were | jdcund | ind sub|li'me. 1668. 
 (14.) Like that | s^lf-be|gdtten | bird. 1S99. 
 (ij-) In the' A|r£ibian | wdods em|b&t. 1700. 
 
 (16) Thit no I second | kndws nor | third. 1701, 
 
 (17) Air is I b^st though | we' oft | doubt. 17+^'. 
 (rS) Whit the' un|seircha|bte dis|p<Sse. 174.6. 
 (19) Oft' he I se'ems to | hide his j ftce. 174.9. 
 
 Of the above lines 4 and 13 are like Chaucer's nine-syllable 
 lines 3 that is, if an initial syllable were added, they would be 
 ordinary ten-syllable 'blank' verses. In f and 12, if contrac- 
 tion were allowed of the words to the and in the, these two 
 lines could be reckoned as in rising rhythm ; while in i y and 
 1 8, if the marked ' elisions ' be neglected, the lines become 
 regular eight-syllable lines with an inversion of the first foot. 
 But of these number 1 2 is the only line in which the falling 
 ('trochaic') rhythm can be doubted as the poet's intention. 
 
 Having dismissed these lines, the whole of the rest of the 
 poem is to be explained as in rising disyllabic (iambic) metres, 
 broken by inversions, etc. 
 
 And first I will take all the instances of the most peculiar 
 rhythm which is obtained by these inversions, that is when the 
 first two feet of the line are inverted : here are the lines, eleven 
 in number : — 
 
 (io) Irre|cdvera|bly dirk, | tdtal | echpse. 81. 
 In this verse there is also inversion of the fourth foot. 
 
 (21) Or by e|visions | thy crime [ uncd|verst mdre. 84.2. 
 
 (22) Irre]sisti|b!e Si(m|son? whdm | unarmed. 126. 
 
 (23) Th.it in|vinci|ble Sim|son, fir | rendwned. 34-1. 
 
 (and compare with these two last 
 
 (24.) Samson ] should be I brought fdrth I to show I the p^o(ple). ifio/'.) 
 (2j) Unilv^r5al|ly crdwned | with hi'gh|est prii(ses). 17/. 
 D 2 
 
3(f The Verse of 
 
 (16) F(Jr his I people | of old; | what hin|ders now. ^S'i'i- 
 
 (17) 6 how I cdmely | it is, [ and how | revi(ving). 1168. 
 (z8) T6 the I spirits | of just | men Mng | oppressed. 12S9. 
 (19) Puts in|vinci|ble might | 1271. 
 
 (30] And with | hUhdness | int6-|nal struck | 1^90. 
 
 and add to these examples 83 and 89 ^.t/. 
 
 I will say about each one of these lines what is to be urged 
 
 against this view of their metrical construction : but first, in 
 
 favour of the explanation that they are all instances of inversion 
 
 of the first two feet, I will give examples of similar rhythm from 
 
 Paradire Lost and Regained, 
 
 (31) Uni|v^rsal | reproiCch, | far worse | to bear. P. L. vi. 34.. 
 (31) Bf the I witers | of life, | where'er | they sat. xi. 79. 
 (35) In the I bosom | of bliss, | and light | of liglit. R. iv. 597. 
 (54.) T<S the I garden | of bliss, | their seat | prepared. L. viii. 199. 
 (3;) After I forty | days f^sjtinghad | remained. R. ii. 24.3. 
 (3$) Throilgh the | infijnite host : | nor less | for that. L. v. 874. 
 
 (37) Shdots in|vi'si|ble vir|t»« ^ven to | the deep. L. iii. jS6. 
 
 This has, like 20, an inversion also of the £>uith foot. And 
 add examples 133 and 147 on pp. 16 and 17 and these less 
 marked lines — 
 
 (38) Adam, | well may | we la|bour still | to dress, ix. 20^. 
 
 (39) L^our, I as to | debar | us when | we need. 236. 
 (40} Gding I into | such dan|ger as | thou saidst. ii;7. 
 
 Of these ten lines from the epic verse, most of the examples 
 
 are indubitable, and prove that the rhythm is one which we 
 
 should expect to find j while the extreme pathos of it in ex. 10, 
 
 where it is impossible to make any other rhythm, the fact that 
 
 in II, 23, and 24 it is used as expressive of the bond-bursting 
 
 Samson, the absolute necessity for allowing it in 30, and the 
 
 appearance of it in those weaker examples connected with 
 
 labour and danger, 38, 39, and 40, all together make a strong 
 
Samson Agonistes 37 
 
 case for admitting the explanation to cover all the examples 
 given. 
 
 But it may have been observed that in three of these 1 1 lines 
 the words irresistible or in-vincible occur, and since ' elision ' of 
 the short i is allowed in Samson (see p. 24), it might be sus- 
 pected here as a preferable explanation. And these examples, 
 i. e. 12, 23, and 29, might, if there were no considerations to 
 determine otherwise, be all scanned as odd-syllable lines con- 
 taining elision of the short ; 5 and thus 
 
 Ir{resis|c>ble Sam{son whom | unarmed. 
 That I invi'njdble Sam [son hr | renowned, 
 
 would be Chaucerian nine-syllable lines, just like examples 
 4 and 1 3 above from the chorus. But this, as I said before, 
 makes no difference to the rhythm : the chief objection to such 
 an explanation is that it does not explain all the lines. It is 
 true that examples 25, z6, 27, 28, 34, 3^, and37 are in the same 
 condition with these other four, for these lines also all contain 
 a possible elision or contraction : but the contraction of univer- 
 slly in 2 J would be unparalleled, and examples 20, 21, 30, 31, 
 3 2, 3 3, and 3 J, which are all decided cases, would still be left : 
 so that it is more convenient to group them together as above. 
 But no metrical explanation which does not felsify the rhythm 
 is in itself objectionable ; what is wrong is to read these lines 
 Irrecoruera.bly, Irresistible, That invincible or dbble, Un'rversally, 
 O how comely. Puts in-^incible, Universal reproach. Shoots 
 Invisible. It would not be worth while to mention such bar- 
 barous distortions, if some of them had not been actually 
 proposed and received by scholars. In face of their authority 
 the student may wish to know how Milton uses these words in 
 
38 The Verse of 
 
 other places, and looking up in the concordance all the passages 
 where they occur, I find for Irresistible, which seems chosen as 
 a word that enforced its" accent, this single line 
 
 (4.1) of union irresistible, moved on. P. L. vi. 63. 
 
 As for invincible, the word occurs in five other places and 
 begins the line in every one but the following — 
 
 (4.1) Thy temperance, invincible besides. R. ii. 4.08. 
 
 Universal occurs in twenty-one other places, and always with 
 its ordinary accent, and again seems as if it was chosen because 
 it could not be misread. 
 
 Invisible occurs in all fourteen times. Its position in eleven 
 of these makes any other than its proper pronunciation impos- 
 sible. One of the remaining three is example 37 above ; the 
 other two are — 
 
 (4.3) To human sense th' invisible exploits. P. L. v. 4.65. 
 
 (44) Things not | revealed, | which th' in|visi|ble king. vii. 12.1. 
 
 Both these lines are printed with the elision of the in the 
 first edition *, which excludes the contraction invis'ble, and in 
 example 43 gives invisible. No 44, if it stood alone, would 
 sustain the Chaucerian invisible ; but there is no doubt that an 
 inversion of the fourth foot is here intended to enforce the 
 mystery of the sense. Compare ex. 72, p. y^. 
 
 Infinite occurs in all twenty-three times. In twenty-one its 
 common accentuation is necessary; of the other two, one is 
 
 (fy;) Infinite wrath, and infinite despair, iv. 74. 
 which contains an inversion of the first foot, as example 3^, 
 which is the other case, does of the second. 
 
 * I use the 'ticsimile reproduction' of Elliot Stock, 1877.. 
 
Samson Agpnistes 39 
 
 It would be difficult to find words the' stress of which is 
 better fitted to secure the inversion of the rhythm, or the usage 
 of which in the poem is better established. I have also in one 
 or two cases pointed out the relation which their rhythmical 
 effect bears to the sense. The meaning in 21 and 23 must 
 strike every one. In examples 32, 33, and 34 it seems to intro- 
 duce a lyrical wave, the contradiction of which to the epic flow 
 of the verse may suggest a remoteness of beauty very like the 
 idea in the words ; and we have the very same condition of 
 things in ex. 1 3 3 J p. I ^. But, not to say anything which might 
 appear fanciful, I leave this suggestion to the reader, and refer 
 him generally to the chorus on p. 41. 
 
 The next peculiarity of rhythm which I will take is the 
 twelve-syllable verse, or line with six stresses. These verses 
 occur in the lyrical parts only o£ Samson : there are some twenty- 
 six in all. It is usually considered that this line (sometimes 
 called an Alexandrine) must have a break or caesura in the 
 middle, between the sixth and seventh syllables. It is 
 best known in this form, and the break is commonly so well 
 marked, that in free unrhymed verse it is indistinguishable 
 from a pair of six-syllable lines. The characteristic of Milton's 
 twelve-syllable line is his neglect of this break, and he makes 
 a verse which has a strong unity in itseli^ and no tendency to 
 break up. In feet, though he allows himself the same liberty 
 of caesura or break in this as he does in his ten-syllable verse 
 (see p. 19), yet his ' Alexandrine ' is almost more coherent, as 
 if it was composed expressly to counteract its tendency to 
 divide into two. And here I should think that there was 
 probably another stumbling-block for the readers o£ Samson, if 
 
40 The Verse of 
 
 it were not for the' great popularity of Milton's Nativity Ode, . 
 where the twelve-syllable lines that close the stanzas are made 
 in the same way, and, with other examples of his early verse, 
 show that he always took the same view of the rhythm of this 
 line. Here are a few well-known lines from the Ode : — 
 
 (4.6) And leave her dolorous mansions to Ae peering day. 
 
 (4.7) Swindges the scaly horror of his folded tail. 
 
 (4.8) The sable-scolM sorcerers bear his worshipc ark. 
 
 (4.9) She strikes a universal peace through sea and land, 
 (j-o) While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmM wave. 
 
 In Samson about nine of these lines are 6 + 6, with the common 
 
 break, which is however often weak or disguised : four are 7 + f 
 
 (see ex. 71) : three are 8 + 4 : one is 4 + J + j : one is jf + 7 : 
 
 one is f + 3 + 4 : and seven are continuous lines without any 
 
 break. These, which are characteristic and show the sweep 
 
 of the rhythm, are here given : 
 
 (j'l) Or groveling, soiled their crested helmets in the dust. 14.1. 
 (j-i) To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou art fallen. 165. 
 [fj) To death's benumbing opium as my only cure. 630. 
 {f^) Left me all helpless with the* irreparable loss. 644. 
 (yj) And condemnation of the' ingrateful multitude. 69S. 
 (j-6) Seeming at first all heavenly under virgin veil. 103^. 
 {fy) This idol's day hath been to thee no day of rest. 1197. 
 
 This last line might be taken as an example of 4 + 4 + 4. 
 
 It should be remarked on these twelve-syllable lines that 
 
 some of them may be reduced to ten-syllable lines, by reckoning 
 
 the last two syllables as extrametrical (see p. 2, ex. 2). 
 
 (y8) Made arms ridiculous, useless the fdrgery. 131. (6 + 6.) 
 (jSi) Hopeless are all my evils, all remediless. 64.8. (7 + j.) 
 
 (60) So deal not with this once thy glorious cham(pion), 
 
 (61) The image of thy strength and mighty minister. 70S. (6 + 6.) 
 
 Such an explanation would be quite out of the question if the 
 
Samson Agonistes 41 
 
 ten-syllable verse were judged by that o£ Paradise Lost, though 
 a few lines might seem to support it ; but in Samson Milton has 
 used heavier endings : here are a few, — 
 
 (62) Nothing of all these evils hath befifllen me. 374.. 
 
 (63) Samson of all thy sufferings think the heaviest. +4.5. 
 
 (64) Private respects must yield with grave authdrity. 867. 
 {6s) Besides how vile, contemptible, ridiculous. 1361. 
 
 (66) No better way I saw than by importuning. 797. 
 
 (67) Of brazen shieul and spear, the hammered cuirass. 132. 
 
 (68) My son is rather slaying them: that otitcry. ^Ji-y. 
 
 and thus therefore, silence, deliverance, diminution, submission, etc. 
 The lines last quoted, and ex. 60 (see ex. 16, p. 3) must all 
 be taken as ten-syllable lines with extrametrical endings, but 
 it is of no consequence how (j8) (5:9) (tfi) are explained, 
 although they are almost certainly meant for twelve-syllable 
 verses. 
 
 The reader might now take the opening of the first chorus, 
 and see how the various lines which have been already described 
 are put together, and how the verse, with the exception of the 
 lines given on pp. 34, jy, is all resolved into disyllabic rising 
 rhythm. 
 
 {6g) This, this | is he j | sdftly | awhile, , 
 
 an eight-syllable line, with third foot inverted ; the sibilants 
 are hushing. 
 
 (i) L^t us I ndt break | in ujpdn him : 
 a perfect four-foot line in falling rhythm (see p. 34). 
 (70) O change | beyond | report, | thdught, or | belief! 
 
 a ten-syllable line, metre reflective : the fourth foot inverted 
 for wonder. 
 
42 The Verse of 
 
 (71) See how | he lies | ac ranldom, care]lesily | difFus'd, 
 the first twelve-syllable line in the poem, 7 + J- In describing 
 great Samson stretched on the bank, it describes itself. 
 
 (yz) With langjuish'd head | unpropt, 
 
 a six-syllable line, its shortness is the want of support. 
 
 (73) As one | past hope, | aban-(don'd), 
 (74.) And by | himself | given o-(ver) j 
 
 two six-syllable lines, with extrametrical final syllables sug- 
 gestive of negligence. 
 
 (75) In sla|vish ha|bit, ill-fit-|ted weeds 
 
 an eight-syllable line with elision in third foot : see above, 
 p. 2 J, ex. 14. 
 
 (76) O'erworn | and soii'd ; 
 
 a four-syllable line ; its shortness and simple diction are the 
 poverty of the subject. 
 
 (77) Or do I my eyes | misre]present ? | Can this | be he, 
 
 a twelve-syllable line (8 + 4) ; the length of the verse suggests 
 the crowding of new ideas. 
 
 (2) Thit he|r<Sick, ] thift re|now'ned 
 a seven-syllable line, the rhythm heralding 
 (la) firelsi'sti|ble Sam|son ? whom, | unarmed, 
 a ten-syllable line, with first two feet inverted, descriptive of 
 Samson's violence. 
 
 (78) No strength | of man, | nor fierjcest wild | beast, could | with- 
 
 stand ; 
 
 a heavy twelve-syllable line, descriptive of Samson's strength. 
 
 (79) Who tore | the li|on, as | the li|on tears | the kid ; 
 
 same with break disguised.- Observe how the first half of the 
 line is more powerful than the second. 
 
Samson Agonistes 43 
 
 (80) Ran on | embatltled ar|mies clad | in i(ron) ; 
 
 a ten-syllable line, with final extrametrical syllable. The ease of 
 the metre after two Alexandrines is Samson's successful rash. 
 
 (81) And, wea|ponless | himself, 
 
 a six-syllable line ; its shortness is Samson's nakedness and 
 singlehandedness. 
 
 (j-8) Made arms | ridi|culous, | lisel&s | thS fdr|gSry 
 a twelve-syllable line, with fourth foot inverted, and weak 
 ending to each hal^ descriptive of the failure of the preparations. 
 
 This will serve for an example. The relation of the form of 
 the verse to the sense is not intended to be taken exactly j it 
 is a matter of feeling between the two, and is misrepresented 
 by any definition. Poetry would be absurd which was always 
 mimicking the diction or the sense ; but that is a different thing 
 from matter and form being in a live harmonious relation. 
 The above passage happens to be rich in opportunities for 
 descriptive rhythm, and it was necessary to the purpose of this 
 chapter to draw attention to Milton's observation of these, 
 because this often explains what has been censured as harsh or 
 careless irregularity in the verse. Nor have I much indulged 
 my fency ; it will have strack many readers that in the line 
 (ex. 7j) where Milton puts his hero in rags, he must have been 
 conscious that he was putting his verse into rags ; for he always 
 rejected such a garment as he here weaves as unworthy of 
 his Muse. 
 
 Lastly, I will indicate a few examples of the free rhythms 
 which are carried by the regular disyllabic structure* 
 
 * The sign u is used as on pp. i £-14 to mark the unaccenced light 
 syllables ; these are not all classically short. 
 
44 The Verse of 
 
 Ex. ly above reads, 
 
 In the Ajra'bian | wiSods eni|bdsc. 
 
 (83.) Prison within | prison Tn{separabl)r | dark, if^, ^. 
 which is made of two six-syllable lines, the first of which has 
 its first and last feet inverted, the second a weak middle ibot. 
 
 (83) But the heirt | of the fdol | . zpS. 
 which is also a six-syllable line, with its first two feet inverted, 
 and may be added to examples 20-30 above, pp. j J, 36. 
 
 (84.) with toiich ethe'real of H&ven's fiSi^f r<5d. j-+9. 
 a ten-syllable Kne, which reads thus by means of three elisions 
 and one weak place. 
 
 (8j) Mjr I griefs nSf dnljr | pain me is a ] lingering dis]ease. 617, 8. 
 a six-syllable line, with extrametrical syllable at the end, fol- 
 lowed by a falling seven-syllable line, ex. 8, above, 
 
 (86) Many Sre th? | sayings 8f the | wise. 6ji. 
 
 which is an eight-syllable line, with its inverted first foot con- 
 taining an elision, and with a weak third foot. 
 
 (87) Temper's! thy | pr<Jvidence | thrdugh his ] sh(5rt cdurse. 670. 
 thus reads an ordinary ten-syllable line with first and fourth 
 inverted. 
 
 (88) Therefore God's universal law. 10/3. 
 
 begins a passage of seven short lines every one of which has 
 the first foot inverted, so that the whole reads as verse in 
 falling rhythm, interspersed with ' dactyls.' 
 
 (13.) Drdnk with i|d(51atry | driink with | wine. 1670. 
 this ' dactylic * verse scans thus ' 
 
 Drunk with | iddljotry drunk | with wine, 
 with elision in the third foot, see p. 2 J. The concordance gives 
 
Samson Agonistes 45* 
 
 eight references for idolatry, idolatrous, etc., and the word has 
 always its common accentuation j but in the two lines quoted 
 from Samson (p. 24, ex. 11, 1 2) the third syllable is elided or 
 contracted. There can be no doubt of this ; but there is a 
 third line, commencing also with two ' dactyls,' 
 (85) By the idolatrous rout amidst their wine. 443, 
 
 and, given the contraction of idolatrous bx the two other places, 
 as Shakespeare has it. 
 
 But now he's gone, and my idolatrous &ncy. ^11 's W.i. 1. 
 
 this would scan most simply with a common inversion of first 
 foot. 
 
 By the | id(51|<itrous rout | amidst | their wine, 
 
 but in the first edition it is printed with elision of the, which 
 gives 
 
 By th' i|ddla|crous roilt | amidst | their wine, 
 
 and puts it among the examples of verses which invert the first 
 two feet. I had before supposed that the elision of the was 
 a mistake of the printer or his reader, but this scansion, though 
 further fetched, is more like the rhythm : either is a fiction, 
 and neither contradicts the rhythm. 
 
 In recognizing the fictitious •■ dactylic ' character of some of 
 these lines (compare also the three "■ dactyls ' in ex. J 8), the 
 reader must not believe, as he will sometimes find it asserted, 
 that true 'dactylic* verse, or verse made of true trisyllabic 
 units, was practically unknown in Milton's time. It was quite 
 common : indeed common is the right term for it, because 
 the greater poets thought it beneath their style. Milton was 
 therefore not inventing anything new or unheard, but seeking 
 
4<J "The Verse of Samson Agonutes 
 
 rather to make a good use of natural English stress rhythms, 
 without falling into their singsong, or setting all his verse to 
 dance. And if it is now clear to the reader by what means he 
 did this, there is nothing left which needs fiirther explanation. 
 Some criticism of Milton's method will be found in Appendix F. 
 
 Note. — What I halve said on p. 43 about the line 'in 
 slavish habit,' etc., being an unworthy garment may be 
 obscure to some readers. The passage in Mr. Stone's essay 
 (p. 145), in which he distinguishes the pronunciation of Plautus 
 from that of Virgil, will explain exactly what is intended. 
 
APPENDIX A 
 
 The Extrametrical Syllable. 
 
 How does an extrametrical syllable, occurring in the midst 
 of a line, differ from the supernumerary syllable of a common 
 trisyllabic foot 9 For instance, how do these lines differ ? 
 
 (i) To quench the drouth of Phce^(bus) : which as they taste. Ex. 4,. 
 (a) To set himself in glo-ry above his peers. Ex. 18, p. 5. 
 
 The answer is that in the second the extra syllable is made 
 rhythmical by its brevity, in the first it is made rhythmical by 
 there being a pause after it. 
 
 This rhythmical explanation accounts for the prosody, and 
 for the fact that an extrametrical syllable is often followed by 
 an inversion. 
 
 The extrametrical syllable proper is of frequent occurrence 
 in Shakespearian dialogue. Where a line is divided between 
 two speakers, the second speaker often disregards the last 
 syllable of the firJt speaker, and treats it as extrametrical. 
 This was used by Shakespeare among his devices, — which 
 increased as he perfected his art, — to prevent such a line falling 
 pat, and to avoid the effect of the second speaker having his 
 answer conditioned for him by the first; who bein^n posses- 
 sion of the line, ceded, as it were, only as much as he chose. 
 Our ear has a romantic and masculine objection to any such 
 
48 Appendix A 
 
 appearance of the verse overruling the matter : and the value 
 of a reply is actually impaired, if it seems to be led up to, and 
 preari'anged ; and so ttichomythia, as it is called, in which the 
 speaker is bound to fill and not exceed the line, requires the 
 art to be free from all realism whatever * j a condition not often 
 presented by our drama. 
 
 But if a line, which has in the middle of it an extrametrical 
 syllable followed by a pause, pleases the ear, it is plain that 
 this extrametrical syllable will have a way of coming in some- 
 
 • It is difficult to use the word realism without causing some mis- 
 understanding : and for the sake of clearness I will try to explain what 
 I conceive to be the place of realism in the best art. To put the matter 
 in the simplest diagrammatic form, every work of art is a combination 
 of nature and iimgination. If it were all nature, it would not be art ; if it 
 were all imagination, it would be unintelligible, — and this last because art 
 is man's creation, and man is a part of nature. We may therefore roughly 
 figure any work of art as being compounded of ^o parts imagination and 
 JO nature, or 10 of one and 90 of the other, and so on: and (supposing 
 equal intellectual excellence and aesthetic beauty) tjie best of two works 
 of art would be the one which had most imagination and least nature. 
 Classical art is that which, like the most characteristic Greek work, fixes 
 certain natural limits, and does not transgress them. It is poised at 
 a certain imaginative height within touch of common life, and it does 
 not deviate very far either above or below this constant elevation. 
 RomantSfe art (and Greek gives some examples of it) refiises these 
 ' reasonable ' limits, and leaving the imagination free to transcend them, 
 is in danger of losing touch with nature. Thence it follows that in 
 romantic art (where the percentage, so to speak, of the natural may be 
 reduced to a very small proportion) it becomes necessary for the natural 
 to be reinforced, and this can only be done by realism far stronger than 
 classical art would bear ; which not being at so great a height is more 
 easily de^^ed and brought down: and thus realism becomes the 
 companion of imagination. This, I believe, gives a true and intelligible 
 account of one of the main distinctions between classical and romantic, 
 as we use those ill-defined terms. 
 
The Extrametrical Syllable 49 
 
 times when it is not expected, and, in bad writers, where it is 
 not wanted. 
 
 Also, it may not be always easy to determine whether such 
 a syllable is truly extrametrical or not, because there may be 
 all gradations, and even a doubt whether there is a pause in- 
 tended. Nor does the existence of a grammatical pause always 
 decide the question : the lines in which Milton has made an 
 elision across a stop, are good examples of the rhythmical con- 
 ditions which lie between the extrametrical syllable proper, and 
 simple elision. See exx. lo, ii, iz,on p. 2, and y8, fp, (Jj, ^9, 
 on p. 7. The theory of trisyllabic feet best suits these places : 
 but as a question of Miltonic prosody they are all examples of 
 ' elision.' In cases where there is doubt it is better to regard 
 the syllable as extrametrical : the test is this, that if it is 
 extrametrical, it does not signify to the ear whether it is long 
 or short, though it is better for being rather long ; whereas in 
 a trisyllabic foot the quantity of the syllable makes all the 
 difference, for it must be light, and the lighter the better. 
 
 On the other hand it is not essential that a strong gram- 
 matical pause or an inversion should follow an extrametrical 
 syllable in a line, though this is its typical conditioii : the 
 syllable itself may be introduced to make the verse to pause. 
 The frequent occurrence of these extrametrical syllables in 
 Shakespeare, whose later verse is sometimes restless with 
 them, — and who may be said to have exceeded the bounds of 
 propriety in this, as in other matters, with perfect felicity, — 
 
 has given rise to mistakes * 3 for this extra syllabll^is often 
 
 ■*' , , < 
 
 * Any study of Shakespeare's versification must first of all exclude from 
 consideration the plays which he did not write. His work should then 
 
 BRIDGES £ 
 
j'o Appendix B 
 
 confounded with the condition of a trae trisyllabic foot, and 
 imagined to be a bad attempt at that. Some modem writers 
 have thus used it with a sort of affectation of anticjue negli- 
 gence; though it never has been, nor can ever be more 
 wretchedly abused than it was by the second-rate Elizabethans. 
 
 APPENDIX B 
 
 On Elision. 
 
 CoNCEE,NING the use of the term Elision in this tract : it has 
 been taken by some that I meant that the elided syllable 
 should be ' cut out' of the pronunciation: but I chose the tern), 
 which is in common use, because I wished not to imply any 
 theory of prosody, as to how the supernumerary syllables were 
 to be accounted for in rhythm. I did not think that there 
 could be any doubt as to whether they should be pronounced. 
 That Milton regarded his open vowels as ' elided,' like open 
 vowels in Latin, can hardly be doubted : that is, he intended 
 that they should not count in the scansion : yet though he printed 
 Th' almighty, etc., it cannot be supposed that he wished it to 
 be so pronounced *. In English the open vowel is always pro- 
 nounced : but the actual phonetic conditions of open vowels 
 are difficult, and that of vowels separated by ' liquids ' is still 
 more sa However slightly we may pronounce the e 'm Tk 
 
 be classified in periods or styles, and the classes examined separaceljr. 
 A collection of instances firom all his poetry can lead to no result, because 
 his late verse is written on a different system from his early verse. 
 
 * On the question of the spelling and printing of the first edition of 
 Paradise l.ott, see Appendix E. 
 
On Elision fi 
 
 Almighty, it is always heard : but what of the e in tuondering 
 and ' wondenus' ! or is that more sounded than the unwritten 
 vowel before the I'm warblingi That Milton recognized the 
 vowel character of the semivowels is certain from his manner 
 of writing words in which they occur: for though such forms 
 as assembl'd, resembfst (which should be read resembebt in ex. 
 10, p. a), stttmbfd, trembtd, troubl'd, tramptd, etc., were no 
 doubt so written to avoid the pronunciation aiiem-bUd, resem- 
 blest, etc., and to ensure the pronunciation assembeld, smmbeld, 
 etc. ; yet this does not account for such printings as Imbattld 
 for Imbattl'd, of'n'd, and of'nd for ofen'd, reciln'st for reck^n'st, 
 broken for brokfn, etc., in verses where such words have their 
 full syllabic value. And no one can read the first edition of 
 Paradise Lost without seeing how difficult it is to draw a line 
 where theoretic elision, if once admitted for open vowels, 
 should end. 
 
 The true metrical theory of these syllables must depend not 
 upon their spelling, but upon their speech-condition : I could 
 not thoroughly enter into that, and so I chose a term which 
 should imply nothing, because it could not be taken literally. 
 Milton's practice is somewhat inconsistent or arbitrary, and 
 may be open to various interpretations : I have not observed 
 that it differs much from Chaucer's, and it is common to all 
 our poetry since. 
 
 As for open vowels, when two vowels which require differ- 
 ent positions of the mouth are spoken consecutively without 
 interruption of sound, a third sound must occur between them, 
 made while the mouth is passing from one position to the other. 
 It is a necessary physical condition in all languages, and it 
 
 E 2 
 
f2 Appendix C 
 
 must have been present in Latin, and it does not prevent two 
 short vowels in juxtaposition from being one of the shortest 
 possible conditions of a disy liable. But some authorities assert 
 that in English this vowel glide is not pure, but has, in passing 
 between extreme positions [e. g. from oo [u] to ee [i] or from 
 ee to oo], a consonantal quality of w or ^ added to it, and 
 that for this reason, true elision between such vowels is im- 
 possible in English. On account of the great variety and 
 composite character of the English vowel-sounds, and the fact 
 that our modem spelling prevents us from distinguishing 
 sounds to the eye by the ordinary means which were invented 
 for that purpose, I have avoided this question, and used dUkn 
 as a term of no definite meaning. I also use the term />j»;</, 
 as it is found in old grammars, for the four sounds r, 4 "> 
 and m. 
 
 APPENDIX C 
 
 Adjectives in ahk. 
 
 It seemed necessary to prove at length that Milton treated 
 
 the a in these words as long, and that in the trisyllabic places 
 
 in which they occur, it is the hi and not the a. which is short or 
 
 'elided,' because he is now often misread by those who are 
 
 more familiar with the poetry of this century, as a few examples 
 
 may explain. Shelley, who generally follows Milton's use in 
 
 this particular, has the a short here and there, e. g. 
 
 (i) The plectrum struck the chords — unconquerable. H. Utrc. 
 
 Ixxi. I". 
 (1) Like earth's own voice lifted unconquerably. Isl. ix. 3. j. 
 (3} The tremulous stars sparkled unfachomSbl^. WitiM. xlix. 
 
Appendix D f 3 
 
 The following are from Rossetd : 
 
 {4.) With sweet confederate music fiCvorabl^. 
 (s) Their refuse maidenhood abominable. 
 
 And Rossetti does not stop here j he has 
 
 (£) The inmost incense of his s^nccuSry. 
 
 (7) This harp still makes my name its vdluntSr^. 
 
 To such words as these last, i. e.'four-syllable words accented 
 on the first, and having a long vowel in the penultimate, 
 Milton always gives their fiill value, as they are heard in 
 modern American speech : and when they occupy only three 
 places in the verse the last syllable is elided before a vowel. 
 There is one exception, the shortened a in luminary, vii. 38^. 
 
 Ellis represents Chaucer's able as aahl- or aah'l; thus 
 
 (8) And fill plee'zaunt' and aa'miaa-bl- of poort'e. Pnl. 138. 
 
 and these words were thus accentuated by Chaucer, Shake- 
 speare, and Milton, and down to our time, the a gradually 
 lightening. It seems now a question whether they have so 
 changed their speech-accent, as to justify a departure from 
 tradition in higher poetry, in face of the indisputable perman- 
 ence of our classical verse. See further remarks in App. H, 
 p. 83. 
 
 APPENDIX D 
 
 On Recession of Accent. 
 
 Recession of accent, which was defined on p. 13, is not now 
 heard. I have been told that it lingers in Ireland in the com- 
 mon speech in which it must have originated, and that Roman 
 Catholics there will still talk of extreme unction, just as Milton 
 
j-4 Appendix D 
 
 has extreme shift in Comus : also that they do not say Sir John 
 Robinson, but Sir-john Robinson; in the fashion in which, 
 I suppose, our names Sinclair, Silliger, and St. John (Sinjun) 
 arose : which tempts me to quote from Milton's sonnets, 
 (i) Thjr age like ours, O soul of Sir John Cheek. 
 As regards Shakespeare,, the industry of Dr. Alexander 
 Schmidt has put this question clear of conjecture. The first 
 article in the appendix to his Shakfsfeare Zexicon is on the 
 'Changeable accent of disyllabic adjectives and participles.' 
 His rule is this : that DisylUbic adjectives and fartkifks which 
 are accented on the lasty shift their accent to their first syllabk when 
 occurring before nouns which are accented on the firsts frcrvided that 
 their own last syllable occur in the arsis: i. e. off the verse stress. The 
 only fault to find with this definition * is that it confines reces- 
 sion of accent to adjectives and participles, and that it requires 
 the determining (following) word to be a noun, which it is 
 true that it is in all his instances ; but I should be inclined to 
 consider this unessential, and treat the recession as being due 
 entirely to collision of accents. I do not see that it has any- 
 thing to do with the sense, or with the adjective being in the 
 predicate or not, as implied by Dr. Schmidt's remarks. 
 
 * It might seem simpler to suppose that these words have their 
 accent determined merely by their place in the verse : but they must of 
 course have acquired their shifting pronunciation before the poet could 
 have relied on their obeying the verse stress ; and if, as seems probable, 
 this came about from the perpetual contact of their final accent with 
 the initial accent of nouns, then their position before the noun is their 
 typical condition. But two things follow ; first, that once in this un- 
 stable condition they would shift their accent under less provocation 
 than what first displaced it, and, second, that other disyllables would 
 imitate them. 
 
T{ecession of Accent f 7 
 
 I will give from his examples enough to convince the reader 
 of the real existence of this practice. 
 
 (2) He is complice in feature and in mind. Gent. ii. 4.. 73. 
 
 (3) Can pierce a cSmfUte bos(om). Why I desire thee. Mm;, i. 3. 3. 
 (4.) A maid of grace and comflete majesty. L. L. L. i. i . 137. 
 
 (j) Than all the citiflete armour that thou wear'st. Rich. 3rd, iv. 
 4.. 189. 
 
 (6) Though time seem so adve'rse and means unfit. M't W.v.i. z6. 
 
 (7) Thy <irfwr« party is thy advocate. Smn. 35. 10. 
 
 (8) Therefore my verse to constancy confined. Smn. loj. 7. 
 
 (9) Supposed as forfeit to a confined doom. Smn. 107. 4.. 
 
 (10) Have you conspired, have you with these contrived. TAid. iii. 
 
 2. ijfi. 
 
 (11) To do no cmtrhed murd{er) : I lack iniquity. 0th. i. i. 3. 
 (ii) So then I am not lame, poor, nor despised. Smn. 37. 9. 
 (13) The pangs of despised \ove, the laws delay. Hum. iii. i. 71. 
 (14.) And not the puddle in thy sea dispersed. Lucr. 6/8. 
 
 (i/) The dispersed air, who, holding Lucrece' life. Lucr. 1 8oj. 
 
 (16) And make distinct the very breach, whereout. Tro. iv. f. 14.J. 
 
 (17) To offend, and judge, are distinct offices. M«r. ii. 9. 61. 
 
 (18) With distinct breath and consigned kisses to them. Tro. iv. 4.. 4.7. 
 
 (19) This fellow is district and so am I. Err. iv. 3. 4.2. 
 
 (20) Their distract faiceU in combined sums. Confl. 231 (? author). 
 
 (21) O royal knavery ! an exact command. Ham. v. 2. 19. 
 
 (22) To set the exaa wealth of all our stales, ist Hen. 4th, iv. i. 4.6. 
 
 (23) I have with exact view perused thee. Hector. Tm. iv. j. 232. 
 (24.) Let their exhaled unwholesome breaths make sick. Lucr. 779. 
 (2/) And be no more an exhaied meteor, ist Hen. 4th, v. i. 19. 
 
 (26) To work my mind, when body's work's expired. Sonn. 27. 4. 
 
 (27) An expired date, cancelled ere well begun. Lucr. a.6. 
 
 (28) To the contrary I have express commandment. Wint. ii. 2. 8. 
 
 (29) As bid me tell my tale in express words. John, iv. 2. 234. 
 
 (30) Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust. Sonn. 129. 4. 
 
 (31) And extreme fear can neither fight nor fly. Lucr. 230. 
 (32] But qualify the fire's extreme rage. Gent. ii. 7. 22. 
 
 {33) The extreme parts of time extremely forms. /.. L. L. v. 2. 750. 
 (34) Tempering extremities with extreme sweet. Rom. Chor. 
 (3;] To some forldrn and naked hermitage. L. L. L. v. 1. 805. 
 
^6 jippendix D 
 
 (36) And from the firlam world his visage hide. Smn. 33.7. 
 
 (37) Round rising hillocks, brakes obsciire and rough. Vai. 2.37, 
 
 (38) His means of death, his itscure funeral. Ham. iv. j. 113. 
 
 (39) In so profoiind abysm I throw all care. Smn. iiz. 9. 
 
 (40) There's matter in these sighs, these prifmni heaves. Hum. iv. 
 
 I. I. 
 {4.t) Open the door, secUre, fool-hardy king. R. and, v. 3. 4.3. 
 (4z) Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole. Ham. i. j.6i. 
 (4.3) To lip a wanton in a secure couch. 0th. iv. r. 72.. 
 (44) Which knows no pity, but is still severe. Ven, 1000. 
 (4;) And let go by the ac(tor). O just but 'so/ere law. lieas. ii. 
 
 2.. 4r. 
 
 (46) His love sincere, his thoughts immaculate. Gent. ii. 7. 76. 
 
 (47) Sir, in good sooth, in sincere verity. Lear, ii. i. in. 
 
 (48) Neither supreme, how soon confusion. Cor. iii. i. no. 
 
 (49) The life of purity, the «/>re»« fair. Lwrr. 780. 
 
 (fo) But as we, under heaven, are siifreme head. John, iii. 1. iff. 
 
 He also draws instances from the apocrypha o£ benign, cormft, 
 
 remits ; and brings under his rule the well-known instances of 
 
 exiled and humane ; (which we may here dismiss, for Milton 
 
 uses exiled where it will take either accent, and distinguishes 
 
 human and humane as we do ;) he also quotes 
 
 [fj) Have you done yet ? Alack our terrene moon. jint. iii. 13. IJ3. 
 
 to which I would add 
 
 (yz) Open their congealed mouths and bleed afresh. Xich. 3rd, i, 2. }6, 
 
 (fj) My cincealed lady to our cancelled love. Rem. iii. 3. 98. 
 
 ($-4) Of murderous lech(ers] : and in the mature time. Lear, iv. 6. xSz. 
 
 and these prepositions 
 
 {ff) That the'reliy beauty's rose might never die. Sonn. i. x. 
 {j6) All ignorant that soul that sees thee mthout wonder. L. L. L. iv. 
 1. 117. 
 
 This is one of the lines in which Nathaniel ' missed the accent ' : 
 
 and thereon ia the same play, iv. 3. 298, and 
 
 (/7) Who, if it wink, shall thereon fell and die. Lucr. 11 39. 
 
l^cession of Accent jy 
 
 Schmidt concludes his essay with instancing the similarly shift- 
 ing accent of disyllables compounded of »», as unbackfd, unhid, 
 unblown, unborn, unbound, unchaste, etc. (and I should class with 
 these the compounds of mis-^, which may be considered as 
 parallel cases ; but these disyllables are made up of a positive 
 and a negative syllable, both of which carry some stress in 
 ordinary speech, with either one or other insisted on according 
 to the sense of the speaker ; and they may thus easily take 
 either accent in verse, and they differ in this from such words 
 as divine, secure, profound, etc., which are, or have become, irre- 
 soluble units with one single well-marked stress. I therefore 
 class these apart, and shall consider them separately. 
 
 This being the use of Shakespeare, we have to determine 
 whether it gives the explanation of any of the verses in Paradise 
 Lost. There can, I think, be no doubt that in Milton's early 
 poems Instances of recession do occur : of the prepositions there 
 are these : — 
 
 (j-8) The brood of Folly nithaa facher bred. Tens. z. 
 (f9) Here be mthmt duck or nod. Com. gSo. 
 
 and of the adjectives and participles these : — 
 
 (60) About the tifrane Throne, limt, 17. 
 
 (61) In regions mild of calm and strene air. Com. 4.. 
 
 (6z) And He, ch« Sifreme Good, to whom all things ill. 2.17. 
 
 (63) Not any boast of skill, but extreme shift. 2.yz. 
 
 (64.) She, chat hath that, is clad in cimflete steel. 421. 
 
 (6;) Wherewith she freezed her foes to cmgeded stone. 449. 
 
 (£6) The dhine property of her first being. 469. 
 
 (67) The sMime notion, and high mystery. 78/. 
 
 I should say that the above are all genuine cases ; and yet 
 
 most of these verses, if they occurred in Paradise Lost, (and a 
 
 few similar ones do occur,) I should explain differently. 
 
5-8 Appendix D 
 
 The matter stands thus : in all Milton's verse there is a fre- 
 quent occurrence of the following rhythm, that is, a foot of two 
 unstressed light syllables preceding a foot composed of two 
 heavy syllables, as in these lines from Shakespeare's Midsummer 
 
 Night's Dream, 
 
 \j \j — — 
 
 (68) The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn. 
 
 \j \j — — 
 
 (69) Before milkwhite, now purple with love's wound. 
 
 \j \j — — 
 
 (70) Love takes the meaning in love's conference. 
 
 It is common in Milton's early verse, which is much influenced 
 by the verse of Shakespeare's first style ; and he always made 
 use of it. Whatever the account of it is, it is pleasant to the ear 
 even in the smoothest verse, and is so, no doubt, by a kind of 
 compensation in it. In typical cases there is no possibility 
 of stress in the first short foot, and the first heavy syllable of 
 the' next foot seems to carry what has been omitted, with an 
 accentuation bearing relation to the sense. Instances occur 
 everywhere in Milton. 
 
 It will readily be seen that this is a condition of things which 
 must very often do away with the necessity for supposing reces- 
 sion of accent ; for if a passage occurs in which recession of 
 accent might be supposed, it is merely in this usual condition 
 of rhythm, and may be in order without it : and further, the 
 more the verse frees itself by assertion of stress, from the 
 common smooth flow of alternate accents, and exhibits variety 
 of rhythm, as Milton's late verse does, — the more will the ear 
 allow this, or any other recognized irregularity, to intrude itself 
 without support from the sense ; and the less will it be prepared 
 or disposed to correct such weak places by the conventional 
 
l^cession of Accent f 9 
 
 metric stress : or, to put' the same thing in another way, there 
 
 is a very strong reason why Milton should have excluded the 
 
 licence of recession of accent from Paradise Lost; because the 
 
 uncertainty which it introduces as to whether a syllable should 
 
 be stressed or not, and the tendency which it has to make the 
 
 verse smooth at all cost, would infect his inversions with 
 
 uncertainty, and on these the character of his rhythm in a great 
 
 measure depended. If we add to this consideration the rarity 
 
 of possible instances in all Paradise Lost, ^gained, and Samson, 
 
 — putting the question of prepositions aside, — the evidence 
 
 that Milton did actually intend to renounce this licence is very 
 
 convincing. I have noted only these : 
 
 (71) Next Chemos, the obscene dread of Moab's sons. i. it.o£. 
 [yx) i^nd sat as Princes; whom the Supreme King. i. 73;. 
 
 A doubtful example, for with the same sense we have the same 
 
 rhythm as supreme would make, in P. L. i. 40, etc. 
 
 (73) Encamp their legions; or with obscure wing. ii. 132,. 
 (74.) Our Supreme Foe in time may much remit, ii. zio. 
 
 this may be a common inversion of first foot. 
 
 (7j) In confused march forlorn, the adventurous bands, ii. £1;. 
 this is better with the ordinary accent descriptive of confusion. 
 
 (76) Through the pure marble air his oblique way. iii. 564.. 
 The words complete, extreme, serene, sublime, together occur in 
 all twenty-four times in Paradise Lost, Paradise Stained, and 
 Samson, and are always accented on the last. Each of these 
 words occurs once in Comus, and there suffers recession of accent 
 (see exx. above ^i et seq.) : and it is wqrth observing that in 
 Par. Lost, divine Semblance, ix. 606, and supreme l^ngdom, vi. 
 814, are divided between two lines. 
 
(f o Appendix D 
 
 The word adverse cannot be reckoned, for though Milton uses 
 both accents, the choice seems arbitrary (see ii. 77) : and we 
 still accent the word either way. It is like the adjectives com- 
 pounded with »n ; and of these I have remarked only unkpmm 
 as being in a double condition. 
 
 (77) Or unkumtt regions, what remains to him 
 But Anksmn dangers, ii. 443. 4.. 
 
 Uncouth is always accented on the first : and for frostrate, 
 which might seem from ex. 14!', p. 16, to have a shifting accent, 
 see the remarks there. 
 
 If the reader will now observe that all the six examples (seven 
 if unkpown be counted) of recession or doubtful recession occur 
 in the first three books of Paradise Lost, he will, I think, agree 
 that Milton purposely excluded recession from Paradise Lost, as 
 he did extrametrical syllables within the line, for fear of intro- 
 ducing uncertainty into his rhythms, but that the necessity of 
 avoiding it altogether was not at first fully realized, or that his 
 old habit was not quite conquered. The only fallacy here must 
 lie in the premises, and it is possible enough that I may have 
 overlooked some examples. 
 
 As Milton has twice in his earlier poems shifted the accent 
 of without, it is necessary to examine the prepositions, and 
 although the greater number of the following verses give far 
 better rhythm to us without recession, and seem constructed to 
 emphasize the sense, yet I think it not improbable (considering 
 exx. j8, ^9 above) that they may most of them have been read 
 with recession in his time, whether he meant it or no. The 
 following lists of examples, though not exhaustive, may I think 
 be considered as very fully representative : — 
 
J{ecession of Accent 61 
 
 (78) That conies to all ; but torture nithaut end. P. L. i. 67. 
 
 (79) Must exercise us nithmt hope of end. ii. 89. 
 
 (80) Illimitable ocean nlthom bound, ii. 892. 
 
 {81) Loud as from numbers nithmt number, sweet, iii. 34.6. 
 
 (81) In whose conspicuous countenance, nithmt cloud, iii. 38/. 
 (83) He views in breadth, and, nithaut longer pause, iii. fSi. 
 (84.) Him first. Him last, Him midst, and nithmt end. v. 16 f. 
 {8j) One kingdom, joy and union nithmt end. vii. 161. 
 
 (86) Variety nithmt end : but of the tree. vii. /4.Z. 
 
 (87) Smooth sliding nithmt step, last led me up. viii. 301. 
 
 (88) Us happy, and nithmt love no happiness, viii. 621. 
 
 (89) And forty days Elijah, nithmt food. P. R. i. 353. 
 
 (90) f'rom national obstriction, nithmt taint. Sam. 312. 
 
 There are like instances of other such parts of speech, as in 
 the following verses : 
 
 (91) Thus high uplifted ieymd hope, aspires. P. L. ii. 7. 
 
 (92) Their seasons : among these the seat of men. vii. 623. 
 
 (93) And not molest us; mlest we ourselves, viii. 186. 
 (94,) Still glorious, iefore whom awake I stood, viii. 4.64.. 
 (9/) The stairs were such as nherem Jacob saw. iii. ^lo. 
 
 (96) From the Asian kings, and Parthian among these. P. S. iv. 73. 
 
 The ibllowing verses, in which recession is possible but 
 evidently not intended, may be compared : — 
 
 (97) Alone, and nithout guide, half-lost, I seek. P. L. ii. 97 j. 
 
 (98) Love without end, and nithout measure grace, iii. 14.2. 
 [^g) And be thyself Min among laia on earth, iii. 283. 
 
 (100) Flowers of all hue, and nithout th<$rn the rose. iv. 2/6. 
 (loi) Thy goodness lie/md thoijght, and power divine, v. 159. 
 
 (102) In mystic dance ndt nithmt song, resound, v. 178. 
 
 (103) Ordained without redemption, nithout end. v. 615. 
 (104.) As a desp/te ddne againit the Most High. See p. 17. 
 (10;) Successfiil bejmd hope, to lead ye forth, x. 463. 
 
 I do not expect every one to agree with me in the grouping 
 of these examples, but if^ as I think, recession must have been 
 meant to be excluded from some, it could scarcely have been 
 
62 appendix D 
 
 excluded if it had been admitted in the other places. The 
 only lines which seem to me probable cases are the unless and 
 whereon exx., 93 and pj. 
 
 But even if Milton, as I suppose, banished recession of accent 
 from his later prosody, it did not disappear from English poetry. 
 There are strangely many examples of it in Shelley, whose verse, 
 since it is lacking in that quality which critics call roughness 
 in Milton, readily betrays irregularities which it is not con- 
 structed to carry. In The TVitch of ^tUs is this line, 
 
 (106) A haven, beneath whose translucent floor, xlix. 
 
 Beneath was here, I suppose, sounded benneath, as in ex. 118 
 on p. 13 before would be beffor, if that line be admitted as an 
 instance of recession. 
 
 The word serene, which Shelley usually stressed as we do, 
 removes its accent away to the first syllable, when followed by 
 a contiguous stress. 
 
 (107) Or se'rene morning air j and far beyond. Efifs. 4.38. 
 
 (108) Through which his soul, like Vesper's serene beam. Mhim. i. fir. 
 
 (109) And profoundest midnight shroud the serene lights of heaven. 
 
 There is an example of recession in the first stanza of The 
 Skylark, 
 
 (no) In pr(Sfuse strains of unpremeditated art. 
 
 The word divine is in the same condition, 
 
 (in) And lofty hopes of divine liberty, ^lastor, 1^9. 
 
 (ill) Bore to thy honour through the divine gloom. Prom. iii. 3. 
 
 (113) The herd went wandering o'er the divine mead. H/mn-Utrc. 
 
 Ixxxvi. 
 
 And thus intense, distinct, stipreme, extreme. 
 
 (114) By sightless lightning? — th' intense atom glows. M. xx. 
 (nj) The distinct valley and the vacant woods, ^latt. 19/. 
 
J\ecession of Accent 6^ 
 
 (ii6) More distinct than the thunder's wildest roar. Spect. H. 4.6. 
 
 (117) God is one supreme goodness, one pure essence. Cold. i. 
 
 1 1 J, etc. 
 
 (118) Thy extreme hope, the loveliest and the last. M. vi. 
 
 (119) His Extreme way to her dim dwellingplace. ^d. viii. 
 (izo) Scarce visible from Extreme loveliness. Efips. 104., etc. 
 
 Thus also antique^ and obscene. 
 
 The new Concordance to Shelley's poems, by Mr. F. S. Elh's, 
 published this year * by Mr. Quaritch, will give ample evidence 
 of Shelley's practice : I observe in it that the line, 
 
 (ill) Its stony jaws ; the abrupt mountain breaks. Mast. jjj. 
 is given with ahri^t accented on the first syllable. The line 
 with the usual accentuation has a fine Miltonic rhythm, in cor- 
 respondence with the sense ; and it is an interesting confirmation 
 of what I said above of the character of Shelley's rhythms, that 
 the compiler of the dictionary, whose acquaintance with Shelley's 
 ■verse must be of a most exceptional kind, should have con- 
 sidered that rhythm impossible. 
 
 Note. — The above remarks on recession were written before 
 I had seen Dr. Schmidt's excursus : to which a friend called 
 my attention. I have rearranged my notes to give prominence 
 to his work, which I have inserted, to the readers' advantage, 
 in place of my own examination of Shakespeare's practice. 
 
 * 1851. 
 
(J4 appendix E 
 
 APPENDIX E 
 
 Pronunciation in Milton. 
 
 I AVOIDED the question of pronunciation in my tract, because 
 I am not qualified to give any opinion on the subject, and for 
 whatever I know I have to thank those who know more. The 
 matter too is complicated by the peculiar spelling which Milton 
 used in Paradise Lost ; and since that is unfortunately not 
 preserved in later editions, I could not conveniently use it. 
 With regard to this spelling, I was myself familiar only with 
 the common texts, and wrote from my knowledge of them : 
 but when I undertook my task I read through the poem 
 in a facsimile of the first edition, and came to the following 
 conclusions. 
 
 First, that — excluding words, the spelling of which is fiincifiil 
 or antique, such as highth for height, and thir for their — the 
 main object of the unusual spelling is to ensure the verse being 
 read rightly. Where a word is shortened, if there is choice 
 or doubt as to which syllable should suffer, one is generally 
 indicated in the spelling ; as much for the sake of whole verses 
 as of words. In the appendix on elision examples will be 
 found of words, and on pages lo and 38 of lines, which 
 illustrate this. Also the elision of the definite article is 
 intended to be always shown. 
 
 Next that, as might be expected, Milton's blindness did not 
 allow such work as this to be carried out thoroughly ; so that 
 the spelling is not consistent, nor free from mistakes which 
 might be corrected with certainty and advantage. 
 
Pronunciation 6f 
 
 Also that Milton did not aim at consistency. It seems 
 as if, in cases where he rejected the ordinary spelling as mis- 
 leading, he did not care to fix another, for he has represented 
 the same word in different ways. And in this, as in other 
 respects, he was a true Elizabethan. 
 
 Lastly, that the spelling shows that Milton took a phonetic 
 view of prosody j and that, though his system may be considered 
 as a literaiy modification of Chaucer's, yet the modification was 
 made on phonetic principles, with definite purpose in choice 
 and exclusion. 
 
 Though I have not examined the book so well as to be in 
 a position to deny that a study of Milton's spelling in the first 
 edition might eliminate the errors, and non-essential variations, 
 and leave a residue which would exhibit a .system not at first 
 apparent, yet I did not myself discern it, ,and I found nothing 
 to change the conclusions at which I had already arrived, except 
 in the particular last mentioned, namely that the ' liquid elisions ' 
 were adopted by Milton to the .exclusion .of others, not only 
 because they pleased his ear, but because he knew why they 
 did so. See the Appendix on Elision. 
 
 A phonetic examination of English verse, much as it is to be 
 desired, I never undertook : and as Milton's method is after all' 
 only a modification of tradition, I thought that the aim which 
 I had in view was to be gained without discussion of this kind. 
 
 Setting therefore the spelling aside, the question remained 
 whether the pronunciation in Milton's time differed so from our 
 own as to need attention in an examination of his verse ; and 
 I was decidedly of opinion that it did not : and as I was loth to 
 hamper the metrical facts which I wished to notice with any- 
 
66 Appendix E 
 
 thing so unfamiliar and uncertain as restorations of old pro- 
 nunciation are apt to be, I chose to disregard the whole subject 
 except parenthetically. 
 
 But I was led in my first edition to adopt the suggestion that 
 the monosyllabic prepositions, to, from, with, etc., might have 
 had more stress value in Milton's time than they have now. 
 I do not myself see any sign of this in Milton's verse, and I should 
 not have inserted the opinion if the following disproof of it 
 had occurred to me. Shakespeare, whose early verse may be 
 described as syllabic, gradually came to write a verse depen- 
 dent on stress, which we may assume was the speech-accent 
 of his time ; and from his later work we can tell exactly the 
 relative stress-values of the syllables in the sentences. Now 
 the prepositions in question are among the first words to lose 
 fiill syllabic value in this competition : see the following pas- 
 sage from Antony and Cleopatra, 
 
 We must return to the court of guard: the night 
 Is shiny; and, they say, we shall embattle 
 By the second hour, in the morn. 
 
 It is, I think, certain from such verse as this that these preposi- 
 tions had even less syllabic value in the speech of Shakespeare's 
 time than they have now ; and I suppose it follows that they 
 had not more in Milton's time. 
 
 In another place I rejected the notion that the shortening 
 of words like general in Milton was due to a clumsy trilling of 
 the r, and a pronunciation like generl. It has seemed to me 
 as if it was the fashion of the present day rather to exaggerate 
 the difference between the older pronunciation and our own. 
 With regard to r it is, I believe, universally assumed that it was 
 
Pronunciation 67 
 
 without exception trilled throughout England in Chaucer's time*. 
 But in Freeman's Norman Conquest, vol. ii, p. J 1 1 of the third 
 edition, under his account of Westminster Abbey, which was 
 at first called Thomey Abbey, is the following note : — 
 
 'Wace (io5J3) enlarges on the name, and his phonetic 
 spelling illustrates his natural difficulty in pronouncing the 
 
 letter ]?. 
 
 En un islet esceit assise, 
 
 Zmee out nom, joste Tamise ; 
 
 Zonee por 50 1' apelon, 
 
 Ke d' espine i out foison, 
 
 E ke 1' ewe en alout environ. 
 
 Ee en engleiz isle apelon, 
 
 Ee est isle, znn est espine, 
 
 Seit rainz, seit arbre, seit racine; 
 
 Zonee, 90 est en engleii 
 
 Isle d' espine en franceiz.' 
 
 from which it seems to me to follow that thorn was pronounced 
 in London in the twelfth century as it is now : for if the r had 
 been trilled it would surely have appeared in the Norman-French 
 as 'j^n. Can there be possibly any other explanation of this ; 
 
 It is true that a number of words are to be found in Milton's 
 poems which he stresses differently from us ; and these are 
 generally marked with their peculiar accent in the common 
 editions. The following list of them is taken from Nares' 
 Orthoefy ; I do not know how complete it is, and I have omitted 
 a few words, which I thought doubtful or not requiring notice. 
 
 Aspect. Attribdted (also attributed). Blasphemous. Brigad. 
 
 • Thus Prof. Skeat (Chaucer, vol. vi, p. xxix), 'r is always strongly 
 trilled,' etc. ; and A. Ellis and Dr. Sweet say the same. The evidence 
 seems to me insufficient. 
 
 F 2 
 
<J8 appendix E 
 
 Captive (verb). Colleague. Commercing. Comrade. Consdit 
 (subst.). Contest (subst.). Cdntribute. Converse (subst.). Con- 
 voy. Crystillin. Egress. Exfle. Farewell (subst.). Impiilse. 
 Instinct (subst.). Minkind. Midnight. Odorous. Perfume 
 (subst.). Precincts. Prescript. Process, Procinct. Product. 
 Receptacle. Reflux. Remediless. Sepdlchred. Sojodm. Sun- 
 beam. Sunshine. Survey (subst.). Traverse (verb). Triumph 
 (verb, also triumph). Uncouth. Upr6ar. VoMbil. 
 
 Of the above words, which it will be seen are mostly Latin, 
 about ten are either with this accentuation peculiar to Milton, 
 or of very rare occurrence in p)etty. The remaining thirty 
 are about equally divided between words which were thus 
 accentuated in his time, and words the accent of which had 
 already shifted, or was then shifting, and for which he preferred 
 the older or more correct pronunciation. Some of them he 
 himself accents differently in different places : they seldom give 
 rise to any doubt j and when they do, a knowledge of his 
 rhythms is necessary to solve the difficulty. 
 
 For if the old poets are to be our authority for the accent 
 and pronunciation of their time, we must first understand their 
 rhythmical intention, nor can trustworthy conclusions be drawn 
 from their verse until the verse be understood ; and Milton 
 wrote much more carefully than he has been criticized. The 
 learned Tyrwhitt, for example — to whom I gladly record a 
 heavy debt of enjoyment for his edition of the Canterbury 
 Tales, — when commenting on the structure of the following 
 verse from the Prologue, — 
 
 Of Engelond to Can]terbu|r5r they w^nde, 
 which he thus divides, and arguing against the supposition that 
 
Pronunciation dp 
 
 Chaucer can have written ' without any restraint ' of metrical 
 rule with respect to 'superfluous syllables,' justly parallels 
 Chaucer's trisyllabic feet with examples from Milton ; and, 
 among some lines from Paradise Lost, which he explains more 
 or less correctly, he gives our ex. 44, page 3 8, 
 
 Things not revealed which the invi|sible King, 
 which he thus divides, not only violating both the scansion and 
 rhythm, but negleaing the correct elision as printed by Milton, 
 in order to establish an inferior rhythm, which makes the line 
 like his misinterpretation of the line quoted from Chaucer. 
 
 That same line of Chaucer may serve me to justify my com- 
 plaint of what I called the exaggeration of the differences of 
 the old pronunciation. It is one of three lines in the first 
 thirty of the Prologue which contain the word Canterbury, and 
 Canterbury is used to fill either three or four places in the 
 verse : thus — 
 
 Of Engelond to Canterbury they wende. 
 That toward Canterbury wolden ryde. 
 
 from which I should conclude that Canterbury was pronounced 
 
 in Chaucer's time as it is now ; for we say either Canterbury 
 
 or Canterb'ry. But on p. 1^4 of vol. I of the Aldiiie edition, 
 
 I am instructed to pronounce the lines thus — 
 
 Of Engelond to Kan'terber'ee dhahy wende. 
 Dhat tohwerd Kan'terber'ee wolden reede. 
 
 And thus written the first of these verses will not scan, dhahy 
 does not look inexpugnable, but confining criticism to Canter- 
 beree this ee seems to be at least an exaggeration. It must be 
 the vowel sound of feel, Ellis' ii (the longest of all the i, y, 
 sounds J being twice the i in the French ^w), and it is presum- 
 
JO yfppendix E 
 
 ably put here for his ii (which is the prolonged or double form 
 of the short i in the English finny), for the reason that this 
 latter sound is more difficult of pronunciation, and the instruc- 
 tions are intended for ordinary readers. But even this w would 
 be an extreme allowance of length. It happens that bury is one 
 of the words in the table which Ellis gives to illustrate the 
 changes of pronunciation since the fourteenth century, and he 
 writes it beri, unchanged from Chaucer's time to our own. So 
 that it seems that (ee=ii) the heaviest of all the four i, y, 
 sounds, is put instead of (/) the lightest, to show us how to 
 pronounce y, which we should have pronounced correctly if left 
 to ourselves ; whereas the antiquary's explanation destroys the 
 verse. 
 
 But my only purpose in writing these notes on Milton was 
 to draw attention to his workmanship, and to combat the 
 common opinion that there is no such thing as English prosody. 
 It is not too much to say that most of our classical scholars have 
 regarded the ten-syllable verses of Chaucer, Shakespeare, and 
 Milton, as so many better or worse attempts to compose regular, 
 alternately stressed, so-called iambic lines ; broken here and 
 there by the negligent admission of ' superfluous ' syllables. 
 The language of Tynvhitt in the following note is typical : 
 he is speaking of rhymed verse : — 
 
 ' It is agreed, I believe, that in our heroick metre those 
 verses (considered singly) are the most harmonious in which 
 the accents fall upon the even syllables j but it has never (that 
 I know) been defined how fiir a verse may vaiy from this its 
 most perfect form, and yet remain a verse. On the tenth (or 
 rhyming) syllable a strong accent is in all cases indispensably 
 
appendix F 71 
 
 required, and in order to make the line tolerably harmoniousj 
 it seems necessary that at least two more of the even syllables 
 should be accented, the fourth being (almost always) one of 
 them. Milton, however, has not subjected his verse even to 
 THESE RULES J particularly (either by negligence or design) 
 he has frequently put an unaccented syllable in the/oanfc place. 
 
 APPENDIX F 
 On Metrical Equivalence. 
 
 I USED the term ' metrical equivalence ' as I found it. It 
 only means that two short syllables are equivalent to one long 
 syllable. In Greek and Latin they are so considered; and 
 as most of our poets have been familiar with the poetry of 
 those languages, it is likely that they may sometimes have 
 imagined that the rule was natural to verse in all languages, 
 and they may have been also unconsciously affected by it for 
 better or worse ; and this, although the declared attempts to 
 write English verse on the classical system have failed. 
 
 My friend, the late Father Gerard Hopkins, to whom I sent 
 the MS. of my tract for criticism, blamed my omission of any 
 statement of what he considered the truth on this point. He 
 wrote thus to me : — 
 
 ' I cannot but hope that in your metrical paper you will some - 
 where distinctly state the principle of equivalence, and that it 
 was quite unrecognized in Milton's, and still more in Shake- 
 speare's time. All, but especially young students, need to be 
 made clearly to understand what metrical equivalence is, that it 
 
72 jippendix F 
 
 is in use in E glish now, and that it was not then, — and that 
 it was Milton's artifices, as you explain them, that helped to 
 introduce it.' 
 
 In quoting this I consider that I have done my duty by the 
 theory. I suppose that the statement represents fairly what 
 some metrists hold, for it is the opinion of one who was 
 learned and acute on all such questions. I go with it so far 
 that I am ready to grant that in English two short syllables 
 may sometimes be equivalent to one long one j but it seems 
 to me wrong to imagine that English rhythms can ever be 
 explained or governed by such a fiction as this is, when it is 
 made a general law : because we recognize different gradations 
 of length both in our long and short syllables j because 
 also all the rhythms which it is called in to explain are governed 
 by stress, and stressing a short syllable can never make it equal 
 in length to two unstressed syllables, which is really what is 
 intended to be said. Or if this meaning be denied, and equiva- 
 lence defined as between unstressed syllables only, it is enough 
 to remark, that in blank verse the place occupied by two short 
 syllables may, as often as not, be filled as well by one short as 
 by one long syllable ; so that a short syllable must be equiva- 
 lent to a long one. The fact is that our classical verse is a 
 hybrid, and cannot be explained exclasively by English or by 
 classical rule j nor is much light thrown on it by straining the 
 analogy of Greek and Latin quantitative feet. In Milton's 
 verse the chief metrical rule is the number of syllables; and 
 though verse written on his or Shakespeare's early model is the 
 most ready of any to accept the equivalence theory, yet it isj 
 plain that even here the stress is of at least equal importance, 
 
Equivalence 7 3 
 
 and asserts itself to decide every question, as soon as the syllabic 
 limit is trifled with. In this respect the practice of Shake- 
 speare is full of teaching ; for as he threw off the syllabic 
 trammels of his early style, he came to determine his rhythm 
 by stress : and Milton did just the same in Samson ^gonistet, 
 though he learnedly disguised his liberty by various artifices. 
 Immediately English verse is written free from a numeration 
 of syllables, it falls back on the number of stresses as its 
 determining law : that is its governing power, and constitutes 
 its form j and this is a perfectly different system from that 
 which counts the syllables. It seems also the most natural 
 to our language- y and I think that the cause of this distinc- 
 tion not being recognized is the fact that stress cannot be 
 excluded from consideration even in verse that depends prim- 
 arily on the number of syllables. The two systems are mixed 
 in our tradition^ and they must be separated before a prosody 
 of stress can arise. But if once the notion be got rid of that 
 you must have so many syllables in a line to make a verse, or 
 must account for the supernumerary ones in some such manner 
 as the Greeks or Latins would have done, then the stress will 
 declare its supremacy j which, as may be seen in Shakespeare 
 and Milton, it is burning to do. 
 
 Now the primai-y law of pure stressed verse is, that there 
 shall never be a conventional or imaginary stress : that is, the 
 verse cannot makf the stress, because it is the stress that makfs the 
 verse. It is the neglect of this which is the fault of Osleridge's 
 Christdbely considered as stressed verse. The reader will not 
 think that I am finding fault with that poem, when I am only 
 quarrelling with its preface, in which Coleridge implied that 
 
74 Appendix F 
 
 it was written in purely stressed verse, wkereas it is not. He 
 says that the metre of it is ' founded on a nea frincifk, namely, 
 that of counting in each line the accents, not the syllables. 
 Though the latter may vary from seven to twelve, yet in each 
 line the accents will be found to be only four. Nevertheless 
 this occasional variation in number of syllables is not introduced 
 wantonly, or for the mere ends of convenience, but in corre- 
 spondence with some transition in the nature of the imagery or 
 passion.' Now here was, as far as it went, a definite statement 
 of the laws of a stress prosody; but if we examine the verse 
 we find that we cannot count by ^tresses any more than we 
 can in Milton's blank verse, for Cbristabel admits conventional 
 stresses, just as any English verse had done before G)leridge's 
 time, and does to this day. 
 
 'Tis the middle of nfght by the castle dock 
 And the dwls have aw^en'd the crowing cock, 
 
 Tu — wWt ! — Tu— whdo ! 
 And h^rk ag^in ! the crdwing cock 
 How drdwsil^ it cr^w. 
 
 It was a slip in the wording of Coleridge's definition when 
 he said that the third and fifth lines had four accents *, but 
 he did mean the fifth to have three, and the second accent 
 or stress of the three is a conventional stress : it does not 
 exist in the language, but in the metre, and has to be ima- 
 gined because the metre requires it : and it is plain that if 
 the stress is to be the rule of the verse, the verse must not 
 thus be relied on to create the stress. 
 
 * ' Only four accents ' must therefore be interpreted ' not more than 
 four'i but the manner of printing line 3 suggests that it may have been 
 meant to have four stresses. 
 
Equivalence 7f 
 
 To save the reader the trouble of turning to the poem to 
 
 satisfy himself on this point, I will quote some more lines 
 
 which offend against this law of stressed verse. 
 
 Fr6m her kennel beneath the rdck. 
 She mikech inswer tb the d6ck. 
 A furlong from the cistle gfte. 
 Of her rfwn betrdthed knight. 
 
 This poem with its preface has no doubt done much to hinder 
 the right understanding of stressed verse : for Coleridge would 
 not be lightly suspected of thus mistaking his own method : — 
 but it is plain that he did not ever shake off the tradition of 
 these conventional, metric stresses, nor really imagine a stressed 
 verse which should be entirely free from them. The reader 
 will understand that I am not saying that the lines in question 
 are bad or good : they may be necessary in the poem for this 
 reason, that the stress not being really creative of the rhythm, 
 but only accenting the regular beats of a loose metre, — an 
 unbroken succession of strong stresses would make monotony 
 or singsong ; which is generally avoided throughout Christabel 
 by the common methods, the stresses being frequently disre- 
 garded, and sometimes overloaded : Whereas in pure stressed 
 verse the monotony would be avoided by inverting some of the 
 stresses or leaving them bare, in such a manner as we are led 
 to expect early in the poem by the lines — 
 
 Is the ni'ght chilly and dark? 
 The night is chilly, but n6c dirk. 
 
 With regard to stress Christabel is, with such rare exceptions, 
 
 in the same condition as L' Allegro ; while the syllabic liberty, 
 
 so far from being new, is found in English verse from the 
 
 earliest times. 
 
76 Appendix F 
 
 Next to this mistake of admitting conventional stresses, 
 I would mention another practice of writers who have attempted 
 the freer verse based on stress, which is this j they set up a 
 rhythm in the first lines, and expect that this will assert itself 
 throughout the poem, in spite of false quantities and conven- 
 tional stresses. This, though it has not hindered the poems 
 so written from being much praised for their rhythmical flow, 
 implies the same feult as Coleridge's, but it shows also a 
 greater misapprehension of the qualities of stressed verse ; one 
 chief advantage of which is that no rhythm need be exactly 
 repeated. The constant repetition of the same stressed rhythm 
 in every line must produce a 'sing-song,' and it is a clumsy 
 remedy to break the singsong at the cost of the prosody : 
 whereas stressed verse, if freely written, would be as far 
 removed from singsong as is Paradise Lost. If the number of 
 stresses in each line be fixed, [and such a fixation would be 
 the metre,] and if the stresses be determined only by the 
 language and its sense, and if the syllables which they have 
 to carry do not overburden them, then every line may 
 have a different rhythm j though so much variety is not of 
 necessity. 
 
 Now this is very much what Milton was aiming at in the 
 lyrical parts of Samson, but he still sought to accomplish it by 
 fictitious units and feet after the classical models, as I have 
 attempted to show. There is really no reason at all for the 
 existence of these : only one step was needed, which was to 
 cast them away. He wrote in the choruses o£ Samson a rhyth- 
 mical stressed verse, and scanned it by means of fictions, 
 ffe need not have troubled himself about the scansion at alL If the 
 
Appendix G 77 
 
 stressed rhythm Is the beauty of the verse, it is a sufficient account of 
 it. But this seems too simple to be understood. 
 
 Tte metrical questions which arise are, What will a stress 
 carry? and what are the usual units of the verse? This is beyond 
 my subject : but when the laws of English stressed verse are 
 recognized, it will, I think, be found that they explain all those 
 irregularities of well-written free verse, to which metrists 
 are now at pains to match the names of Greek quantitative 
 feet, though these have no natural relation to them. They 
 adopted them, I presume, as a makeshift for a tme termi- 
 nology. Supposing A to represent a stressed syllable, we want 
 names for the following units, —Aw, wA— , u Aw, Aw w, w wA, A—, 
 —A, Aw, w A, A. (In the present edition of this book the reader 
 will find a further account of this subject in Appendix J, p. 88, 
 to which I referiim.) I will only add that when English poets 
 will write verse governed honestly by natural speech-stress, 
 they will discover the laws for themselves, and will find open to 
 them an infinite field of rhythm as yet untouched. There is 
 .nothing which Jnay not be done in it, and itJs perhaps not the 
 least of its advantages that it makes excellence difficult. 
 
 APPENDIX G 
 
 On the use of Greek Terminology in English 
 Prosody. 
 
 Most readers will observe that I have avoided using the 
 term Iambic of blank verse, ^sing and falling are proper and 
 convenient terms to distinguish the two main kinds of 
 unit in accentual verse, and they may, I thmk, be used in 
 
7 8 Appendix G 
 
 the analysis of most English verse without any danger of mis- 
 understanding. These terms depend on the tendency of an 
 accented syllable to be spoken at a higher pitch than an unac- 
 cented syllable : (this is the original meaning of ox)iton and 
 acute accent). Hence a fcot or metrical unit accented on its 
 first syllable tends to Ml in pitch towards the end, and is thus 
 called a faUing £aot ; while a £x>t in which the unaccented 
 part precedes the accented will rise in pitch towards the 
 end, and is therefore called a rising foot : and any metre or 
 rhythm may of course be styled by the name of its prevalent 
 unit. 
 
 The word stress was, in my opinion, preferable to accent for 
 my purpose, because, though it includes acute and other accent 
 it does not necessarily imply them. It is a wider term and 
 may include all forms of accent that distinguish the stronger 
 syllables. Stress without the true acute accent may be heard 
 in the monotone recitation of the prayers in cathedrals, 
 the ordinary 'accent' being preserved without any raising 
 of the voice pitch. In music the accent is often coincident 
 with a lowering of the pitch ; and this can of course be repro^ 
 duced in speech : but the tendency of a stressed syllable to 
 carry a true acute accent is sufficient to justify the use of these 
 terms rising and falling. 
 
 Whatever terms be used, the important matter is to have 
 their definition fixed and clear j and for that reason anything 
 must be better than the application of the names of quantitative 
 Greek feet to our English verse. I believe they were first 
 used thus through a misconception, and I am sure that they 
 lead to nothing but confusion. Before any one calls the feet 
 
Greek Terminology j<) 
 
 in English blank verse iambs let him consider in what respect 
 they are entitled to the name. A Greek or Latin iambus is a 
 foot of two syllables, the first of which is always short, and the 
 second always, at least by position, long, while the accent is as 
 often on the first as on the second. The so-called English 
 iambus, whatever its commonest condition may be, may have 
 either of its syllables short, or long, or both may be short, or 
 both long, while the stress is always on the last. There is 
 nothing in common between the classical and the English feet 
 except what is common to all disyllabic feet : the English 
 iambs might for this be as well called trochees or spondees ; 
 and if the consideration be added that in the Greek and Latin 
 iambus the first syllable is reckoned to be exactly half the value 
 of the second — just as a crotchet is half a minim — it is plain 
 that it must be better to renounce altogether the attempt to 
 readjust a term, which means something so remotely and 
 definitely different from that to which we would apply it. 
 
 I am convinced also that it is the misuse of this and like 
 terms which leads many to think that stress in English corre- 
 sponds with quantity in Greek and Latin. But syllables are 
 in English as much distinguished by length and brevity as they 
 can have been in Greek or Latin ; while, on the other hand, 
 Latin verse (if not Greek) was as much distinguished by its 
 stress as English verse is, although that stress may have been 
 less marked, and not of such an overruling character. If this 
 assertion is new or strange to the reader, let him question his 
 ear as to what the chief differentiation of the lines of the 
 iEneid is. Take for example the first two lines : they both 
 commence with a dactyl ; how do these dactyls differ ? 
 
8 o Appendix G 
 
 Arma vi|rilnique ci\no 
 Ic^[i|am H\co prdfujgus. 
 
 Or let him think what it was that Ovid sought after when he 
 ruled that his pentameters should close with a disyllable ; or 
 what Horace gained for his Sapphic line by varying the caesura. 
 Stress is easily perceived in Latin poetry ; indeed the dis- 
 tinction between different Latin paets' treatment of the same 
 metres and our appreciation- of their versification depend on it. 
 But the verse is not usually approached from this side. A. boy 
 is taught at school the sequence 'of long and short syllables, 
 and an attention to the position of caesuras and other breaks 
 which scholars have discovered, and by observing these he 
 counterfeits the rhythms. But it was the rhythms that caused the 
 caesuras. If a boy were told, for example, that it saved the 
 monotony of a pentameter to stress the penultimate, he would 
 understand what he was doing, and would use a disyllable in 
 the last place with -right ^intention ; not as he does now, 
 because he knows that any other word will be scratched out by 
 his tutor. It is possible that the darkness in which scholars 
 find themselves with respect to Greek rhythms has affected 
 their manner of regarding the Latin : for when they come 
 to teach a boy to write Greek iambics they could hardly 
 act otherwise than they do, since there is no one who could 
 point out with confidence the Greek rhythms for imitation. 
 No doubt those scholars who write careful Greek verse do 
 please their ear, as it has been trained by long study of the 
 models ; but it is an English ear that they please, trained by 
 reading the models in the same wrong way as that in which 
 they read their own imitations. No one could tell, a frhri, 
 
Greek Terminology 8i 
 
 how the result would be likely to sound in a Greek ear. The 
 excellence of such performances seems one of the most artificial 
 things in the world, though it may be none the worse for that. 
 As for quantity in English verse, whoever confounds it with 
 stress will be sure to violate it*. Some critics even assert 
 that it does not exist. I suppose that they are led to think so 
 by the numerous false quantities which disfigure English so-called 
 anapaestic and hexameter verse, or because our language does 
 not countenance the fiction concerning quantity, which is 
 drummed into all of us in our tender years j that is, that two 
 short syllables are always exactly equal to one long — which, 
 however, no doubt they sometimes are, even in English, if we 
 could only tell how to measure them. We are accustomed to 
 allow ourselves to consider every syllable on its own merits, 
 in its special place, and thus we can admit all degrees of length 
 and brevity as they really exist ; distinctions which must have 
 equally existed in Greek and Latin speech, but which their 
 system of prosody overrode, for its theory admitted only umts 
 and half units, and nothing between ; and we should have to 
 adopt the same rules of quantity for our words as they did for 
 theirs to obtain the same results. But, whatever our practice 
 may be, there can be no doubt that our language contains 
 syllables as short as it is possible for the tongue to frame, and 
 others as long, I suppose, as spoken syllables ever were; and it is 
 strange that the recognition of these should be hindered by the 
 existence and recognition of syllables of intermediate lengths. 
 
 * Tbe reader will find this question, the application of the classical 
 rules of quantity applied to English, fiilly treated in Mr. Stone's essay 
 printed with this edition of this book. 
 
 BRIDGES G 
 
82 appendix H 
 
 APPENDIX H 
 
 Specimens of ten-syliable verse, etc. 
 
 To fill up the spare pages of this sheet, I will give some 
 specimens of early ten-syllable verse : and first, in illustration 
 of Miltonic elision, that the reader may fcr himself compare 
 Chaucer's use with Milton's, I give, from the begiiming of the 
 Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, the lines in which super- 
 numerary syllables occur within the verse. Neglecting many 
 elisions of the weak terminal vowels now lost to the language, 
 which do not here concern us, I have marked the super- 
 numerary syllables, as in the examples from Milton, by italic 
 type or apostrophes. I take the text from the Rev. Dr. 
 Morris' edition in the Clarendon Press series, except that I 
 have written ever for evere, and deliver for delhere. 
 
 Of which vertii engend'red is the flour. 4.. 
 
 Of Engelond, to Caunterbary they wende. 16 and 2.1. 
 
 80 hadde I spoken with hem everichon. 3 1 . 
 
 And ever honourM for his worrhinesse. fo. 
 
 At Alisaundm he was, whan it was wonne. ^i. 
 
 Of Algezir, and ridm in Belmarye. jy. 
 
 And evermore he hadde a sovrreyn prys. Sy. 
 
 A lovjfcf and a lusty bacheler. So. 
 
 And wonderly deliver and greet of strengrhe. £4.. 
 
 He was as fresh as is the moneth of May. 91 (month). 
 
 A Cristofr; on his brest of silver shene. 11 f. 
 
 That of hir smyling was fill sitafle and coy. 119. 
 
 Wei coud she car» a morsel, and wel keepe. i jo (coude). 
 
 And fill plesailint, and amiab/e of port. 1 38, 
 
 She was so charitab/;, and so pitoils. 14.3. 
 
specimens 8 3 
 
 Pitous was accentaated pitous ; but Chaucer's prosody, like 
 the French, allows such words at the end of the line : where 
 their accent being shifted mart gratik, they cannot have had 
 the full stKss of monosyllabic endings like the precetMng ejc- 
 amples q^uoted ; and thus we see another way in which inver- 
 sions of the fifth foot come naturally to those familiar with our 
 national poetry : seep. 16. 
 
 Is lik'nJd, til a fish that it wateriees. 1 80. = that's. 
 
 What sholde he studw, and make himselven wood. 1 84.. 
 
 Upon a book in cloistre alwey to poure. 1 8j. 
 
 Grehoundes h« hadde, as swifte as fowe/ in flight. 190. 
 
 And, for to festue his hood under his diin. 19/. 
 
 He hadde of gold y-wroglit a curious pin. 156. 
 
 His heed was balled, that shoon as any glas. I98. = ball'd. 
 
 His botes soup/;, his hors in greet estat. 203. 
 
 A fit swan loved he best of any roost. 3.06. 
 
 Unto his ordre he was a noble post. 214 and 220. 
 
 Ful wel biloved, and &niul(er was he. il/. 
 
 With frankeleyns overal in his contree, 2.16 and 14.9. 
 
 So escatly was he of his governance. 281. 
 
 I give these lines without any opinion on the authority of 
 
 this text, which gets rid of several other examples. 
 
 II. 
 
 On page J 3 it is said that Ellis represents Chaucer's abU 
 sometimes as at^% and sometimes as aahL'. aa means merely 
 the long ah soiMid, and this syllable was without doubt com- 
 monly stressed j but about the £4 ^'d Chaucer say miserab'i or 
 miserahC, fofsib'lot fossibl^'i It seems most probable, as Ellis' 
 alternative spelling would imply, that Chaucer said either, and 
 in the same words, as we may hear now in modern French ,j but 
 I think myself that even the spelling h'l shortens the longer 
 
 G 2 
 
84 appendix H 
 
 pronunciation more than is always quite justifiable. I will give 
 some lines from Chaucer which will show that although the 
 syllable was 'elided' before a vowel, — as in lines 138, 143, 
 above from the prologue, — it was yet strong enough to fill 
 a place in the line, even before an open vowel ; and in the 
 vagarious spelling of the MSS., which are contemporary enough 
 to be in evidence, it appears as bel and bit, just as is required 
 by its rhymes in modem verse. I reproduce Dr. Morris* text 
 from the ' Aldine * edition. 
 
 Abhominable to che God of hevene. Somp. 900. 
 Ne see ye noc this honurable knight. March. loio. 
 With invisible wounde ay incurable. Monk. 610. 
 Lord Phebus, cast thin merciable eyghe. Frank. 308. 
 As it possibil is a frend to be. Shipman. 32. 
 
 Whether there is at this early date any sign of the weight 
 of this Latin termination giving way to the more natural 
 speech-stress of the word with which it is compounded I have 
 not knowledge to say : such evidence would, I suppose, first 
 appear in words where the two accents collided, as in dgmfnahle, 
 and in the verse of more purely English writers, who probably 
 use such words more sparingly ; but in the Pearl there is the 
 following line : — 
 
 What resonabele hyre be naught be runne, 
 which, if the text be right, shows a shortening of the a, for the 
 line has only four stresses ; the spelling btle is nothing. See 
 also 6rribly, Monkf Tale, 617. 
 
 The following lines may interest the reader for different 
 reasons : — 
 
 The aungd of God, and every maner boone. x""* Nun. 3 j5. 
 The slaughter of cristen folk, and deshonoijr. M. of Law. 8/8. 
 
specimens 8 / 
 
 And b^nigne hane, shall serve hym till I dye. C' of Love. 114.. 
 
 To r^mewe all the rokkes of Brytaigne. Frank. 4.8/. 
 
 And many a labour, and many a grece emprise. Frank. 4.. 
 
 O noble almighty Sampson, leef and deere. Monk. 6i. 
 
 O noble Sampson, strengesc of al mankynde. Monk. 8/. 
 
 And doun fel temple and al, and ther it lay. $j. 
 
 Well oughte men thy picous deth complayne. Monk. 387. 
 
 With a fill pitous face, pale of hewe. N. Priest's. 203. 
 
 That thilke day was perilous to the. 4.13. 
 
 III. 
 
 The following is a specimen of Marlowe's blank verse, from 
 
 the last act of the first part of Tamburlaine. The text is from 
 
 Mr. Bulleh's edition, but as I am not concerned with the sense, 
 
 I have not adopted emendations : — 
 
 Ah, fair Zenocrate ! — divine Zenocrate ! — 
 Fair is too foul an epithet for thee. 
 That in thy passion for thy country's love^ 
 And fear to see thy kingly father's harm. 
 With hair dishevelled wip'st thy watery cheeks; 
 And, like to Flora in her morning pride. 
 Shaking her silver tresses in the air, 
 Rain'st on the earth resolved pearl in showers. 
 And sprinklest sapphires on thy shining lace. 
 Where Beauty, Mother to the Muses, sits 
 Taking instruaions from thy flowing eyes, 
 f Eyes, when that Ebena steps to heaven. 
 In silence of thy solemn evening's walk. 
 Make, in the mantle of the richest night. 
 The moon, the planets, and the meteors, light; 
 There angels, in their crystal armours fight 
 A doubtful battle with my tempted thoughts 
 For Egypt's freedom, and the Soldan's life; 
 His life that so consumes Zenocrate, 
 Whose sorrows lay more siege unto my soul. 
 Than all my army to Damascus' walls: 
 And neither Persia's sovereign, nor the Turk 
 
8<f Appendix H 
 
 Troubled my senses with conceit of foil 
 
 So much by much, as doth Zenocrate. 
 
 1 What is beauty, saith my sufferingSj then? ij 
 
 If all the pens that ever poets held 
 
 Had fed the feeling of their masters' thoughts. 
 
 And every sweetness that inspired their hearts. 
 
 Their minds, and muses on admii^ themes; 
 
 If all the heayenly quintessence they still 
 
 From their immortal flowers of poesy. 
 
 Wherein, as in a mirror, we perceive 
 
 The highest reaches of a human wit ; 
 
 If these had made one poem's period. 
 
 And all combined in beauty's worthiness, 
 
 Vet should thet« hover in their restless heads 
 
 One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least. 
 
 Which into words no virtue can digest. 
 
 But how unseemly is it for my sex, 
 My discipline of arms and chivalry. 
 My nature and the terror of my name. 
 To harbour thoughts effeminate and faint ! 
 Save only that in beauty's just applause. 
 With whose instinct the soul of man is touched : 
 And every warrior that is rapt with love 
 Of £»me of valour, and of victory. 
 Must needs have beauty beat on his conceits : 
 I thus conceiving and subduing both 
 That which hath stopt the tempest of the gods. 
 Even from the fiery-spangled veil of Heaven, 
 To feel the lowly warmth of shepherds' flames. 
 And martch in cottages of strowed weeds. 
 Shall give the world to note for alt my birth 
 That virtue Solely is the sum of glory. 
 And fashions men with true nobility. 
 
 This passage, which well exhibits the famed magnificence 
 of Marlowe's verse, has, compared with Milton, the following 
 characteristics : Rarity of elisions. Rarity of inversions : thus 
 the nine-syllable Verse (line 25) has great force. Absence of 
 
specimens 8 7 
 
 breaks : the unity of the line being often further strengthened 
 by alliteration. Freijuency of weak third foot : this being 
 actually the commonest type of line. Also the use of rhyme 
 as an ornament. Rhyme occurs in Paradise Lost (see I. i^6. 
 , 8. yi J II. 220. I ; IV. 24-7), but only as a natural richness 
 among the varieties of speech; and it would seem that it 
 cannot be forbidden in a long poem but by the scrupulosity 
 which betrays art. 
 
 This verse is soon monotonous, and, as Mr. Bullen has lately 
 pointed out, Peele wrote it before Marlowe. From his Arraign- 
 ment of Paris, 1584, I quote this example (Act iv). 
 
 Sacred and just, thou great and dreadful Jove, 
 
 And you thrice-reverend powers, whom love nor hate 
 
 May wrest awry ; if this, to me a man. 
 
 This fortune fatal be, that I must plead 
 
 For safe excusal of my guiltless thought. 
 
 The honour more makes my mishap the less. 
 
 That I a man must plead before the gods. 
 
 Gracious forbearers of the world's amiss, 
 
 For her, whose beauty how it hath enticed. 
 
 This heavenly senate may with me aver. . . . 
 
 I might offend, sith I was guerdoned, 
 
 And tempted more than ever creature was 
 
 With wealth, with beauty, and with chivalry, 
 
 And so preferPd beauty before them all. 
 
 The thing that hath enchanted heaven itself. 
 
 And for the one, contentment is my wealth; 
 
 A shell of salt will serve a shepherd swajn, 
 
 A slender banquet in a homely scrip, 
 
 And water running from the silver spring. 
 
 For arms, they dread no foes that sit so lowj 
 
 A thorn can keep the wind from off my back, 
 
 A sheepcote thatch'd a shepherd's palace hight. 
 
 Of tragic Muses shepherds con no skill ; 
 
 Enough is them, if Cupid ben displeased, 
 
88 Appendix J 
 
 To sing his praise on slender oaten pipe. 
 And thus, thrice-reverend, have I told my tale. 
 And crave the torment of my guiltless soul 
 To be rheasdrM by my &ultless thought. 
 If warlike Pallas, or the Queen of Heaven 
 Sue to reverse my sentence by appeal. 
 Be it as please your majesties divine; 
 The wrong, the hurt, not mine, if any be, 
 But hers whose beauty claimed the prize of me. 
 
 These passages of blank verse before Shakespeare show it in 
 transition from the rhymed couplet. 
 
 APPENDIX J 
 
 On the rules of the common lighter stress- 
 rhythms, AND THE ENGLISH ACCENTUAL HEXAMETER. 
 
 I. 
 
 § I. Having frequently been asked to add some definite 
 elucidation of stress-prosody to the remarks on it in the pre- 
 ceding Appendix F (where I said about it all that, it seemed 
 to me, could fittingly come into a textbook on Milton's verse) ; 
 I will here give a few of the common laws of stressed verse 
 and examine some examples. 
 
 § 2. These ' laws ' are merely the tabulation of what my 
 ear finds in English stressed verse : but they appeal confi- 
 dently to the reader's ear for confirmation. He will please to 
 note that I am dealing only with the lighter forms of these 
 stressed rhythms, that is with such as are called dactylic, 
 anapaestic, comic iambic, and hexameter (as £ir as stress governs 
 disyllabic metres, it is I think sufficiently covered by our 
 examination of Milton); and when I say that anything is not 
 
T^ules of Stress-rhythms 8 9 
 
 allowable I mean only that it seems to my ear unsatisfactory 
 in these lighter rhythms. Thvre h no limit to rhythm, nor can 
 I imagine any kind of effect, or any possible collocation of 
 syllables in a 'foot,' which might not be well employed in 
 some poetic metre or other. 
 
 § 3. I use the symbol ^ to denote a stressed syllable. This 
 does not imply that it is a long syllable. The properer symbol 
 is an acute accent, single or double ; but I do not use that for 
 three reasons. First, because it is convenient for primary 
 analysis to have a symbol which does not raise the distinction 
 between single and double stress*. Secondly, because the 
 acute accent does not range well with the quantitative symbols 
 — and w. It has the appearance of being less instead of more 
 important, and thus misrepresents the real units to the eye. 
 Thirdly, the laws to which attention is called are nova fraecefta, 
 and it is well to have a new symbol to indicate them. ^ 
 
 § 4. Also I shall use the terms hearvy, light and short to denote 
 the quantitive value of syllables, instead of the usual terms long 
 and shorff, for the following reasons : — 
 
 * Double stress and che rhythms which ic introduces are alluded to 
 below, see § i6. [Some exx. have occurred p. 44..] 
 
 f Though this distinction between light and short is not made in the 
 earlier part of this book, I do not find anything there which need cause 
 confusion. On pages 17-19 the sign wu is used merely to distinguish 
 the neak^feet'. and on pages 4.3, 44 to show the light (not always short) 
 places in the dactylic passages of Samsm. In Milton's blanic verse the 
 distinction between light and short (indeed even between light and 
 heavy) implies greater refinement of analysis than is possible in an 
 account of the structure of the verse } and it is open to much uncertainty ; 
 at least I have never myself discovered which syllables Milton considered 
 short and which long, so as to be able to draw any line between them. 
 
9 o appendix J 
 
 The term long, as employed in Greek and Latin prosody, 
 includei not only those syllables which have a long vowel, but 
 also those syllables which have a short vowel long 'by position,' 
 that is, having two or more consonants following it 5 while the 
 term short includes only those syllables which have their shoit 
 (or shortened) vowel pure, or followed by only one consonant. 
 But the rules of stress make a very wide distinction between 
 the heavy long syllables on the one hand, which practically 
 retard speech (whether by virtue of the length of the vowel, as 
 in hate, bnght, dov>n ; or by an overcrowding of consonants as 
 in incensebreathing) J and those lighter long syllables on the 
 Other hand, in which a short vowel, though classically long by 
 position, is not much retarded by consonants (as in and, or the 
 second syllable of brightest'). Stressed verse does not, for 
 instance, make much distinction between the second syllables 
 o£ brighter and. brightest, though the one would in classical prosody 
 be short, and the other long. Keeping therefore the terra 
 short, as it is used in the prosody of the Greeks, for the very 
 shortest syllables, it is necessary to make two classes of their 
 long syllables ; and these I shall distinguish into heavy and 
 light, as just explained. And as there will be, in what I shall 
 have to say, seldom any cause to distinguish between the light 
 and the short, the class light will include the short, unless the 
 latter are specially distinguished, and thus it comes about that 
 in stressed verse syllables are primarily classed as heavy and 
 light instead o£ bng and short. 
 
 § y. The symbols will therefore be as follows : — 
 ^ denotes a stressed syllable whether light or heavy. 
 — denotes a heavy syllable as defined. 
 
^les of Stress-rhythms 9 1 
 
 <~i a light syllable as defined, and will include the short 
 syllables, which may however be sometimes denoted by the 
 lesser shoit sign „. 
 
 t It is perhaps well to repeat the warning, that as 
 syllables vary in all degrees of quantity from longest to 
 shortest, there cannot be an accurate line drawn between 
 heavy and light ; and a syllable of intermediate quantity 
 may in some collocations appear heavy, in others light*. 
 The typical heavy syllables however are always heavy 
 and long, and the typical light syllables are plainly 
 distinguishable from them ; whik the true short syllables 
 proper remain always, as in Greek or Latin, an accurately 
 separate class. 
 
 § 6. The first two rules of stress-prosody are given in 
 Appendix F. 
 
 I. The stress governs the rhythm. Ex hyfothesi. 
 
 II. The second rule is a logical corollary from the first, 
 namely, that The stresses must all be true speech-stresses : 
 i. e. the rhythm must never rely upon the metrical form to 
 supply a stress which is not in the natural speech-intonation, 
 but is introduced only by the necessities of the metre. (This 
 is explained on p. 6^ ; examples will be found below exx. iz, rj, 
 20, 21, 21.) The reader to whom this offers any difEculty 
 
 • If the reader asks for an example, I suggest the word ymtig in ex. j. 
 Tmng is classically shore before a vowel, for this tig is only a modified n , 
 and the av is of course only a short v ; but here, being both before a 
 consonant and in a specially weak place of the line, the syllable seems 
 more heavy than light. 
 
92 ^Appendix J 
 
 should master it at once. The reason for the rule is 
 that since it is the stress that determines the rhythm, the 
 rhythm cannot create the stress. The result of not observing 
 this rule is confusion and uncertainty in the verse : for the 
 ear being called on in any one place to impose a stress which 
 does not exist in the natural reading of the sense, will feel at 
 liberty in other places to refuse the rhythm offered to it 5 and 
 will often replace it by some commoner form, obtained by 
 substituting a metrical false stress of its own, as it has been 
 before compelled to do. 
 
 § 7. If we now examine any simple verses written on the 
 accentual system, further laws should appear. And since the 
 verse is framed on the stresses, the first question will be con- 
 cerning the complements of these stresses : what do these 
 stresses carry with them ? Any example will show 5 the more 
 familiar the better. Bp. Heber's hymn will be well known to 
 most readers. 
 
 (i) Brigbcesc and best of the sons of the morning. 
 
 This line was no doubt intended by its author for an 
 accentual dactylic line, and would have been scanned by 
 him thus : 
 
 Brightest and | best of the | sons of the | morning. 
 But that is not its right division into stress-units or feet. 
 
 III. It is a general law of stress, as I think any one who 
 consults his ear must perceive, that A stress has more CARRY- 
 ING POWER OVER THE SYLLABLE NEXT TO IT, THAN IT HAS OVER 
 A SYLLABLE REMOVED" FROM IT BY AN INTERVENING SYLLABLE. 
 
^iles of Stress-rhythms 93 
 
 And this rale, supposing it to be the only rule, would give us 
 the following units : 
 
 Brightest | and best of | the sons of | the morning, 
 which is a better explanation of the verse upon the theory of 
 stress. But this clearly is not right, and a little consideration 
 will convince us of another rule, namely : 
 
 IV. That a STRESS has a pecuuarly strong attraction 
 FOR ITS OWN proclitics AND ENCLITICS and that it will attach 
 them by preference, and override rule III, unless forbidden by 
 some other law, as it sometimes is by rule V. 
 
 This law will give the following division : 
 
 „ A , »-' , ^ ,' . '^ 1 V y ! '^ 1 V y ! '^ v 
 
 Brightest | and best | of the Sons | of the morning, 
 and this is the right explanation of this verse. 
 
 § 8. I do not see that there is any cause for sutprise at find- 
 ing the metrical units sometimes determined by grammar. The 
 conditions are these : the main element and determinant of 
 the metre is the stress — this is conceded — and this stress is 
 often determined by the grammar. Now the syllables which 
 fall between the stresses must be related to them, and their 
 natural relation is that they depend on them, some on one 
 stress and some on another; and if we question which depend on 
 which, there is no escape from the grammatical speechbond : even 
 the expression of the grammatical stress by musical pitch, is pitch 
 in relation to the parts of the grammatical unit within itself. 
 The only objection which I can imagine is this : an objector 
 may say — ' It is true that the stresses do carry the syllables as 
 you explain, but in doing this they makf a dactylic or anapaestic 
 
94 appendix J 
 
 system ; and it is that which satisfies the ear, for the ear is 
 attending to these regular metrical units and not to the irregular 
 speech-units of the stress.' Now I do not at all quarrel with 
 this view. I agree with it so fer as to say that, in fnf onion at 
 the diction is poetic and the versification good, regular metrical units 
 tpill assert themsehes independently of the grammar, so as to override 
 the irregular units of the speech-stress, and may even come to 
 be the simplest description of some regular accentual English 
 verse. But this is not its true analysis ; and I am convinced 
 that if any one who hankers after classical analogies will 
 provisionally cast his &ncy aside, and examine the real English 
 construction of the verse, he will never, after understanding it, 
 wish to superimpose upon it a foreign and needless explanation. 
 For the stressed rhythm is a sufHcient account of itself: its 
 analysis is complete, and it is more beautiful than any other. 
 I would even say that the analogy with Greek or Latin verse 
 (and it is only analogy) is confusing and worse than useless. 
 Analysisof theEnglishaccentualhexameter, for instance, reveals 
 that a trochee (so-called) will serve for a spondee, and it is 
 really provoking that any one should persist in pretending to 
 understand an explanation which, basing itself on the distinction 
 between long and short syllables*, is reduced to admit that a 
 short syllable will serve for a long one. Besides this absurdity, 
 the analysis of classical verse into classical units is sometimes 
 an arbitrary or doubtful matter when it is at home. Is, for 
 example, the £)llowing scheme dactylic or anapaestic ; 
 
 * The long and short syllables of the classical metre being represented 
 by accented and unaccented syllables respectively. 
 
"H^lss of Stress-rhythms 9 j" 
 
 and if it may be either, why may it not eejually well be 
 this? — 
 
 Certainly classical prosody does not make the slightest a frrni 
 probability in favour of an anapaestic or dactylic system in 
 English rather than the one last shown. So again if— vj— w— u— 
 may be either trochaic or iambic, why must it be one of these 
 rather than something else ; But if the stress-laws be allowed 
 and observed, it matters not what explanation of this sort be 
 indulged in; and if it can add to the pleasure which any one 
 takes in reading the verse, it is so far good, even though its 
 expositors may not always be able to agree about it among 
 themselves. 
 
 § 9. The next line will give us more laws. To write it£rst 
 as the Bishop would have divided it, 
 
 (2) Dawn on our | darkness and | iend us thine | aid. 
 Here are plainly two bad felse quantities. Dawn on our, and 
 lend Us thine are very bad even for accentual dactyls. One has 
 only to speak them detached to perceive this. But as they 
 lie in the verse their faultiness does not appear. The line is 
 qtrite smooth and satisfactoiy 5 it does not halt. How is this 3 
 The reason is that, though a bad accentual dactylic verse, it is 
 a very good line on the principles of stress, dividing thus : 
 
 Dawn on [ our darkness [ and lend us | tmne aid. 
 V. The law which this verse may illustrate is this, that 
 (at least in these light uhythms) A stress will not carry 
 
 A HEAVY SYLLABLE WHICH IS REMOVED FROM IT BY ANOTHER 
 SYLLABLE J Or thuS, A HEAVY SYLLABLE MUST EE CONTIGUOUS 
 
9 (J appendix J 
 
 WITH THE STRESSED SYLLABLE THAT CARRIES IT; and it will 
 
 follow from this, that when the first of two proclitics is heavy, 
 the stress will refuse it unless the two can be contracted by 
 speech into one heavy syllable. 
 
 § lo. There are numberless instances of infraction of this 
 rule in almost all stressed verse hitherto written. Here are 
 some examples from Shelley's Sensitive Plant: 
 
 (3) Each and all like miniscering angels were. 
 
 {4.) Whilit the Zinging hours of the day went by. 
 
 {;) Liki Jinfg lovers whom youth and love make dear. 
 
 — \j I .11 I 
 
 (6) Wrafiei and filled by their mutual atmosphere. 
 
 The reader should consider whether he likes the italicized 
 initial feet of these lines or not ; they have, of course, a definite 
 character of their own, which is not bad or intolerable in itself. 
 The question is whether such feet are admissible as units of 
 this light verse. If they are not, then their admission puts the 
 .verse into another category, and we must describe it differ- 
 ently : only, since by far the greater part of the poem is 
 in a lighter rhythm, we are in a dilemma ; nor can one 
 ■be expected to defend a confusion of two kinds of verse. 
 I should certainly rule them out. There is some explanation 
 of Shelley's practice given below, p. 98, § 13, with further 
 examples and strictures. 
 
 § II. From rule III above, it would appear that so-called 
 daciyU and anafaestt must be comparatively rare units in stressed 
 verse, and that the typical trisyllabic foot will be one in which 
 the stress is in the middle, with an unstressed syllable on 
 
Titles of Stress-rhythms 97 
 
 either side of it, like the word brhannic, which may provision- 
 ally be used as a name for these feet*. 
 
 § 1 1. We may now give a list of the common stress-miits or feet, 
 which are found in the kind of verse which we are describing. 
 1st. The bare stress a without any complement. This is 
 frequently found. (An ex. occurs on p. 75.) 
 
 2nd. The two falling disyllabic feet : 
 Aw 
 
 A — 
 
 3rd. The two rising disyllabic feet : 
 
 WA 
 
 — A 
 4th. The britannics, or mid-stress trisyllabics : 
 
 W Avj 
 
 — Aw 
 
 w A — 
 
 — A — 
 
 yth. The so-called dactyl and anapaest, i.e. the falling and 
 rising trisyllabics : 
 
 A w w 
 w w A 
 
 6th. The quadrisyllables : 
 
 w Aw w 
 -- A w w 
 w w A w 
 w w A — 
 
 7th. The five-syllable foot : 
 
 WW A WW 
 
 which will rarely occur in the rhythms which we are discussing. 
 
 * On p. 77, where I gave commonest stress-units (as found in such verse 
 as was there analysed), I intended to call attention to the prevalence of 
 these hitherto unrecognized ' feet ' by putting ihera first in the list. 
 
 BRIDGES H 
 
9? Appendix J 
 
 § 13. It will be seen that in the above list there is no 
 example of a heavy and light syllable occurring both on the 
 same side of a stress. The forms — u A and Aw— have been 
 excluded by rule V. The other possible forms are w-A and 
 A — w : of these the second is I think rare, and we must be 
 contented here to rule it out by defiult ; of the first, I will 
 give examples from The Sensitive Plant, beginning with a fall 
 stanza to show the metre. 
 
 And the spring arose on the garden fair. 
 And the spirit of love fell everywhere} 
 (7] ^nd each flmer and herb on Earth's dark breast 
 Rose &om the dream of its wintry rest. 
 
 (8) ^nd their heiah was mixed with feint odour sent. 
 
 (9) ^nd narcissi the feiresc among them all. 
 
 \j — I I I t 
 
 (10) Whidi unveiled the depth of her glowing breast. 
 
 (11) Can frit lull but at last must awaken it. 
 
 Now if we do not approve of the heaviness of the initial feet 
 italicized in these lines, which plainly I do not, we have to ask 
 why Shelley wrote them. Why did he like them? I think 
 the answer is this. Having chosen this particular metre to 
 write in, that is a stressed rhythm, with liberty to use tri- 
 syllabic or disyllabic units at will (a metre sometimes called 
 comic-iambic stanza), he knew that it would play havoc with 
 the gentle mood of his poem if it were not freely broken or 
 delayed j and having no system to govern his liberties in 
 breaking the rhythm, he did just what came most naturally to 
 the language, and overloaded the stresses. And he not only 
 
^ules of Stress-rhythms 9 9 
 
 overloaded the stresses, but he did not even keep the stresses in- 
 tact. The poem is in the same condition as Christabel (examined 
 on pp. 73-7 j). Here are some of Shelley's false stresses : 
 
 (12) And the Naiad-Gke lily 0/ the vale. 
 
 f f \. t 
 
 (13) Till the fiery sun which is its eye. 
 
 Weak places, like these third feet, cannot be admitted in 
 stress-prosody (see rale II, and for the possible omission of 
 stress in stressed verse § 17) ; so that from these and many 
 other lines in the poem it is clear that The Sensitive Plant is 
 not written in pure stressed verse, and that Shelley had not, 
 any more than G^eridge, a. consistent practice in that system 
 of versification. This is the account of these verses. A con- 
 sistent prosody is, however, so insignificant a part in what 
 makes good English poetry, that I find that I do not myself 
 care very much whether some good poetiy be consistent in its 
 versification or not : indeed I think I have liked some verses 
 better because they do not scan, and thus displease pedants. 
 I should have put Blake into the 'Golden Treasury' in 18^1. 
 However, when one is considering prosody and principles of 
 rhythm, it is necessary to attend to that only ; and I cannot 
 admit that these verses are good as mere versification. Shelley's 
 practice has naturally done much to accustom our ear to allow 
 these heavy initial feet in light measures ; and it has en- 
 couraged others to be careless about such syllables, especially 
 as it requires some pains to avoid them. But it is worth while 
 to add that, in this so-called comic-iambic stanza, the first 
 place is the one to which even the light rising trisyllable is 
 most sparingly admitted by those who have done best in 
 
 H 2 
 
loo Appendix J 
 
 this metre, and a faniori, the heavy rising trisyllables would 
 be excluded entirely. 
 
 + It will be seen that in this metre (in which the lines 
 are very strong, distinct units), this peculiar behaviour of 
 the initial stress of the line in disliking to carry more 
 than one unstressed syllable before it, follows logically 
 from law III above, and confirms the statement that 
 a 'britannic ' is the commonest trisyllabic unit of stressed 
 verse. Adopting the classical terminology, the rule would 
 be that in these comic-iambics an anapaest is allowed in 
 any place, but is best excluded from the first. The laws 
 of stress give a perfect account of this, for the first foot is 
 in aii exceptional condition, the unstressed syllables that 
 precede its stress having a stress on one side of them only; 
 whereas the two unstressed syllables of all the otter 
 anapaests have a stress on both sides of them, so that they 
 can divide and go one to one stress and one to another, 
 as they will do if either of them is heavy: and as this is not 
 possible in the first foot, it is for this reason exceptional. 
 
 t+ Heine's strictness in this respect is one great cause 
 of the crispness and force of this measure in his hands. 
 I cannot do better than give an example of a few stanzas 
 by that master, as they will not only illustrate this point, 
 but will exhibit, better than any words of mine can, the 
 great variety of rhythm possible in the simplest form of 
 strict writing in stress-prosody. 
 
 Es treibt | mich 'hin, | es tr6ibt | mich her ! 
 
 Noch wenige | Stdnden, | dann s611 ich | sie schauen, 
 
"B^les of Stress-rhythms i o i 
 
 Sie s^lber, | die sch6nste | der schonen | Jungfranen ; — 
 Du treues | H^rz, [ was p6chst du | so schwer ! 
 
 Die Stdnden | sind aber | ein fiules [ Volk! 
 Schleppen | sich { behdglich | trage, 
 Schl^ichen | gahnend ] fhre | Wege ; 
 Tiimmle | di'ch, | du fadles ] V61k! 
 
 T6bende I Eile | mich treibend | erfisst! 
 Aber I wohl niemals | Ifebten | die Horen; — 
 Heimlich ] im grausamen | Bunde | verschw6ren, 
 Sp6tten sie | tuckisch | der Llebenden | Hist. 
 
 § 14. If all these feet, in which more than one heavy sylla- 
 ble is carried by a stress on the same side of it, be ruled oat, 
 then the simple general nile would seem to be that — 
 
 VI. A STRESS WILL NOT CARRY MORE THAN ONE HEAVY SYLLA- 
 BLE OR TWO LIGHT SYLLABLES ON THE SAME SIDE OF IT 5 and 
 
 this would be an example of Equivalence, and we may join 
 hands with the classicists ; see Appendix F. I believe that in 
 the lighter trisyllabic rhythms this should be made the rule, 
 and that its infractions should appear as exceptions. 
 
 § I J. The difficulties in the application of such a rule are 
 these : First, the uncertain and even varying length of some of 
 
 these syllables ; e. g. in the common phrases / am coming 
 
 — u A w 
 th^ are going, the pronouns I and the)i are undoubtedly to be 
 
 classed with the heavy syllables ; but in common speech the 
 
 phrases in which they occur are so subject to contraction, as 
 
 in I'm and th^'re, that in comic verse, like Clough's, they are 
 
 rightly admitted. Their frequent occurrence, however, when 
 
102 
 
 Appendix J 
 
 written uncontracted, tends to lower the standard of the 
 fluency of the verse, and leads to the admission of units of 
 like weight, which cannot be so well explained in theory, or 
 got over in reading. 
 
 Secondly, a very difficult question arises, which affects equally 
 all those units where the stress is apparently overladen on one 
 side or other, and concerning which I do not find it possible to 
 make a clear definition : it is this, how iar the refusal of a sntss 
 to carry the whole of its grammatical unit (see exx. zz, zf, itf) 
 will cause the thrown-off syllable or syllables to attach them- 
 selves to another stress : or, in other words, how far the stresses 
 may be relied on to carry their proper metrical complements 
 independcmly of the grammar. I believe the answer to be that 
 this depends on the style in which the verse is written ; and 
 while in common colloquial language (such as is the greater 
 part of Clough's comic poems) the grammar must assert itself 
 very strongly, yet in a higher poeric dicrion (even such as 
 Shelley's Senshhe Plant) the grammar readily gives way to the 
 versification. If this is true, then where the grammar is most 
 stringent, there the liberty of treating these difficult heavy 
 syllables freely by contraction and hastening is greatest; while 
 just in those cases where they cannot be contracted without 
 disgracing the style, the questionable syllables may be resolved 
 into other stresses. 
 
 Thirdly, a question is likely to arise as to how fer the 
 weight of syllables is relative — i.e. whether, when the stress 
 is on a very heavy syllable, it will carry more than it will 
 when on a light one. When stress and weight are combined 
 they may make a more commanding element of rhythm j but, 
 
J{ules of Stress-rhythms 103 
 
 on the other hand, when the stress falls on a short syllable 
 there is evidently more spare time in the foot to devote to 
 heavy syllables, if the whole foot be regarded as a time-uflit. 
 These are points which I must be content to indicate. It is 
 well to train the ear before trusting it. 
 
 Fourthly, it must be decided as to how far the fiction of 
 elision is to be allowed. Such a line as 
 
 (14.) Only' overhead the sweet nightingale 
 
 is by our rules good or bad according as the elision is allowed 
 or not. It pleases me. 
 
 The main difficulty however lies undoubtedly in the un- 
 certain length of these light longs, and the indisposition of 
 English writers, either to oppose their tendency to intrude, 
 or to allow them their true length ; for it is owing to this 
 leniency towards them that so little of our stressed verse is 
 satisfectory to read, or possible to refer to as a model. The 
 lightness or heaviness of the more doubtful syllables can only 
 be a question of use, and one wishes that the practice were 
 better and stricter. 
 
 §1^. Finally, there is no doubt that this stress-prosody is 
 fit for much heavier rhythms than those which we are con- 
 sidering; and that in such heavier rhythms heavier units or 
 feet would be allowed, though, as these come in, secondary or 
 subordinate accents will appear. A study of Shelley's very 
 beautiful early poem, 'Away, the moor is dark beneath the 
 inoon,' will illustrate what I mean. The scheme, on which 
 this poem is written, is one of four main or double stresses in 
 the line ; but, if read with due gravity, it will show generally 
 
104 appendix J 
 
 six accents, and sometimes five or seven. Shelley was of 
 coarse conscious that the various stress-rhythms with which he 
 was, so to speak, counterpointing the original measure, were 
 destructive of its singsong framework : for instance 
 
 (i j-) Rapid I clouds | have drunk | tne lasc | pa!e beam | of even 
 is convincing and extremely fine, whereas 
 
 Rapid clouds have drunk | the lasC pale beam of even 
 is altogether unworthy ; and so of most of the lines. 
 
 t The scheme of the first line, which looks like a 
 common syllabic ' iambic * line, of five places, is this : 
 
 (i6) Away, the moor | is dark beneath the moon. 
 And any one who would read this poem aloud, or the 
 one next mentioned, must be acquainted with the skeleton 
 scheme of four double stresses and the break in the mid- 
 line, and give indication of these, as may be done by 
 keeping just in touch with the musical-time accent (the 
 musical scheme being four beats in the bar, with the 
 double stress always on the first beat). The variants 
 of the counterpointed rhythms are purposely elaborated 
 towards the end, with a great effect of luxuriance j but 
 the two lines here scanned with the double accent will 
 enable any one to scan the rest. 
 
 This most pathetic poem, the poet's wail of desolation 
 on first feeling the wound from which his spirit never 
 recovered, cannot be made the subject of diy metrical 
 analysis without some apology. We shall find however 
 more than exculpation, for in seeking some other example 
 
The Accentual Hexameter lOj- 
 
 of Shelley's use of this metre for comparison, we shall 
 come upon the song of the sixth Spirit in the first act of 
 Prometheus : 
 
 (17) ' Ah, sister, desolation | is a delicate thing'.' 
 And it is a matter of no small interest to discover that 
 when Shelley wrote that song it was his own desolation 
 that was in his mind, and that he was recurring to the 
 very same form in which the outburst of his despairing 
 passion was first expended. 
 
 § 17. In such heavier and freer measures (and this rule may 
 be extended to the accentual hexameter) it will be found that 
 the ear will tolerate the omission of a stress under certain 
 conditions. As far as I know, the law is this : — 
 
 VII. In some metres when four, and in any metre 
 
 WHEN MORE THAN FOUR, UNSTRESSED SYLLABLES OCCUR TO- 
 GETHER, THEY WILL OCCUPY THE PLACE OF A STRESS, WHICH 
 MAY BE SAID TO BE DISTRIBUTED OVER THEM ; AND A LINE IN 
 WHICH SUCH A COLLECTION OF SYLLABLES OCCURS WILL LACK ONE 
 OF ITS STRESSES. 
 
 II. 
 
 If these are the simple primary laws of the lighter (so-called 
 dactylic and anapaestic) forms of stressed verse — and they 
 must be these or something very like them— then they must 
 be the trae account of the English 'accentual hexameter.' 
 The rationale of that verse is that it substitutes six stresses or 
 speech-accents, with their complements, for the six quantitive 
 feet of the classic hexameter : it regards that hexameter as 
 
io6 j^ppendix J 
 
 a falling rhythm, and represents the trisyllabic dactyl by two 
 unaccented syllables following their stress, and the spondee by 
 one. Any attempt to supply the falling syllables of the dactyl 
 with short syllables rather than long, or the spondees with long 
 ones rather than short, seems a matter of taste, or a refinement 
 of scholastic fancy. 
 
 As this English verse is built on stress, and neglects quantity, 
 it is absolutely certain that it must come under the laws of stress 
 and not of quantity. Any attempt at quantitive explanation 
 will be futile j and if our laws of stress-prosody fail to explain 
 it, then we must have laid them down wrongly, and we may 
 test or correct them by it. But i^ on the other hand, we 
 find that it is well explained by our laws, then we shall have 
 a simple and intelligible explanation in lieu of one that is both 
 forced and unintelligible, and shall also establish the truth of 
 our inductions. 
 
 Any one who has read, or tried to read*, many of these 
 ' hexameters ' will remember that, while there are a majority 
 of lines which read fairly well without halting, there are many 
 that are very defective in rhythm j by which I mean that they 
 offer no convincing rhythm to the ear. Among the former 
 
 * ' Tried CO read ' is true of most of this verse ; and no one can have 
 failed in the trial more thoroughly than I have. My quotations are from 
 Clough because I have found him an exception, and am charmed with the 
 sympathetic esprit of his Bothie and jlmmrs, in which he has handled 
 aspects of life, the romance of which is very untractable to the Muse, and 
 chosen for them a fairly satisfactory, though not a perfected form. If 
 Clough did not quite know what he was doing in the versification (and 
 if he had known, he could have used some of his liberties more freely, and 
 others more sparingly), yet he of all men most certainly knew very well 
 what he was not doing. 
 
The Accentual Hexameter 107 
 
 class (those that seem to scan) there are some that are 
 extremely 'fluent, where all the unaccented syllables of the 
 ' dactyls ' are light, or even short ; and sometimes the falling 
 syllables of the spondees are long. Here is an example : 
 (18] Tibur is beauciful too, and the orchard slopes and che Anio. 
 
 And here is one really accentual, but made to scan on Latin 
 rules: 
 (19) Ouc of a dark umbrage sounds also musical issued. 
 
 Such verses as these cannot offend any of our laws j all 
 the feet are easily resolved into very simple stress-units. But 
 among those that please there are also some which cannot be 
 explained on the hypothesis of (even accentual) dactyl and 
 spondee ; and taking these as one class, and those which 
 absolutely refuse to be read as another class, we shall find that 
 the former are pleasing because they are good verses according 
 to stress-prosody ; while those which off"end are offensive 
 because they break the rules of stressed verse. I will give 
 enough examples to enable any one to apply the test for 
 himself. 
 
 The first line of The BothU is a halting line : 
 
 (lo) It was the afternoon and the sports were now at the ending. 
 
 This offends against rule II. There is a metrical accent 
 in the first place (on it) instead of a speech-accent, and the 
 verse will not read without distorting the intonation. The 
 same fault occurs in the following verse : 
 
 (ii) And she got | up from her | seat on the ] rock putting | by 
 her I knitting. 
 
io8 appendix J 
 
 But if the accent be put on its proper place (on gat instead 
 
 of on ancC) the verse, though not praiseworthy, will read, and 
 
 scan in stress-prosody. 
 
 v-" V A , A , ,w >j A u y A l-" .«-> A 
 And she got | up ] from her seat | on the rock | putting by | 
 
 her knitting. 
 Compare the final metrical units as differently explained by 
 the two prosodies. 
 
 So I find in Longfellow's Evangeline : 
 
 (22.) And they rode | slowly ajlong through the | woods conjversing 
 to|gether. 
 
 This halting line offends law II in the first foot, and law IV in 
 his third. If the grammar happened to require a stress on 
 they, the first place would be cured : 
 
 And they | rode slowly | along [ through the wood | con- 
 
 A ,w u A w 
 versing | together. * 
 
 But the heavy syllable through belongs to mood, and, if read with 
 that stress, will make the place halt ; whereas it refiises to be 
 attached to along. 
 
 In order to exhibit plainly that the reason why this line halts 
 in that place is not because there is a heavy syllable where 
 there may not be one, but only that it is collocated by grammar 
 with a wrong stress (as ruled by law V), compare the follow- 
 ing line (again Longfellow), where the third place is identical 
 in quantity ; and yet the verse reads well : 
 
 (z;) So is it | best, John | Estaugh, we | will not | speak of it | 
 / \j 
 further. 
 
* The Accentual Hexameter 109 
 
 And observe that it reads well because the heavy syllable taugh 
 
 is attached to its contiguous stress. 
 
 Aw.wA , V A— , ,w \„ ^ , ^, H^ I 
 So IS I It best, I John Estaugh, | we will not | speak ot it | 
 
 further. 
 The following verse from Clough reads quite well: 
 
 (14.) Yea and | shall hodmen | in beershops | complain | of a glory | 
 denied them. 
 But consider the grace of heerihopscomfl as a dactyl ! 
 
 The following verse also scans in spite of a bad dactyl in the 
 second place : 
 
 (zj) Yes and I | feel the life|juices of | all the ( world artd the | ages. 
 
 because its units will divide thus : 
 
 A C — A \J — Aw WA W AW^WAw 
 
 Yes and 1 1 feel the | lifejuices | of all | the world and | the ages. 
 tifejuices does not refuse to part with its article 3 and I think 
 this line will serve for an example of how a little poetic diction 
 will relax a grammatical bond (as explained above, § i j). The 
 following line, which is in much the same metrical condition, 
 halts because the diction is low, and the grammar-bond fast : 
 
 (2.6) Noble ladies their prizes adjudged for costume that was perfect. 
 The word for will not leave costume, the stress of which is 
 already folly occupied. 
 
 The following beautifol line, — 
 
 (17) Bright October was come, the misty, bright October, 
 would be thus scanned on the classical system : 
 
 Bright Oc|tober was | come, the | misty, | bright Oc|tober. 
 
no Appendix J 
 
 Whereas, on the stress system it is thus ": 
 
 Bright 1 OcLober | was come, | the misty, | bright | October. 
 
 The following is a line which Clough would never have 
 written, had he imagined himself to be making classical hexa- 
 meters : 
 
 (z8) With a mathematical score hangs out at Inverary. 
 
 This is of course irreducible to classic feet, but the verse 
 reads well enough because it does not offend the laws of 
 stressed verse ; though I do not know what is the correct 
 division o£ Itrverary 
 
 KJ \J A — Awv, , A — A , \J A \jA\j 
 
 With a ma|chematical | score | hangs out { at Injverary. 
 
 This may lead to the remark that words of four or more 
 syllables, which have two speech-stresses in them, are generally 
 in this condition : though it is impossible that they should ever 
 give rise to any difficulty or uncertainty of rhythm, they often 
 refuse to be divided, or, which is the same thing, offer two 
 equally satisfactory alternatives. 
 
 It appears from verses like the last that there is no objection 
 to the occurrence of an unstressed syllable (or even of two 
 short syllables) before the first stress of the line in these 
 accentual hexameters, as some writers have perceived, and 
 trusting to their ear have used it. It is of course quite in 
 order in the prosody, though it has the effect of dispelling the 
 last remnant of classic illusion. 
 
 PS. A few days after writing the above I came into pos- 
 session of Professor Skeat's great edition of Chaucer, and read 
 
The Accentual Hexameter m 
 
 his account of Chaucer's versification, and I find that he 
 analyses English poetic rhythms with the very same units 
 which I have given for the units of stressed prosody * : his list 
 of stress-units corresponds with that on p. 72 of my old book 
 (77 of this) dealing only with disyllabic verse, and is incomplete 
 for the same reason j but he draws no distinction between 
 heavy and light syllables. I am glad to be able to quote 
 the confirmation of so experienced an investigator, and I 
 do not wish to criticize any part of his scheme j but what 
 he has written makes it necessary to my purpose for me to 
 explain very clearly that I do not myself consider that, as he 
 would seem to say, these stress-units are the true account of 
 the structure of all English verse. Chaucer's and Milton's 
 verse, for instance, and the greater part of English verse, is 
 mainly syllabic ; and the grammar of its structure must be also 
 mainly syllabic in principle, just as the grammar of ' accentual ' 
 verse must be accentual. And if any one should think to 
 reply to this that all verse is both syllabic and accentual, and 
 therefore refuse to distinguish between them, I would offer 
 him the following considerations : — 
 
 When reading Milton's or Chaucer's ten-syllable verse aloud, 
 the occurrence of a line which is deficient in one of the ten 
 syllables (and such lines occur in Chaucer) is extremely awk- 
 ward both for hearer and reader, especially if the latter is not pre- 
 pared for it. It cannot escape observation : and if a line occurs 
 in which there are more than ten syllables, the ' trisyllabic foot * 
 
 * Ic is on p. Ixxxiii of the sixth volume dated 1 894. and issued in the 
 following year. The date of the first edition of my tract, which had 
 some previous life as a manuscript, being 1893. 
 
112 
 
 jippendix J 
 
 is readily perceived j so that of every line, as it is read, the 
 hearer can say at once of how many syllables it was composed, 
 whether of nine, ten, eleven or twelve. But he will not 
 observe a variety in the number of stresses in the same way ; 
 whether the line have its full normal complement of five, or 
 only four (as is very frequent), or only three, no awkwardness 
 or interruption of rhythm will be perceived; nor will the 
 hearer be able to Say readily at the close of any line how 
 many true stresses it contained. This is syllabic verse. 
 
 Of stressed verse exactly the contrary is true. The omission 
 of an initial unaccented syllable from the line produces no 
 awkwardness : hearer and reader alike are indifferent as to 
 the number of syllables which go to make the line j nor, as 
 each line is read, can they say how many syllables have gone 
 to make it. But if a stress be omitted, they perceive the 
 rhythm to be unsatisfactory, and readily detect the awkward- 
 ness of the false metrical stresses which they passed over in 
 the syllabic verse. This is stressed or accentual verse. 
 
it^ CLASSICAL METRES 
 IN ENGLISH VERSE ^ 
 
 A History ?3 criticism of the attempts hither- 
 to made, together with a scheme for the deter- 
 mination of the QUANTITY OF ENGLISH SYLLA- 
 BLES, based on their actual phonetic condition 
 
 by 
 WILLIAM JOHNSON STONE 
 
 Late of King's College ^ Cambridge, ^ ufssistant 
 (^Master at fSMarlboro' College 
 
 i4AV\, 
 
CLASSICAL METRES IN ENGLISH 
 VERSE 
 
 The object of this paper will be to examine the question 
 whether classical metres might find a place in our language 
 not merel/ distantly similar to that which they held in Latin 
 and Greek, but really and actually the same, governed by 
 rules equally strict and perfect, and ptodncing on the ear the 
 same pure delight. Every one who has tried to write thus 
 has j&iled. Either he has thrown quantity to the winds and 
 written lines which resemble their models only in the number 
 of the syllables and the exaggerated beat of the verse. Or 
 he has felt himself so trammelled by rules of quantity that he 
 has 'modified them and produced a hybrid which has the 
 merits of neither. Or finally — and rarely — he has written 
 perfect quantitative verse, but has been so hampered by 
 English rules of accent that his writings have hardly reached 
 one hundred lines. 
 
 Although in making this attempt I feel that I am exploring 
 a desert white with the bones of distinguished predecessors 
 and persistently shunned by the mass of sensible Englishmen, 
 yet in the last fifty years some attempts have been made 
 which mark very clearly the direction in which the road lies, 
 if the journey is to be taken at all, and encourage me to hope 
 
 I 2 
 
1 1 (J Classical Metres 
 
 for fellow travellers. My "hope is not very sanguine, but 
 I think it may perhaps be possible to carry some with me as 
 far as this : — that there is no other road and that any com- 
 promise is fatal. 
 
 Let me make my position quite clear at the outset by 
 putting down my convictions on certain controversial points. 
 I believe then — 
 
 I. That there is hardly any difference at all between accent 
 as it is now and as it was in classical times ; and that if it 
 differs the difference is in degree, not in kind. 
 
 z. That classical writers did not deliberately in reading 
 make their verses read themselves*^ in the meaning of the 
 modern phrase ; and that their words so read would have 
 sounded as monstrous to them as the word unexpectedly pro- 
 nounced unixfectidly would sound in English. 
 
 J. That English words, if' pronounced accurately, have a 
 distinct quantity, which is easily perceived by any one who 
 will attend to it. 
 
 4. That the accent in English does not lengthen the sylla- 
 ble at all. 
 
 J. That our English ears are so vitiated by the combined 
 effect of reading English accentuated verse and reading Latin 
 and Greek without the true pronunciation or accentuation, 
 that we are in general unable to detect quantity, and that the 
 quantitative attempts of the greatest masters are often demon- 
 strably unsound. 
 
 * That is, their aim in composing a beautifiil verse was not to bring 
 the speech-accent of a word to coincide always with the metrical accent. 
 They liked and sought a disagreement or combat between them. 
 
in English Verse ii7 
 
 All these points will be dealt with in the course of this 
 paper. I propose to begin by giving some account of the 
 various attempts that have been made at different times to 
 introduce classical metres, showing why in my opinion they 
 have severally ^led; then to examine some of the objections 
 that have been raised generally against such attempts ; and 
 lastly to give suggestions for a quantitative English Prosody. 
 
 I. 
 
 Dr. Guest {^History of English %'thms, p. J Jo) describes 
 the evolution of the modern accentual from the ancient 
 quantitative metre somewhat in this manner. Goths and 
 Celts from the beginning probably read the Latin poets with- 
 out any feeling for quantity, but, at first at all events, with 
 a clear idea of the rhythm of the lines, by which I suppose he 
 means the rules which govern the breaks and the cutting up 
 of the words. Subsequently this perception was lost and the 
 line governed by accent alone. 
 
 Here we have the distinction between ancient and modern 
 metre very clearly expressed, and Dr. Guest is absolutely 
 convinced, as he shows further on, of a point of some import- 
 ance, that in English rhythms the metre is entirely dependent 
 on accent, quantity making no sort of difference. I would 
 add a corollary to this, that accent and quantity are two entirely 
 separate things, neither affecting the other in the smallest 
 degree (except indirectly as I shall note further on), and 
 I would define the difference between ancient and modern 
 metres thus : — in the one the verse scans by quantity alone, 
 the accent being used only as an ornament, to avoid 
 
ii8 Classical Metres 
 
 monotony : in the other the functions are exactly reversed, the 
 accent deciding scansion, the quantity giving variety. The 
 final result on the ear I believe to be very much the same, 
 but whereas we attend (theoretically) to accent exclusively 
 and are only unconsciottsly affected by quantity, with the 
 ancients the position was reversed. 
 
 I know that what I have just said will not be readily 
 accepted. Professor Mayor, for instance, holds the belief 
 that the ancients were like children, who, as soon as they 
 get a rhythm into their heads, love to emphasize it. But to 
 look upon classical metres as something more elementary than 
 ours, seems to me a monstrous absurdity. I know too that my 
 thesis is likely to become more distasteiiil to many, the 
 further it proceeds to its logical conclusion; but since the 
 subject is one on which there has been nothing but diversity 
 of opinion and wanton inconsistency in the various statements 
 of those who have undertaken to explain it, a simple and con- 
 sistent account of the matter should find an audience. If then 
 I shall be found to condemn scansions of words which seem 
 perfectly correct to most people, if I outrage the ears not only 
 of the uneducated but much more, as I am afraid, of the highly 
 cultured, I beg the reader's confidence until he reach the end. 
 
 The great movement in the direction of classical metres 
 came, as might have been expected, at the Renaissance, when 
 the spread of knowledge revealed the vast superiority of the 
 Latin poetiy. It died out when the work of our great Eliza- 
 bethan dramatists and poets had produced something of 
 original excellence in our own language snfEcient to counter- 
 balance this superiority. While the movement lasted it 
 
in English Verse 119 
 
 engaged the serious attention of the greatest litterateurs of 
 the day, but it was always a failure, and deserved the ridicule 
 heaped upon it by Nash*. Not that it was altogether mis- 
 directed. Webbe had sound ideas on the subject, and Fraunce 
 produced some very pleasant verses. But its exponents had 
 in some cases all the roughness of Ennius and in no case an 
 approach to his correctness of scansion. Not one was able to 
 ■throw away the enthralment of accent except in partial and 
 therefore worse than useless instances. Not one could dis- 
 abuse himself of certain utterly fallacious correspondences 
 between Latin and English, or naturally feel the true phonetic 
 value and quantity of the syllable. At the same time they 
 wrote prosodies (none of which except that of Stanihurst seems 
 to be procurable) and were really anxious to obtain definite 
 rules of scansion. 
 
 The first attempt I can find to write accurate quantitative 
 verse consists of two lines, written by Dr. Watson, Master of 
 St. John's, Cambridge, and quoted by Ascham in The Schooi- 
 
 All travellers do gladly report great prayse of Ulysses 
 
 For that he knew many men's maners and saw many cities ; 
 
 which were regarded as perfect by Ascham, Gabriel HaiTey, 
 and Webbe, but in which it is easy to point out false quanti- 
 
 * ' The Hexamiter verse I graunt to be a Gentleman of an auncienc 
 house (so is many an English beggar) yet this Clyme of ours hee cannot 
 thrive in ; our speech is too craggy for him to sec his plough in 3 hee goes 
 twitching and hopping in our language like a man running upon quag- 
 mires, up the hill in one Syllable, and down the dale in another, retaining 
 no part of that stately smooth gate which hee vaunts himselfe with amongst 
 the Greeks and Latins.' — Nash, in Fmr Letters Confuted. 
 
120 
 
 Classical Metres 
 
 ties i—he, maners, cities. Still travellers is a creditable anapaest. 
 
 Ascham himself appears to have made some attempts, but the 
 
 inventor of the English hexameter by his own account was 
 
 Gabriel Harvey, who was made a Doctor of Laws in Cambridge 
 
 in ij8f. This man, a person of inordinate conceit, published 
 
 in I J 80 his correspondence with Spenser on 'versifying,' as 
 
 Spenser called it, in which he figures as the adviser and 
 
 corrector of his younger friend. 
 
 In these letters it is shown quite clearly that Spenser was 
 
 very much in earnest j ' Why a God's name,' he says, ' may 
 
 not we as else the Greekes have the kingdome of our own 
 
 language, and measure our accentes by the sounde, reserving 
 
 that quantity to the verse ? ' — a phrase which I confess I do 
 
 not understand. Moreover he talks of a prosody, which 
 
 Sidney had taken from Dr. Drant (the translator of Horace) 
 
 and which had been supplemented by Sidney and himself. 
 
 This he is anxious to correct by comparison with Harvey's 
 
 views. His own specimens certainly leave something to be 
 
 desired. Here is a translation of Sardanapalus' epitaph : — 
 
 That which I eate did I joy, and that which I greedily gorged: 
 As for those many goodly matters leaft I for others; 
 
 which it is satisfactory to learn was an extempore efibrt made 
 in bed. 'Goodly' is intended to scan as a spondee. So 
 are ' matters ' and 'others.' A more serious effort began : — 
 
 See ye the blind-foulded pretty god, that feathered Archer, 
 in which we see with satisfaction a combative accent in blind- 
 foulded and fretty, but false quantities to. yl and feathered. 
 
 The accent however was evidently a great difficulty to 
 Spenser : carpenter he says must be scanned with second sylla- 
 
in English Verse 
 
 121 
 
 ble long although it is short in speech, a significant phrase as 
 we shall see later. This seemed to him 'like a lame gosling 
 that draweth one leg after hir.' 
 
 I do not intend here to deal with this great stumbling- 
 block, but I think it will be useful before going further to notice 
 two errors, which have I believe more than any other infected 
 quantitative verse. Their recognition will condemn almost 
 any five consecutive verses that have ever been written in this 
 manner. The first is that of making a vowel followed by 
 a double consonant long by position. Any one who considers 
 the matter for a moment must see how utterly fallacious this 
 lengthening is. Why for instance should the first syllable of 
 hitting be longer than hiti The doubling of a letter in 
 English has no other purpose than the marking of the preced- 
 ing vowel as short, except where it is a survival of the Latin 
 spelling, and in one or two cases to be mentioned presently. 
 Moreover, where it preserves the Latin spelling, it does not of 
 course preserve the Latin pronunciation. For it can hardly 
 be doubted that in Latin both consonants were pronounced, as 
 they are now in Italian, and as we pronounce them in some 
 English words*. 
 
 The second cardinal error is connected with the scansion of 
 monosyllables with open vowels. There are in my opinion 
 only three or four such that may be scanned short, and they 
 only because they are enclitics or proclitics. Taken by them- 
 selves they are long. They are a, to, the, and sometimes be 
 
 * Words like innate, mrnatural, shrilly, cruelly, dissatirfuctim, are instances 
 where we do make the vowel long by position. There are not many such 
 and chey are easily distinguishable. But see p. 162, § 21. 
 
122 
 
 Classical Metres 
 
 and me*. Yet all writers have made use of the extraordinary 
 licence of allowing all such words to be common. Even 
 Tennyson has my short : yet my is ^ diphthong. I believe 
 that these two mistakes only need to be pointed out, yet it 
 is unaccountable that they should not at least have been 
 mentioned before. 
 
 Harvey, in his answer to his young friend 'Immerito,' 
 expresses a desire to see the spelling of English so modified 
 and crystallized that it may be used as a guide to scansion. 
 How necessary was some check on the vagaries of Elizabethan 
 spelling we shall see in Stanihurst's case. Now that our spell- 
 ing is fixed, I can only say that it is a terribly unsafe guide 
 and must be kept in the background. Harvey then gives 
 several specimens of his own versifying, one of which begins — 
 what mighc I call this tree ? A laurell ? O bonny laurell, 
 
 which allowing for every possible alteration in pronunciation 
 can hardly have scanned accurately. 
 
 Moreover Harvey has some very amusing and trenchant 
 things to say about carpenter. He ridicules with great gusto all 
 such long syllables, and is finally compelled to say : ' Position 
 neither maketh shorte nor long in our tongue, but so fer as 
 we can get hir good leave * (i. e. that of ' the vulgar and 
 natural! Mother Prosodye '). He feels that this dictum is the 
 deathblow of any scientific treatment of scansion, and adds 
 that he hopes some day that a principle equipollent and coun- 
 tervailable may be found in the English tongue. For myself 
 I am not sanguine on this point, and fail to see that position 
 
 * See p. 1/7, § J. 
 
in English Verse 123 
 
 has less force now than formerly, though Harvey has the 
 majority on his side. It is not surprising at all events that 
 this letter put Spenser finally out of sympathy with ' versifying.' 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney, in spite of Harvey's own words, was not 
 I believe indebted to him for his metrical rules. He uses 
 solemnise at the end of a hexameter, which would seem to show 
 that he did not agree with Harvey's judgement on carf enter *. 
 But his verses contain extraordinaiy perversions of natural 
 rules. He shows a laudable desire to neglect accent, but this 
 has been done at the expense of the true quantity of the sylla- 
 bles. Take the line — 
 
 Then by my high cedars, rich rubie and only shining sun. 
 Can anything be more perverse than the quantity of shining ? 
 I suppose if the n were doubled he would scan it long ; for 
 Sidney does not of course escape the doubled consonant iallacy. 
 
 Sidney's ' versifying ' was a very unsatisfactory production. 
 But he wrote largely and was sanguine about the future of the 
 movement. He declared his belief that English was better 
 fitted than any other vulgar language for both sorts of versify- 
 ing, the modem and the ancient. 
 
 Stanihurst's Virgil (ij8i) is a unique and delightfiil pro- 
 duction. Its eccentricities need not detain us however. What 
 is important is that he formulated rules of quantity, and that 
 the combative accent [is distinctly and successfully used to 
 
 * A macter of no importance : but tolemniie was not at that dace in 
 quite the same condition as carf enter ; it was still heard accented on the 
 penultimate : and thus Shakespeare, L. L. L. ii. i. 4.2, though in all other 
 places silemnise. See Par. Lost, vii. 448 : and, for an account of the 
 change of accent of words in izje, Abbott's Shdksipearian Gramtnar, 4.91. 
 
 [R.B.] 
 
124 Classical Metres 
 
 retard the hurrying hexameter. For all his faults Stanihurst's 
 verses read to me more like hexameters than any others I have 
 seen, except those in dough's ^ctaeon and some written by 
 Mr. James Spedding. Here are one or two random lines : — 
 
 And the godesse Juno full freight with poysoned envye. 
 With thundring lightnings my carcase strongly beblasted. 
 Wasd for this, moocher, that mee through danger unharmed ? 
 
 But lines without felse quantities are few and fer between. 
 For Stanihurst, like the majority of Englishmen, was under" 
 the fetal impression that English vowels have no fixed and 
 unalterable quantity. He has only to double the consonant 
 in order to lengthen the vowel, or worse still, to double the 
 vowel. He can thus give a satisfaction to the eye, which with 
 our limited orthography is denied us, but he is constantly 
 offending the ear. We laugh when Stanihurst writes — 
 
 Flee, fle, my sweet darling, 
 or — 
 
 with rounce robel hobble, 
 
 the former the beginning, the latter the end, of a hexameter; 
 but we are most of us still imder the impression that we may 
 scan a vowel long or short as we will. 
 
 In lyStf appeared William Webbe's Discourse on English 
 Poetry. He was a private tutor and a very well-read man. His 
 opinion is clearly stated that classical metres ought to be trans- 
 ferred to English. He says he is fiiUy and certainly persuaded 
 that if the true kind of versifying had been transplanted into 
 English and become habitual, as the Latin was borrowed from 
 the Greek, it would have attained as high a perfection as in 
 any other tongue. As it is, he promises we shall not find the 
 
in English Verse izf 
 
 English words so gross and unapt, but that they will fit into 
 metre and run thereon somewhat currently. In another place 
 he declares that though our words cannot be forced to abide the 
 touch of position (here we see the influence of Harvey), yet 
 there is such a natural force or quantity in each word that it 
 will not abide any place but one. This assurance I look upon 
 as very valuable. It was shared as we shall see by Lord 
 Tennyson. But in examining the quantities of words, Webbe 
 shows all the usual weaknesses. The monosyllables with open 
 vowels are to be short, with the curious exception of ' we ' : and 
 when we come to his own attempts, a translation of the two 
 first Eclogues and a transposition of some of Spenser's Shef herd's 
 Calendar into Sapphics, there is very little satisfaction to be 
 found for the ear, quite apart from the extreme clumsiness 
 of the style. Here is a Sapphic stanza : — 
 
 Shew thyself, now Cynthia, with thy cleere rayes 
 And behold her : never abasht be thou so ; 
 When she spreads those beams of her heav'niy beauty, how 
 Thou art in a dump dashc ; 
 
 which is interesting only as being framed on the Greek model. 
 Notice the elisions, which I regard as a mistake, the shortened 
 monosyllables, and that there is very little attempt to play 
 accent against quantity. 
 
 One more Elizabethan experimenter and the series comes 
 to an abrupt end. This was Abraham Fraunce, a protege . of 
 Sidney, referred to in flattering terms by Spenser in the Sh^- 
 hard^s Calendar. I believe it is a fact that he wrote no other 
 poetry, and his attempts are the only ones that seem to me to 
 deserve the name of poetry at all, though they are scarcely 
 
125 Classical Metres 
 
 more correct than those of his contemporaries. He wrote an 
 account of the Nativity and the Crucifixion in what he called 
 rhyming hexameters. The rhyme is of the suppressed order, 
 but the verses are some of them of great beauty. I transcribe 
 the opening ten lines : — 
 
 Christe ever-lyving, once dying, only triumpher 
 
 Over death by death ; Christ Jesus mighty redeemer 
 
 Of forlorne mankynde, which led captyvyty captive 
 
 And made tbraldome thi-all; whose grace and mercy defensive 
 
 Merciles and graceless men sav'd; Christ lively redeemer 
 
 Of sowles oppressed with sin; Christ lovely reporter 
 
 Of good spell Gospell, Mayds son, celestial ofspring, 
 
 Emanuel, man-god, Messyas, ever abounding 
 
 With jrity perpetual, with pure love, charity lively. 
 
 This Christ shall be my song and my meditation only. 
 
 There are about ten felse quantities here, and there is a 
 tendency, which grows afterwards more marked, to emphasize 
 the rhythm by putting a monosyllable before the break. 
 Many will agree with me in picking out ' Merciles and grace- 
 less,' and ' With pity pei-petual ' as the most perfect beginnings 
 in these lines, and veiy few I hope will say with Ben Jonson, 
 ' Abram Francis in his English hexameters was a fcol.' 
 
 With all this various talent aijd energy devoted to its begin- 
 ning, how was it that Webbe's ideal of a gradually perfected 
 English prosody was so iar from being realized ? One reason, 
 no doubt, was the extraordinary richness of the Elizabethan 
 age in verse of the other sort. These poor little efforts which, 
 regarded as poetry, were not generally worth much attention, 
 were completely swamped. No one who read the Fidrji Queen 
 could tolerate for a moment Spenser's dull, awkward hexa- 
 meters. They met besides with violent opposition from 
 
in English Verse 127 
 
 Harvey's personal enemy Nash. But the two main reasons 
 I take to have been these. First, that they were in each case 
 a compromise j they do not scan perfectly,' and accent plays too 
 important a part. Secondly, there were people even in those 
 days as unconscious of the meaning of quantity and its diiFerence 
 from accent as the generality of people now. The extent to 
 which this was the case I have found illustrated with unexpected 
 simplicity by George Puttenham in his ^rt of English Poesie, 
 which appeared in 1589, in fact just at the most fruitful 
 period of metrical experiments. Here is a man who honestly 
 believes that the only criterion of the length of a syllable is its 
 accent, who has no suspicion of the difference between 'length 
 of tone,' 'strength of tone,' and 'height of tone.' 
 
 He begins his chapter by saying that though English is not 
 very well fitted, being a monosyllabic language, fcr classical 
 feet, and though such innovations are unwelcome to wise and 
 grave men, yet for the benefit of the young and curious he 
 intends to show how such feet may be commodiously led into 
 our language. For this purpose, though it may offend the ears 
 of the over-dainty, we must keep our ordinary pronunciation, 
 remembering to allow to every polysyllable word one long 
 time of necessity, namely, where the accent falls. This is 
 bad enough, but Puttenham could do worse ; he proceeds thus 
 with his teaching : ' Wherein we would not follow the licence 
 of the Greeks and Latines, who made not their sharpe accente 
 any necessary prolongation of their times, but used such silla- 
 ble sometimes long, sometimes short, at their pleasure.' This 
 fantastic misconception he afterwards modifies, but only by a 
 further instalment of fcUy. We must not, he says, attempt to 
 
128 Classical Metres 
 
 model our scansion on Latin and Greek, because they did not 
 use accent as their standard. What then was their standard ? 
 Not, as he seems to imply above, the caprice of the particular 
 writer, but the pre-election of the first poets, who decided the 
 matter, as he thinks, ' at their pleasure or as it fell out.' . This 
 last phrase, at first sight mysterious, he hastens to explain. 
 Homer must be imagined as beginning his line with the word 
 ' Penelope,' which consequently had to take the shape Penelope, 
 nothing in the world appearing why^e should be longer than 
 ne or lo, all being equally smooth and current upon the tongue. 
 He has a similar explanation for the scansion of the first line 
 of the ^eneid; he that first put such words into verse having 
 found, as it is to be supposed, a more sweetness to have the a 
 of ca.no timed short, and the o of oris long. In fact the whole 
 system of quantity is entirely dependent on tradition, which he 
 compares to theological traditions of an untrustworthy sort. 
 
 I am very grateful to Puttenham for the lengths to which 
 he has carried his principles. He makes the attitude of those 
 who deny the existence of quantity in English, once for all 
 and to the last degree absurd. 
 
 From the Elizabethans is a far cry to Robert Sonthey, yet 
 we have to make the jump before any real revival takes place. 
 I have no serious quarrel with Southey or with his very 
 numerous imitators. He founded a school — in England at 
 least : the experiment had long before been tried in Germany 
 — as he himself claims, with the words — 
 
 I first adventure, follow me who list. 
 For though the idea was not at all new, it was he who gave it 
 its impulse in the simple and rational direction which it took. 
 
in English Verse 129 
 
 He adopts in fact Puttenham's suggestion that we should scan 
 hexameter lines by accent alone. He even falls apparently 
 into Puttenham's delightful confusion, but I am ready to 
 believe that the mistake is only in words. He says 'the 
 dactyl consists of one long syllable and two short ones, as 
 exemplified in the name IVeUin^on.' He does not of course 
 mean long and short, but accented and unaccented. But I do not, 
 as I say, wish to quarrel with Southey. His system seems to me 
 perfectly legitimate, though it may offend the ears of many j — it 
 was hatefiil, for instance, to Tennyson. It is simply this (I do not 
 use his own words on account of the confusion noted above) : — 
 do away with quantity altogether as a basis of metre, and 
 make every dactyl an accented and two unaccented syllables, 
 every spondee one accented and one unaccented. This last 
 foot, as he justly observes, is better called a trochee. The 
 reason why a spondee is an impossibility as a basis in such 
 verses, is explained by Dr. Guest (on page J J i of his book) : 
 consecutive syllables in one word cannot both have the accent, 
 so that a true accentual English spondee is only possible with 
 two monosyllables. 
 
 On these simple lines Southey framed his metre, and his 
 work has borne fruit, some of it well worth producing.. But 
 why should he claim to be grafting the classical system on the 
 English language ; An Englishman who had never read a 
 word of Latin or Greek might very well have invented such 
 a metre* and thrown in a rhyme or two into the bargain. 
 Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket fiill of barley, 
 
 * A rationale of chis accentual verse on simple English principles is 
 given on pp. 88 and foil, of this volume. 
 
130 Classical Metres 
 
 will make one of Southey's hexameters, a decidedly spondaic, 
 or rather trochaic specimen, it is true. Or take these lines 
 from Swinburne — 
 
 Yea, is not even Apollo, with hair and harp-string of gold, 
 A bitter god to follow, a beaucifUl god to behold? 
 
 The fatal objection to this form of verse to my mind is the 
 incomparable ease with which lines can be reeled off by any- 
 body, and the inability which it has hitherto shown to attain 
 anything like aitistic elaboration, such as has perfected our 
 blank verse. It has even betrayed a disgust of its own 
 rules : Coleridge, for instance, found it necessary to check 
 it by intentional harshness, so ovei-powering was the flow 
 of it. 
 
 As used by Southey, Coleridge, Kingsley, Longfellow, Clough 
 (in the Bothk}, and Matthew Arnold, there would be no 
 objection to the so-called hexameter as an English metre, if 
 it could only develop on its own rhythmical principles. But it 
 must not be compared with or called the classical hexameter, 
 nor be used, as Matthew Arnold wished it to be used, to 
 translate Homer. It is when similar imitations are made of 
 the shorter and more delicate classical metres — imitations 
 which appeal to classical scholars, and have no claim to exist 
 except that of reproducing classical form and eflfect — that the 
 travesty calls for censorship. Coleridge's hendecasyllables, 
 with twelve syllables to the line, and without an approach to 
 the true scansion^ must shock any one acquainted with the 
 original. If however they had been given a diflTerent name, 
 their pretension to represent the classical metre would have 
 escaped notice, and they might perhaps justify themselves on 
 
in English Verse 131 
 
 their own merits : that is the question which they raise, and 
 it does not concern ns here. 
 
 I have just alluded to "Matthew Arnold's translations of 
 Homer, and though they cannot find a place except under the 
 Southey group, the views of so eminent an authority, expressed 
 in one or two lectures On Translating Ifomer, must not be over- 
 looked. He is chiefly concerned with Homer's diction and 
 the manner of its reproduction in English, on which points 
 I suppose his judgement is final. But he also examines criti- 
 cally the various metres in which Homer has been translated, 
 and decides that there is only one which can be used appro- 
 priately — the hexameter. This is a conclusion which I need 
 not say I am glad to have expressed. But of what sort is the 
 hexameter to be ? He is quite explicit : 'they must read them- 
 selves '; in other words, the accent must be an absolute guide : 
 the intention of the writer must never be in doubt. 
 
 This universal rule, which however he afterwards modifies 
 to give variety to the first fcot, is a perfectly sound rule for the 
 Southey hexameter. Even for quantitative verse the intention 
 of the writer must of course never be in doubt, nor I maintain 
 is it, if rules of prosody be strictly observed. But we shall see 
 presently what Calverley's opinion was of the words 'they 
 must read themselves,' applied to imitations of classical metres. 
 For the present I would notice one more point in Matthew 
 Arnold's essay. He feels strongly the drawbacks of his metre : 
 in Longfellow's hands, he says, it is at its best elegant, at its 
 worst lumbering. In plain words it is undignified, and though 
 this may perhaps be overcome in some measure by using 
 spondees — or as he ought to call them trochees — more freely, 
 
 K 2 
 
1 32 Classical Metres 
 
 yet I think it says the last word for the Southey hexameter as 
 in any sense an equivalent for the classical. This may be 
 surely affirmed without denying the beauty of many of Matthew 
 Arnold's own lines, or of those few pleasing hexameters which 
 Dr. Hawtrey wrote. 
 
 The prophecy of a coming translator of Homer contained in 
 these lectures was fulfilled. In the next year (i Stfi) at least 
 three attempts appeared. I refer to those of Dart, Herschell, 
 and Cochrane. Two of these writers were apparently seized 
 with certain very natural misgivings in their use of the English 
 hexameter. Mr. Dart could not bear to scan the classical 
 names on Southey principles, e. g. PenelSpe. Mr. Cochrane, 
 again, was appalled by the substitution of the trochee for the 
 spondee, so that his verse abounds with such words as wind-rwept, 
 used not without success to add dignity to the verse. The mis- 
 givings of both mark a slight reaction in favour of quantitative 
 verse ; but they are entirely irrational, and were justly censured 
 in MacmilUn't Maga':^ne by Dr. Whewell. Given the accent- 
 uated hexameter, Southey's rules are, as fer as they go, per- 
 fectly sound. Half measures are impossible. 
 
 It will be as grateful to the reader as to me to arrive at 
 something with which I can be in agreement : hitherto my 
 task has been very little beyond trying to expose what I think 
 to be fallacies, and I have found myself in conflict with every 
 one. But in the last half-century there have been movements 
 of a very different character, and names of authority to which 
 I can appeal. The three stones at the base of my column are 
 Clough, Tennyson, and Calverley. Separately each would be 
 a very doubtful prop, but collectively they form a solid founda- 
 
in English Verse 133 
 
 tion. I shall also have the pleasure of noticing my one 
 predecessor. » 
 
 dough's short experiments are among the best, and they 
 are practically unique, at least among modern writers, in one 
 respect. He has really tried to make a scientific use of the 
 ordinary accent to lend variety to the rhythm. Is not this 
 pentameter perfect ? — 
 
 Now with mighty vessels loaded, a lordly river. 
 
 -In this verse we actually find a tacit acknowledgement that 
 two /s do not necessarily make the preceding vowel long ; but, 
 alas, he is as far as any one from seeing that they never do. How 
 is it possible that a man should have written the above and in the 
 same poem ' thou busy suimy river,' with the belief that the 
 first syllable of sunny is longer than that oi busy or r'rver'i It 
 implies a really extraordinary clinging to a classical rule that 
 has no sort of bearing on our language, and is the more deplor- 
 able in Clough because he trembles on the very edge of discovery. 
 He writes passage ,- and even treats as single those true double 
 consonants which are made by the final and initial of contiguous 
 words : — 
 
 quickly will lend thee passage 
 
 is the end of one of his pentameters, and a very bad end too ; 
 for such coalescing is a conversational licence, and thee is of 
 course long. Again, while we have a line beginning ' Boughs 
 with apples laden,' perfect in my judgement ; in the same 
 poem uttering is a dactyl. 
 
 I should like very much to know what Clough himself had 
 to say about these verses of his, and what effect be intended 
 
134 Classical Metres 
 
 the accent to have. He goes so far as to end a hexameter 
 
 ^ not therefore less the forest through, 
 
 which, as his lines are I think intended to be Virgilian, could 
 
 not be paralleled by many lines in his model : and again with 
 
 hideous perversity-^ 
 
 she thither arrived, 
 
 where arrived scans as a spondee. Though I must rale his 
 quantities often very faulty, these experiments of his are more 
 like what I imagine classical metres were to their readers, than 
 almost any others. 
 
 I turn with particular pleasure to Tennyson, not so much 
 for the experiments that appear in his works as for certain obiter 
 dicta to be found in Tennyson, ^ Memoir. He was a great 
 precisian and an accurate artist, and so it is not surprising to 
 find that he had a good hatred for hexameters of the Southey 
 class and especially for those of the Germans. He insisted on 
 rigid adherence to the proper scansion of a word in any attempt 
 at classical metre, and it is his authority that I hare found 
 most encouraging in plunging into this subject. 
 
 He has left three poems, in elegiacs, in hendecasyllables, and 
 in alcaics, very carefully and accurately worked out, not to men- 
 tion Boadicea, which has only a distant resemblance to galliambics 
 and does not conform to strict rules of scansion*. They do not 
 give me very much satisfaction. We know that Tennyson in 
 reading his poems emphasized the beat of the verse in a way 
 that would have been found intolerable in any one else. It 
 
 * Catverley notes that the words ' tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, gentle- 
 man, apothecary,' make a correct Tennysonian galliambic. 
 
in English Verse 1 3 f 
 
 is strictly in accordance with tliis principle that his metrical 
 experiments have the accents consistently, with only one or two 
 exceptions, coinciding with the metrical ictus. This method 
 must, I think, be fetal, ifonly on account of the monotony and 
 the extreme difficulty of writing it. More than half the polysyl* 
 labic words in the English language would have to be tabooed. 
 But it is evident that to Tennyson's ear there was some- 
 thing grotesque in such verses as observe classical quantity and 
 at the same time admit the classical liberty of combative accent. 
 He seems to have attempted them, but only in a playful spirit : 
 he thought that even quantitative hexameters were as a rule 
 fit only for comic subjects. He quotes the conclusion of an 
 alcaic stanza — 
 
 Thine early rising well repaid thee, 
 Munificently rewarded artisc, 
 
 where it is a relief to find one combative accent ; and this 
 
 pentameter — 
 
 All men alike hate s!(^», particularly gruel, 
 
 which nearly brings tears into my eyes, not because of the base 
 
 uses to which he is putting the metre, but because he scans 
 
 gr«e/ with the » short, one of the most persistent and easily 
 
 traceable blunders. As a fact I believe there is in English 
 
 no accented vowel shortened before another vowel. But this 
 
 I shall deal with later. Coleridge's well-known couplet is 
 
 corrected by Teimyson to— 
 
 Up springs hexameter with might as a mountain ariseth: 
 Lightly the fountain &lls, lightly the pentameter; 
 
 which scans perfectly, but I would ask whether the excessive 
 insistence on the rhythm is not a fault, and whether the 
 
1 3 (J Classical Metres 
 
 ancients were not right in their nile about a monosyllable before 
 the break. 
 
 On page 13 1 of the second volume we find Tennyson's 
 assertion that he believed he knew the quantity of every word 
 in the English language except scissors. It is this assertion 
 that is most valuable to me in Teimyson's remarks on the 
 subject. I believe with him that every syllable in the English 
 language has a definite quantitative value apart altogether from 
 accent. But why this grotesque exception of scissors ? I think 
 it probable that, as in the case of grml mentioned above, he 
 may have been entrapped by the desire of saying something 
 whimsical. 
 
 Tennyson, in spite of scissors and ^ud, was I am sure on the 
 right track with regard to quantity. He has a false quantity in 
 the words ' Time or Eternity ' in the alc-aic ode, and is guilty 
 of the common mistake of scanning my, me. Sec, short. 
 Whether he was sound on the subject of doubled consonants I 
 cannot tell. He seems to have avoided them instinctively except 
 in the word Catullus, where perhaps Homeric lengthening would 
 be excusable. In spite of his opinion that purely quantitative 
 verse is comic, he has done more perhaps than any one to 
 show that an exact English quantitative prosody is a possibility. 
 
 The authority which Clough gives me for accent, and Tenny- 
 son for quantity, Calverley will give me for rhythm. His views 
 are to be found in a letter to The Lordon Student, published in 
 his Literary Remains. 
 
 He is answering a writer, who maintained that classical 
 translations ought to reproduce the metre of the original, 
 instancing Tennyson's attempts as an illustration of the way in 
 
in English Vetse 137 
 
 which metre should be treated in English. Calverley maiif- 
 tains, apart from quantity altogether, that if the verse scans 
 itself— falls necessarily and obviously, that is, into the metre — 
 it is ipso facto a bad verse from a classical standpoint. When, 
 he says, Teimyson writes — 
 
 Calm as a mariner out in ocean, 
 though the scansion is unexceptional (this is untrue j and 
 Tennyson did not write and would not have written mariner as 
 a dactyl), the line is condemned by one of the elementary 
 rules of lyric scansion. He then points out that all such 
 arbitrary rules of Latin rhythm as the rule of the caesura, of 
 the monosyllable before the break, &c., are explicable on one 
 ground only, and can be assigned to but one object, namely, 
 the prevention of self-scanning verses. There is no pentameter, 
 he notes, in the whole Latin tongue, ending in a single mono- 
 syllable. 
 
 So far, and in his criticism of such dactyls as 'trembled the," 
 ' Romans be,' ' turn the helm,' ' silenced but,' he is admirable. 
 But the page is turned and the illusion gone. He is not only 
 out of accord with Tennyson in regard to rhythm, but in regard 
 to quantity also. He objects to the second syllable of orgaTt- 
 voice being scaimed long, when he has just made the remark 
 ' helm and realm are as distinctly long syllables as any can be.' 
 Why are their vowels long except by position ? In what re- 
 spect then do the syllables differ from -gatyu- in length ? nv 
 retards the voice quite as much as Im. The answer comes 
 only too certainly; it is because there is no accent on the 
 second syllable of organ. How, in the world then, we must 
 ask, did he intend to avoid insistence on rhythm, if the unac- 
 
138 Classical Metres 
 
 cented syllables were still to be counted short, and the accented 
 long ! If it is simply a question of not dividing the words 
 exactly into dactyls and spondees, though that is something, 
 surely we shall still have the verses reading themselves and the 
 rhythm accentuated in the very manner that he was depre- 
 cating. 
 
 Later on he quotes to condemn, where I am entirely with 
 him, the pentameter — 
 
 Joyous knight-erranc of God, thirsting for labour and strife. 
 It is a shockingly bad' line to classical ears, but it is not wrong 
 on Calverley's principles : for it divides naturally thus — 
 
 Joyous — knight-errant — of God — thirsting — for labour— and strife, 
 which is unobjectionable on Latin rules, except that the two 
 halves balance one another with too great exactitude. 
 
 Finally let me say Calverley's own specimens do not seem to 
 me to differ in respect of reading themselves or in any other 
 way from Southey's, e. g. 
 
 Shines forth every cliff and the jutting peaks of the headlands. 
 
 It will be seen that my three foundation stones are very 
 much in the position of the combatants in a triangular duel, 
 but they form together a solid base. It now remains only to 
 consider my one predecessor, whom I was as much surprised 
 as pleased to discover. 
 
 This is Mr. James Spedding, who in Frasets iWaga^W for 
 July, i85i, wrote a criticism on Matthew Arnold's lectures, 
 especially attacking the Southey hexameter. I may say at once 
 that my views are almost exactly in accordance with his ; and 
 the way in which his remarks were received by Matthew 
 
in English Verse 139 
 
 Arnold and Mr. H. A. J. Munro prepares me for the sort of 
 criticism that I may expect. Still he had not my triangular 
 foundation to support him. 
 
 Here is a significant passage : ' Slumbers is a word of two 
 long syllables with the accent on the first ; supper is a word of 
 two short syllables, also with the accent on the first. Bittern 
 has its first syllable short but accented, its second long but un- 
 accented. Quantity is a. dsLCtyl : ^»;(£f2fr7' is a tribrach. l{apidfy 
 is a word to which we find no parallel in Latin. The degrees 
 of length being infinite in number^ there are of course many 
 syllables which are doubtfiil or common. . . . But in general 
 you can tell the quantity of every syllable at once if you will 
 only listen for it, and may soon learn to be as much shocked 
 by a felse quantity in English, as if yon knew it to be against a 
 written rule. 
 
 Sweetly Cometh slumber, closing the o'erwearVed eyelid, 
 is a correct Virgilian hexameter, like 
 
 Ipsa cibi blandos fiindenc cunabula flores. 
 Sweetly felleth slumber, closing the wearied eyelid, 
 contains two shocking false quantities.' 
 
 Further, Mr Spedding notes the doubled consonant fallacy, 
 observing that when we wish to distinguish between annus and 
 anus in Latin, we do so by pronouncing anus like canus ,• and 
 since we do not pronounce double n in annus, but only use it, 
 in our English fashion, to shorten the a, we actually pronounce 
 the short "Vowel long, and the long vorvel short in order to distinguish 
 between them ! To give another example ; many excellent 
 scholars will read ' arma virumque cam * with the a of cam 
 distinctly long, thinking of it all the while as short; whereas 
 
140 Classical Metres 
 
 if the word were written canno^ they would pronounce it short, 
 and consider it long. 
 
 Mr. Spedding models his versa confessedly on Virgil, and 
 I think that he is justified in claiming that it is like Virgil's 
 in effect. But he is also right in saying that Virgilian hexa- 
 meters are almost impossible in English. Our words are not 
 like Latin words, our accents are also very different : the Latin 
 accent, for instance, never came on th: last syllable of a word. 
 This fact is in itself, I think, fatal to the English VirgiL 
 Practically every line of Virgil ends with a dactyl and a 
 spondee in which quantity and accent coincide, as they do 
 invariably in Mr. Spedding's lines — 
 
 Verses so modulate, so tuned, so varied in accent, 
 Rich with unexpected changes, smooth, stately, sonorous, 
 Rolling ever forward, tidelike; with thunder, in endless 
 Procession, complex melodies —pause, quantity, accent 
 Aittt Virgilian precedent and practice, in order 
 Distributed— could these gratify th' Etonian ear-drum ? 
 
 Virgil my model is : accent, caesura, division : 
 
 His practice regulates ■ his rules my quantity obeyeth: 
 
 but these lines are of course quite un-English in sound. He 
 has been at great pains to choose words which resemble Latin 
 words in quantity and accent, and has I think been successful 
 in producing a very Virgilian effect. The second line is the 
 best, the last two are the worst : the elision quite intolerable. 
 There are two or three felse quantities. 
 
 Now hear for a moment what objections were raised against 
 Mr. Spedding by Mr. Munro (in 18^1), He declared that 
 neither his ear nor his reason could recognize ' any real dis- 
 tinction of quantity exceft that which is froduced by accented 
 
in English Ferse 141 
 
 ,dnd unaccented syllablet.' This is of course just the healthy 
 scepticism which one would expect to result from such a pro- 
 nunciation of Latin as I have described two pages back (with 
 examples of annus, anus and cano) j but considering the con- 
 dition of phonetic science, it is incredible that any one should 
 }je willing to make the confession. It seems to me pure 
 Puttenham, and to require as a proper continuation a disquisition 
 on how the Greeks came by their scansion of Penelope. ' Quan^ 
 tity,' he says, ' must be utterly discarded.' Well, some may 
 consider that a sufficiently good working hypothesis for English 
 accentuated metres. It is a consistent attitude with regard to 
 the English hexameter, preferable in my opinion to Arnold's, who 
 was prepared to meet Mr. Spedding halfway. He said he would 
 not scan seventeen as a dactyl (though on his own principles 
 it is admissible), but that he thought most people incapable of 
 Mr. Spedding's nicety of ear ; that they would be unable to 
 feel the difference between quantity and quiddity. I should have 
 thought, but for such unexpected authority to the contrary, 
 .that there did not live a man who, if the question were fairly 
 put to him, could fail to detect the difference. 
 
 II. 
 
 Study of the history of these various attempts, the survey of 
 which is now finished, has led me to a very strong conviction that 
 we must go straight to the fountain-head and model our metre 
 not on the Latin but on the Greek. I believe that our language 
 is singularly like ancient Greek in intonation, and that we can 
 transplant their metrical system with greater ease and with less 
 change than was possible to the Romans. Heire I have at a 
 
142 Classical Metres 
 
 word brought upon myself the most difficult part of my subject^ 
 the vexed question of Greek accents. I approach it with the 
 greater hesitation, because I shall find myself as elsewhere in 
 this paper, but here particularly, in the singular position of 
 feeling quite convinced of an explanation which has apparently 
 never even occurred to any one else, and which consequently, 
 it is feir to guess, will not at first commend itself to any one 
 who reads me. 
 
 Mr. Munro, in dealing with the Spedding heresy, states that 
 ' the accent of the old Greeks and Romans resembled our 
 accent only in name, in reality was essentially different.' I 
 may be doing Mr. Munro an injustice, but I believe that the 
 essential difference to which he refers, is feirly to be gathered 
 fi'om these words of Dr. Blass (^Pronunciation of^^ncient Greeks 
 translated by W. J. Pnrton, p. ijr) : — 'With regard to the 
 accent of words it is well known that in Greek this consisted 
 in voice-pitch, not voice-stress, and still less voice-duration, 
 although in both languages the latter was united with the 
 voice-pitch in the period of their degeneration.' Further, 
 Dr. Blass notes that ' the versification of the classical period 
 makes no account whatever of a word-accent, and indeed, since 
 the accent was musical, there was not the slightest reason why 
 it should.' 
 
 Now I regard this view of the matter, which represents 
 Greek accent and intonation as so different from oar own 
 that it is impossible we should understand it, to be altogeth«r 
 misleading : I affirm with confidence that not only does this 
 essential difference between Greek and English not exist, -l?ut 
 that the words just quoted might have been applied with equal 
 
in English Verse 143 
 
 truth to our own accents. Surely I cannot be entirely mis- 
 taken in declaring what seems to me quite undeniable, that the 
 ordinary unemphatic English accent is exactly a raising of pitch, 
 and nothing more. I do not mean to deny that it is possible to 
 accent, or let me rather say to emphasize, a syllable in the other 
 two ways, i. e. by strength or length of tone, but I assert that that 
 is not the commonest method of accentuation *. If our accents 
 are to degenerate some day into long vowels, as Dr. Blass says 
 has happened to the Greek accents (he instances xenus for 
 l^wovr, yenitS for ye'i/oiro), it is certain that such degeneration 
 has not taken place yet, and that we freely accent the shortest 
 syllables with the tnie acute accent. Further, Dionysius men- 
 tions that the difference between an acute and grave accent 
 was nearly a fifth ; now when I say the words ' upon it,' 
 I believe that I raise my voice about a third on this purely 
 grammatical enclitic accent. The Greeks had besides the 
 circumflex accent, which was midway between their acute and 
 grave : and this also is to be found in English. Notice the 
 difierence of pitch with which we say whut ? and wfco ? and 
 compare it with tI ; and ttoS ; If any one, whose mind is open on 
 this question would read a few words aloud in such a manner as 
 to make the difference of nearly a fifth between any two con- 
 secutive syllables, he might judge for himself whether the higher 
 note does not accent its syllable in a very distinct and I should 
 say in a distinctively English manner. It seems to me diiEcult to 
 
 * The fact chat it is possible, and even usual at the end of a clause, to 
 accent by the contrary process, by lowering instead of raising the voice, 
 does not affect my argument seriously. It is still a question of pitch and 
 not of stress. 
 
144 Classical Metres 
 
 imagine a closer correspondence than what one is thus forced 
 to admit. There is however one difficulty of considerable 
 magnitude which makes the Greek accent sometimes impossible 
 to us : and this is due to a well-known peculiarity of our vowel 
 pronunciation. I refer to the fact that our vowels if not 
 followed by a consonant supply themselves with a consonantal 
 y or IP *. This has a curious and I think indisputable effect 
 on vowels followed by other vowels, namely, that if they are 
 accented they are invariably long. The rule is thus exactly 
 the opposite to the Latin rule. A few instances will be enough, , 
 foet-y fious (cf. imfious), ruinf. Even when it is not accented 
 and comes before the accent, such a vowel seems to be always 
 long, as in reaction, f re-eminent. Consequently, if we use our 
 English pronunciation of the vowel, it would be impossible 
 for us to accent, for instance, the word alria aright without 
 lengthening the iota. 
 
 Except this I do not discover any essential difference between 
 the rules of Greek accentuation and such as might be formu- 
 lated for English. We allow, it is true, the accent to be thrown 
 back a syllable further j but the rules about acute turning to 
 grave and about enclitics are almost exactly the same — compare 
 ufon it with ujpon all things, and to get money with to get it — ; and 
 while we are bound to conclude that the three Greek accents 
 were a very rough and unscientific way of expressing all the 
 
 * There is one notable exception to this rule. Syllables ending in -am 
 do not supply themselves with either a w or iy, but it is remarkable how 
 strong the tendency is to insert an r. See p. t j3, $ 8. 
 
 f I should like to suggest this as a possible explanation of [he long e 
 in the word njido. 
 
in English Verse 147 
 
 variations of pitch extending over the interval of a fifth, we 
 cannot suppose that all the syllables between the accents were 
 strictly monotonous, and free from lesser variations of intona- 
 tion and accent. 
 
 Furthermore, I do not see how any one can contend that the 
 Greek accents were lesser in degree than ours. Surely a fifth 
 is a sufficient interval, not to mention the indirect testimony 
 given by modern Greek to the strength and importance of the 
 old accents. The strength of the Latin accent again is testified 
 to in a remarkable manner by the metres of Plautus : and since 
 a consideration of his metrical treatment of hurried syllables 
 will illustrate our own common practice, and perhaps resolve 
 the old carf enter difficulty of Spenser, I will speak of it here. 
 
 In ordinary rapid pronunciation we habitually shorten un- 
 accented syllables, often slurring or half leaving out conson- 
 ants. An extreme instance of such shortening maybe seen in 
 Clough's dactyl silenced but (see p. 1 3 7), where ncd b have all to be 
 made equivalent to little more than one consonant. I think it 
 must be conceded that such shortening argues a strong accent 
 on the preceding syllable. Well, Plautus makes use of this 
 shortening exactly, and that too in verses that are meant to 
 scan, not merely to go by accent, like Clough's ; and his practice 
 is to my mind conclusive to prove the strength of the Latin 
 accent. Such shortening is of course a colloquial licence in 
 Plautus, careless pronunciation being natural on the comic stage, 
 with its imitation of the actual manners of common life : but 
 we do not expect to find such a treatment of syllables in ele- 
 vated poetry, and thus, though the proper accent of a word was 
 not in any way surrendered in reading Virgil, it would not be 
 
i4<J Classical Metres 
 
 allowed by educated Romans to cause any contraction, the 
 full value being given to every syllable. A sufficient answer 
 then to those who say that to them the second syllable of the 
 word carpenter or organ-voice is distinctly short, is this : You 
 are associating yourselves by such an admission with the vtdgar 
 actors of Plautus rather than the educated readers of Virgil. 
 An unaccented syllable can no doubt be shortened in conver- 
 sation, even to the extent of saying dunno for dont kftow, but 
 is that any reason why we should do so in reading poetry ? 
 Our best practice here is just like the Latin : our low comedies 
 even print the words contracted, and so do the French — 
 
 Nous qui n' somm's pas d' I'Acad^mie, 
 Souhaicons-Iui d' ces p'cits plaisirs-U. 
 
 I have said that accent does not lengthen a syllable : but has 
 
 it any effect at all on quantity ; I think it has. Its function 
 
 is to preserve a syllable from conversational shortening, and I 
 
 would go fiirther and say that it preserves it also from length^ 
 
 ening. Far from believing that it is the accent of the verse 
 
 that causes the occasional lengthening of syllables in arsi, I hold 
 
 that it is the absence of the natural accent that allows of such 
 
 lengthening. I mean in such cases as — 
 
 TiTTe @4Tt raviireiiKf. 
 Tribul^que trabea^que. 
 
 Such lengthening (at least wherever the succeeding conson- 
 ant is a mute) would, I believe, be absolutely impossible if the 
 accent were upon it j but of course I may be confuted by an 
 instance. The accent has besides an importance in deter- 
 mining whether a syllable is long by position, as we shall see 
 later, p. i Jtf, § 4, and 1^0, § 14. 
 
in English Verse 147 
 
 If the foregoing considerations be of any value, they will 
 have gone fer to support my contention of the similarity between 
 English and Greek accentuation; and the reader may fairly 
 look for a solution of the vexed question of metrical ictus. He 
 may take an extreme case, a line of Homer, for instance, in 
 which the acute accents do not fall on the places of the 
 metrical ictus, and he may ask how, if he gives foil value 
 to these acute accents, he is to express the metre of the line. 
 I do not myself think that this is so great a difficulty as it 
 is generally regarded ; and, to give my view more clearly I 
 should separate the question into two distinct parts : First, Is 
 the metrical ictus to be observed at all in those places where 
 it disagrees with the speech accent 3 and if it is to be 
 observed, how far is it to be observed ? Second, What is the 
 means by which it can be expressed? 
 
 In answering the first question the difficulty lies in the 
 extreme variety of opinion which has to be satisfied. There 
 is hardly any consensus even among the most educated readers : 
 some are not content unless the metrical ictus be fully ex- 
 pressed ; others neglect it altogether. If there is any agreement 
 it would probably be in such commonly recurring instances 
 as the disyllabic ending of the Ovidian pentameter, where 
 the last syllable is short, or the frequent paroxytone pyrrhic at 
 the end of tragic iambics. I suppose that there is hardly any 
 reader familiar with the classics who would in these cases 
 doubt that it was the intention of the writer to displace the 
 accent, or who would wish to put an accent of any kind on 
 the last syllable of the line. But if this is so in these par- 
 ticular cases, the presumption is very strong that some others 
 
 L 2 
 
148 Classical Metres 
 
 are like them, and that those who prefer to read Virgil with- 
 out marking the metrical ictus in any place in which it is con- 
 travened, probably understand the poet better than do those 
 who require the metrical ictus to be always expressed. At 
 any rate the conclusion may be that the greater or less 
 expression of the metrical ictus is just such a matter of taste 
 as cannot be disputed about. 
 
 The second question then comes to this : What means 
 have we to express the combated metrical accent, when we 
 desire to do so ? The difficulty is of course considerable if the 
 metrical ictus has to overcome the force of a combative acute 
 accent expressed by raising the voice through the interval of 
 a fifth : but this description of the Greek acute accent by 
 Dionysius requires to be explained. It can only have one 
 meaning : It can not possibly mean that the voice was raised 
 a fifth at every acute accent j it can only mean that the acute 
 accent marked the syllable where the voice was properly raised 
 in pitch, if it was to be raised at all in the sentence j and that if it 
 was raised, then the fifth was not an uncommon interval : and 
 this will correspond very fairly with our own best way of reading. 
 Any one may try a simple experiment for himself: let him take 
 any three or four lines of blank verse, and mark in them the 
 syllables which he thinks were intended to carry accents ; 
 •then let him read these lines aloud, raising his voice a fifth 
 at every mark. He will need no argument to convince him 
 that no civilized people within historic times ever read or could 
 iiave read their poetry or anything else in this manner. If he 
 will then read the same lines as he thinks they should be read, 
 he will find that he uses numberless lesser changes of pitch, 
 
in English Verse 149 
 
 besides other devices of time, tone and pause to interpret the 
 rhythm and metrical structure j and it is reasonable to suppose 
 that the Greeks had as many. It may also be useful to 
 remark that if one were asked to ' mark the accents ' in ten 
 lines of Paradise Lost, one would have no scruple in marking 
 the main accents (as the Greeks did) all with the same sign, 
 although one would never contemplate their being all inter- 
 preted by the same inflexion of voice ; nor does any hearer, 
 who is listening to a good reader, ever doubt of the rhythm 
 or metre, although it may be often out of his power to define 
 how it has been given. If the verse is purely quantitative, 
 the devices for marking the metrical ictus should, I suppose, 
 be mainly a management of the time ; and as time is quite 
 distinct from accent, there is no cause to fear any confiision 
 between them. Probably our main difficulty is that we have 
 not an exercised faculty to distinguish long and short syllables. 
 It is the chief object of this essay to establish a trae quantitative 
 English prosody, and render it easy for any one to distinguish 
 our syllables by the same rules of value as the Greek did. 
 
 It would indeed be impossible to exaggerate the confusion 
 of mind which writers on the subject of the quantity of English 
 syllables have exhibited : and as I am afraid that I may have 
 left an erroneous impression of my meaning in what I stated 
 about the ' shortening ' of the second syllable in silenced but (on 
 p. 14 j), I will explain myself on this point again in connexion 
 with a criticism of Dr. Whewell's, which will also illustrate a 
 statement made at the beginning of this essay, that modern 
 and ancient verse are both a play of accent against quantity, 
 with the attitude reversed. Dr. Whewell in an article in 
 
I JO Classical Metres 
 
 MacmWart's Mtga.-Kine (l8^i), arguing against the view that 
 the consonantal nature of English prevents smoothness, asks, 
 What could be smoother than the line — 
 
 The breezy call of incense-breathing morn — ? 
 
 and yet, he says, what a surprising short syllable -censbr- is ! 
 This proves to his mind that the English tongue has a peculiar 
 power of running rapidly over an agglomeration of consonants. 
 It proves of course nothing of the sort, -censbr- being I should 
 say not only not short, but the longest syllable ih the line. 
 It pleases the ear just because it is long, and with its length 
 combats the accent*. This principle of quantity warring against 
 accent is in my opinion exactly paralleled by the contrary process 
 in classical metres. The word hollow is a Southey trochee, but a 
 classical iambus : considered as the first the accent rules, and 
 is contradicted by the quantity: considered as the second the 
 quantity rules and is contradicted by the accent. 
 
 If the above considerations are as sound as they appear to 
 me, there remains only one point for discussion, and that is the 
 practical question as to whether English syllables can be re- 
 duced to a prosody of longs and shorts similar to the Greek. 
 Before any experiment in the adoption of classical metres can 
 be actually made it is necessary that rules for the determina- 
 tion of quantity must be set forth, and agreed upon. But to 
 
 * There is perhaps some antagonism of idea as well as of rhythm 
 between the two halves of this verse. Gray probably got his incmse- 
 breathing from Milton's pictures of morning, see, e.g. Par. Lost, ix. 193, 
 where ' on the approach of morn — In Eden on the humid flowers, that 
 breathed Their morning incense,' etc., there is something heavy and 
 delayed which is not of the same idea as bteet^ call. [R.6.] 
 
in English Verse ij-i 
 
 conclude my argument I should like first to reconsider the con- 
 ditions of the Elizabethan failure, and compare that attempt with 
 the successful transplantation of the Greek prosody made by the 
 Romans, and finally try to dispose of some of the main objec- 
 tions which are nowadays urged against its adoption in English. 
 To compare first the Elizabethan attempt with the Roman : 
 the actual conditions were not dissimilar. The Romans had 
 only the rough Saturnian metre * to call their own, the Eliza- 
 bethans had only their Chaucerian heritage ; Romans and 
 Elizabethans alike were struck by the obvious superiority of 
 quantitative verse almost as soon as they became acquainted 
 with it, and proceeded to adapt their language to it. It is at 
 this point that the parallel fails. We might conceivably cite 
 Plautus as a transitional stage, but I think we should be wrong 
 in doing so. His verse is merely a simplifying and vulgarizing 
 of the scansion as it is of the metre. Unaccented syllables 
 that can be slurred in pronunciation he scans short, because on 
 the comic stage such clipping would be natural and almost 
 inevitable. But he has no doubt whatever of the true quantity 
 of the syllables : the converse process is never found ; the 
 accent never leads him to suppose that a short syllable is long. 
 We must take it then that the Romans from the moment that 
 they began to write quantitative verse were never in any 
 
 * I do not now think it correct to say, as is often said, chat the 
 Saturnian was a (purely) accentual metre. In the femiliar line 
 Immonales mortales si foret hs flere 
 
 the accents on immortelles ii^i foret will be immortales feret, while the beat of 
 the verse would require 
 
 Immortals mort^es si for^t fas fl^re. 
 
ri"! Classical Metres 
 
 doubt as to the quantity of their syllables. They were trans- 
 planting a system from a language, if I may be allowed to say 
 so, even more different from theirs than it is from ours. Yet 
 though it may be called an artificial product, there was none 
 of that astonishing diversity of opinion, that amazing elasticity 
 and inconsistency which we see in even the most conscien- 
 tious of Elizabethan experimentalists. 
 
 We need not go very far to find some explanation of this 
 really surprising difference. The Englishmen had not the 
 advantage of hearing Greeks read their Homer, and besides, 
 our literature had advanced considerably beyond Saturni^s, 
 which made us less ready for innovation. But the true 
 explanation is, I believe, to be found in our spelling, and in 
 the fact that verse is to us so much a matter for the eye, 
 which is a reason why we read classics with terrible false 
 quantities, and mind it not in the least so long as we see the 
 line perfect before our eyes. And so if we cannot hear the 
 accent perpetually forcing the metre upon us, an indulgence 
 which Southey and Longfellow seldom deny us, we like to see 
 our double letters marking the long syllable and our single the 
 short, even when the result is to make shining a pyrrhic and 
 ihinning a trochee. It will not be until we spell our words 
 with a separate symbol for the long and short vowels and with 
 no doubling of consonants at all, as in Pitman s Phonetic Short- 
 hand, that the ordinary English mind will succeed in detecting 
 a false quantity. We like for convenience' sake to think 
 that we can use me and thee and he long or short as we like. 
 Yet, what Roman ever supposed that he might scan tu, te, or 
 me short ? He must, as we are, have been filled with envy, 
 
in English Verse ifj 
 
 when he thought of those delightful words /if, o-f, av, but his 
 
 judgement was unerring, his manhood unshaken. We should 
 
 emulate him and make the best of a language, which I am 
 
 persuaded is more like Greek in sound than his was. 
 
 I will now consider one or two objections which are 
 
 .commonly urged against the adoption of the classical system in 
 
 English. The commonest is perhaps that our language is too 
 
 monosyllabic. Whether or not this is a serious indictment 
 
 against English, I leave others to judge. For myself I do not 
 
 see why it is more fatal to metrical than to ordinary verse. 
 
 It will be said perhaps that it unfits the language for the long 
 
 sonorous roll of the hexameter. But there are many English 
 
 metres as long as the hexameter, even if some of them be for 
 
 printers' purposes divided at the caesura : for instance, let me 
 
 take this line from Mr. Swinburne, which contains eight feet, 
 
 ' iambics ' and ' anapaests ' mixed : — 
 
 Ere Eton arose in an age chat was darkness and shone by his radianc 
 side. 
 
 Here there are no less than eleven monosyllables, yet I do not 
 find that the verse halts on that account. Still I do not deny 
 that the monosyllabic nature of English will cause an unavoid- 
 able, but not necessarily regrettable, modificationof the rhythms. 
 Monosyllabic endings, like i/E^eXijyepcVa Zeis, yr]66<Tvvos Kqp, must 
 be expected to be far more frequent. If we did not like them 
 at first, we should get used to them. Moreover, considering 
 our immense number of proclitics, I think the monosyllabic 
 nature of the language is somewhat exaggerated. 
 
 Secondly, it is said that we are lamentably deficient in pure 
 long vowels, and that two such consecutive are hardly to be 
 
ij'4 Classical Metres 
 
 found. The first of these two statements I am inclined to 
 demur to altogether. In the line quoted above, for instance — 
 not chosen for this purpose — there are eight pure long vowels 
 in the eight feet, a very fair proportion, as I think. In this 
 last clause that I have written, of seventeen words, there are 
 ten. Here at least our monosyllables stand us in good stead, 
 the large majority being pure long vowels. The second 
 clause of this objection is at first sight rather significant, 
 though a vast number of double words, such as always, daylight, 
 nuilight, rvarfare, waylay, sea-mew, mheatear, heyday, seaside, heirloom, 
 will occur to any one. But it is after all due principally to the 
 fact that ours is not an inflexional language, and I do not 
 think it would be un&ir to equate (this is just such a word, by 
 the way) ^atva with / go, /Sai'vcc with he goes, etc. 
 
 A third objection often urged is that our language is such a 
 mass of tonsonants — ' too craggy,' as Nash puts it — that the 
 easy flow of metre is impossible. I am in a curious position 
 with regard to this objection, because my great difEcuIty, 
 mentioned above, is to persuade any one that an agglomera- 
 tion of consonants does retard the verse at all. Of course if 
 the rules of quantity by fosition are continually disregarded, 
 this 'cragginess' is the inevitable result, and a very proper 
 retribution. It seems to me that these two objections, (i) that 
 our language is too consonantal, (i) that our consonants are 
 not strong enough to affea quantity — are directly con- 
 tradictory, and unless one is withdrawn, I do not see why 
 I should answer either. Both I consider at least flagrant 
 over-statements. 
 
 A further objection, if it is an objection, is the extreme 
 
in English Verse lyy 
 
 difficulty of writing such verse, and the bar it would be to any 
 freedom of thought. This difficulty would be very real. A 
 beginner would find his path as thickly strewn with thorns as 
 that of a boy learning Latin verses. He would make false 
 quantities far more ghastly, and his tongue would refuse, quite 
 rightly, to shift the accent on to the long syllable *, a difficulty 
 which does not present itself to the Latin verse writer. But 
 practice and severe correction will in the end, I believe, 
 make the rules of metre very little more galling than the rules 
 of rhyme, and the feeling of victory even more enchanting. 
 The quantity of the word will be felt at once, and its different 
 possible positions in the verse, which is, I suppose, if we care 
 to analyse it, the way in which such verse is written. 
 
 It might perhaps be thought that a very large proportion of 
 EngUsh words could not be made to fit into metre at all. I can 
 only say I have not found this to be the case. On Tennyson's 
 principle it would of course be so j if the accent and the long, 
 syllable are always to coincide, we should be very severely 
 handicapped. But on my principle comparatively speaking 
 very few words refuse to find a place, and we should remember 
 that the Greek dramatists were forbidden the whole class of 
 words in -oavvriy and the Roman hexametrists all words in -atio. 
 
 In the tabulated prosody which I now offer, I have not 
 aimed at exhaustive completeness ; though I have taken pains 
 
 * A warning is perhaps necessary about syllables long or short by 
 position. Just as the gradations of accent are infinite, so are the grada- 
 tions of quantity. So they were to the Romans, who borrowed the 
 Greek mute and liquid rule to mark the exact border-line between long 
 and short. If then the difference between long and short seems in some 
 instances extremely slight, there is no real cause for surprise. 
 
If 6 Classical Metres 
 
 to group together under general laws all the points which have 
 occasioned me difficulty, aftd which I have had to decide for 
 myself. There may be many things which have not occurred 
 to me, and many of my conclusions to which exception will be 
 taken. I have visions, as Webbe had, of a gradual crystalliza- 
 tion of opinion on these various points, but for the present my 
 own alterable views may be of service. 
 
 III. 
 
 Of Vowels Long or Short by Nature. 
 
 § I. Where the accent is on the vowel, its quantity is 
 never in doubt, as hating, hitting. 
 
 § 2. Where the accent is not on the vowel, the quantity 
 may be discovered by accenting the syllable, unless the vowel 
 is indeterminate (as it more often is than not). 
 
 § 3. All indeterminate vowels are short, except when 
 lengthened by position. 
 
 + An indeterminate vowel is one which has lost its 
 distinctive character, its pronunciation depending almost 
 entirely on its surroundings. The symbol generally used 
 for it is 3. Instances are ^i-o/ejj',/o««»«K. If the accent 
 were put on these vowels they would scan profess, fortunate. 
 Short ;■ never becomes indeterminate, and in fact it often 
 occurs in a lower stage of degradation, as the pronun- 
 ciation fortunit, fassige, which we often hear, proves. 
 
 § 4. A vowel followed immediately by another vowel in 
 the same word is, if accented, long, as fieiy, deity, riiin ; if 
 
in English Verse if7 
 
 unaccented, it is long if it precedes the word-accent, short 
 if it follows it, as f re-eminence, immediate. 
 
 § y. No final open vowels (that is vowel-sounds not closed 
 with a consonant) are short in English,, except^ and a (or ough 
 in thorough and borough'). Exceptions are the proclitics the, to, and 
 a, and be when it is used proclitically (as for instance in the 
 passive infinitive, to be lei), and me when it is used enclitically, 
 as ghie me. 
 
 § 6. Notice generally that whereas in Greek a propar- 
 oxytone accent is often followed by a long vowel-sound, as 
 yivoiTo, this appears never to be the case with us, except in 
 compound words, as beef-eater, and perhaps [also such words as] 
 narriw-ly, narrow-ness. Such vowels have all become indeter- 
 minate, except of course the short / : fersonal will serve as an 
 instance. 
 
 § 7. ^r, er, ir, or, ur (and syllables however spelt, if pro- 
 nounced as we pronounce these spellings), when not followed 
 by a vowel must be regarded as unclosed vowels. We do 
 not now pronounce their »• as a consonant, except when 
 followed by a vowel. In that case such syllables are governed 
 by the ordinary rules, e. g. foreign, oral, where the accent 
 shows the quantity 5 dolorous, where the has become in- 
 determinate. When followed by a consonant their length 
 should always be preserved, except where this is forbidden by 
 the principle mentioned in the last section (§ 6). I should 
 thus scan serve, freservation, riverbank^^ but governor seems to 
 me now (in spite ofgarvern) unquestionably the true quantity. 
 The long vowel will however be preserved in bitttr-fy, bitier-ness. 
 
If 8 Classical Metres 
 
 as in narrow-ly, nimw-mss. Those then who hold that the r 
 is still present as a consonant, will differ from me here only in 
 such words as gmernour^ liberty^ etc. 
 
 * Monosyllables in or, etc., are always long; except 
 sometimes for and or, when these words are pronounced 
 (as they sometimes are, but never need be) indeter- 
 minately before a vowel, and her. [See note on p. i^J.J 
 
 * * For when it takes the enclitic accent is, however, 
 often pronounced short : we often hear forrit, for for it. 
 
 Of Elision and Liquid Endings. 
 § 8. Elision of a final syllable it is convenient and rational to 
 disallow altogether. We do not run the vowels of different 
 words together, but either insert a slight consonantal y or w 
 between them, or are careful to preserve hiatus. After the 
 sounds au and a (as in saw and thorough'), where no such con- 
 sonant can naturally be introduced, the hiatus is very marked. 
 In saying j<jb» I, though if pronounced rapidly the words will 
 form a creditable diphthong, we take particular pains to avoid 
 it, which leads in extreme cases even to the introduction of an 
 r. Notice also in this connexion the curious insertion of a ^ in 
 tanyer and lawyer. 
 
 § 9. Elision then — and this includes Homeric shortening — 
 is to be disallowed. Milton's use of it seems to have been 
 fiction only ; its purpose to justify the trisyllabic foot. On the 
 other hand his elision in the middle of a word seems both use- 
 ful and rational ; ruin as well as riiiin, being as well as being. It 
 seems that we can if we like leave out the intruding^ or ip in 
 
in English Verse 1^9 
 
 these cases : the Greek variants a(jiZv and (r^aw are to some 
 extent parallel. iyenVn as well as i^fM-Lren is also reasonable. 
 
 § 10. With regard to words ending in /e, el, en, on, etc., 
 some have urged that these are only vowel fs and n's, holding 
 that able and heofven are only, as philologists would write it, abl 
 and heavn ; and argue from this that such syllables should scan 
 short before a consonant. To me it seems that there is an 
 indeterminate vowel distinctly present j I should write a.b»l 
 and heavan. Even if it is insisted that the vowel in -ble is the 
 vowel I, surely there is a consonant I present also. This is 
 practically acknowledged by Elhs, who writes aabll (or aah'l 
 for short). 
 
 Of Short Vowels Lengthened by Position. 
 
 § II. The effect of consonants in lengthening short vowels 
 in Latin may be shown in three stages : 
 
 1st, et res, always long. 
 
 2nd, fharetra, long or short, i. e. ' doubtful.' 
 
 3rd, mare transit, always short (with rare exceptions). 
 
 From this it seems to follow that the quantity of the e in 
 fharetra depended on whether the word was pronounced 
 pharet-ra or fhare-tra; and generally the Latin practice of 
 lengthening short vowels before more than one consonant can 
 on this principle be simply explained. When two consonants 
 could be pronounced together and both attached to the 
 following syllable (as was the case with mutes followed by 
 liquids), then the syllable before them might be unaffected 
 by them, and remain short : but when in order to pronounce 
 
i6o Classical Metres 
 
 them it was necessary to divide them between the syllables 
 (as in falfo, which must be said fal-fo, and cannot be said 
 fa-lfo), then the preceding vowel was always affected and 
 lengthened; and it was thus lengthened before all combi- 
 nations of consonants, except only those of a mute followed 
 by a liq^uid, and q£ qu. 
 
 § 1 2. The Greejcs, who lengthen a final short syllable before 
 two consonants in the next word (as ^ 8^ trictd), must, if I am 
 right, have run their words together more than was natural 
 to the Romans — and this may perhaps explain their strange 
 initial letters i^, |, f — and they must have said fj Se<r km. The 
 Romans refused to do this, but before st (etc.) they would not 
 scan the syllable short (perhaps unreasonably), and so had to 
 avoid such juxtaposition altogether. 
 
 § 13. The conclusion from these considerations is that 
 when two consonants cannot be attached to the next syllable, 
 they must in that case affect and lengthen a preceding short 
 vowel ; but when they can be attached to the following syllable, 
 then they need not affect the preceding syllable. 
 
 § 14. But in English we have rules which limit this liberty. 
 Where in Latin the division of syllables is optional (fharet-ra 
 or fhare-tra), with us it is usually not so. We are governed by 
 the accent : we say fet-rify, but arbi-trate *, which accordingly 
 can only scan fetrify, arbitrate. Further, with the Latin 
 
 * The hyphen in fet-rify, and above in pharet-m, no doubt exaggerates 
 the diiFerence, for the t and r are inseparable in pronunciation, but the 
 distinction is real, and it will be readily perceived that in petrify the t has 
 a much closer connexion with the vowel that precedes it than it has in 
 arhitrate. 
 
in English Verse i(Ji 
 
 ' doubtful ' combinations I would class those English combina- 
 tions ending in w or y, thus continue, which is phonetically 
 contlnr-yoo (or as the sound would be represented in Latin, 
 contin-ju), should scan comTnue ; while reti-nue would be retinue ; 
 again liquid (Jik;;riiid\ but obCoqwy (oblo-k}v)i). 
 
 * As for liquid, I feel sure that this is the true quantity 
 with us. It is noticeable that Lucretius scans both 
 liq-uidus aad ff-quidus. May not the difference in pro- 
 nimciation account for it ? 
 
 § I J. In English then — and this ought to be a great satis- 
 faction to everybody — there will be ' doubtful ' syllables only 
 where there is a lesser accent, as miserah-ly or misera-blyi We 
 should allow short syllables before initial st (etc.) of the next 
 word. 
 
 §1^. Soft g and ch. Stanihurst regarded the syllajile ending 
 in soft g or ch as ' doubtfiil.' He says that the vowels before 
 g are short, but ' soOmtyme long by position, where D may be 
 inserted, as fassage is short, but yf you make it long, fassadge 
 with a D should be written.' As they are really double, there 
 seemed to me at first some reason in this : but I am now 
 convinced that they can never lengthen, because we cannot 
 separate the double sound j we cannot for instance say mt-shes, 
 led-^es, for witches, ledges. 
 
 § 17. ng must be regarded as a single letter, except when 
 the g sound is truly present j thus sUnger, but finger. 
 
 § 18. !^ sh, th, etc^, are single letters. 
 
 § 19. Initial long » has always the 7 sound before it,aiid all 
 
 BRIDGES M 
 
i6z Classical Metres 
 
 words beginning with it must be regarded as beginning with a 
 consonant. 
 
 § io. ii/is a consonant with us. This is a deplorable fact, 
 but that it is a fact is evident in such words as manhood, which 
 will not scan manhood*. That h is sometimes weak enough 
 (e. g. in hh, her) to be negligible, is a possible view, but at 
 present I am against it. 
 
 § zt. Short monosyllables ending in a consonant seem 
 
 sometimes to have so much force that they are unwilling to 
 
 scan short even before a vowel. The reason is that we 
 
 pronounce them as if the consonant was double, i. e. as we 
 
 pronounce the nn in innate. Such words therefore may scan 
 
 either short or long before a vowel. We may say either 
 
 Boch CO men and Co women, 
 or, 
 
 Boch to the men and maids, 
 
 for the beginning of a hexameter. This rule will also apply 
 to other words accented on the last syllable, as abet. 
 
 Difficulties due to Pronunciation. 
 § iz. Words in ass, etc., create a difficulty, because some 
 people give the a a broad, and others a short sound, and this 
 can only be met by conforming to your author's pronunciation : 
 and we must follow the same rule with other words the quantity 
 of which differs with different pronunciations. But in the case 
 
 * The example does noc seem well chosen, because ic mighc be urged 
 againsc ic chac man (as seated in seccion 19] is one of chose words which 
 may double its final consonant. I believe chac chis lasc face was one of 
 Mr. Scone's lacesc additions. It opens quescions which are nocfiilly 
 answered in che folUowing seccion 11 . [R. B.J 
 
in English Verse id 3 
 
 offassj etc., it would seem better to avoid using them in places 
 where they could be scanned short. 
 
 §13. Finally, there is a great difficulty with regard to 
 classical proper names, some of which have to alter their 
 scansion unless we are to alter ^our pronunciation. My method 
 escapes, it is true, from such barbarities as Pemtopi and 
 Evangeline, which are inevitable in verses of the Southey type. 
 But I am bound in consistency to scan Catullus, Schiller, 
 Priam j nor is there any place in a hexameter for .AHdromeda 
 and Nausicaa (except perhaps by special licence), nor for 
 Diomedes. That these quantities should offend classical ears is, 
 I know, inevitable ; but it is not my fault that the names are 
 so pronounced. Whether Homeric lengthening in the case of 
 labials and spirants might be allowed, need not be discussed 
 here. It would be a dangerous experiment in our present 
 state of haziness about quantity. 
 
 C/5C/3CO 
 
 Note on Monosyllables in or, etc. (see p. ij8). 
 
 It may save the reader trouble if it is pointed out that the 
 mention of her among the exceptions implies that the class here 
 described as ' or, etc' is intended to be the same as that treated 
 
 M 2, 
 
1 6 4- Classical Metres 
 
 of in tte main part of § 7, viz, or, er, ir, or, ur, etc. This 
 being so, otter exceptions (besides for, or and her) may occur 
 to the reader ; e.g. Sir ^ndrav : but loer' for were, as sometimes 
 heard in toer' it so, would probably have to be excluded as con- 
 versational. Though Mr. Stone plainly states that he did not 
 consider his rules as either complete or final, yet it is a pity 
 that we have not his opinion more clearly expressed in detail 
 concerning these difficult syllables. [R. B.] 
 
INDEXES 
 
 The following three indexes are incomplete, especially the 
 subject-index for those parts of the book where rules are 
 tabulated, for instance the third part of Mr. Stone's tract 
 (p. I J6 ad fin."), where the matter, being arranged under its 
 proper headings, can easily be found. Regard has been paid 
 to the reader's convenience in facilitating reference to minor 
 details, and in bringing together scattered remarks on the 
 same subject, especially where these occur in the separate 
 tracts, to distinguish which all references to Mr. Stone's tract 
 are bracketed away to the right, thus (. But any one con- 
 sulting the index may remember that every page-number after 
 113 must refer to the second tract. 
 
 INDEX OF SUBJECTS 
 
 Accent, see under Greek a. ; Recession of a. ; Stress ; and 
 Quantity, 
 does not lengthen a syllable, (116^, ii/j I43- 
 how it may affect quantity, (146'. 
 same now in English as in classical Greek and Latin, 79, 
 
 (ii^j 142, 143- , ., , 
 
 combative a. in classic verse, (116 ; m Stamhurst, (123 ; 
 and advocated by Calverley, (13^. 
 Accentual hexameter, its structure explained, 10 j seq. ; 
 English writers of it criticized, (128-141. 
 accentual verse distinguished from syllabic, 1 1 1 . 
 Adjectives in able, 7 etc., J2, 53, (1^9 § 10. 
 Alexandrine, its construction in Milton, 39, 4^0. 
 Authorized Version, M.'s use of it and reasons, 11 n. 
 
 Blank verse, type o^ i. 
 
 early, transitional from rhymed couplet, 88. 
 
1 66 Index of Subjects 
 
 Break in blank verse — defined, 195 ex. of variety, JO; of 
 single breaks, 2,0 j of double, zi ; elaboration of rhythm 
 consequent on variety, zi. 
 
 CaesuR-A, see under Break. 
 
 classical c. caused by rhythm, 80. 
 
 Choric verse in Samson analysed, 4r. 
 
 Classical prosody advocated at Renaissance^ (ri8. 
 
 Colloquial diction, and shortening of words in verse, 102, (14 J, 
 ijr. 
 
 Combative accent, (116, iij ; see under Accent, and Inver- 
 sion. 
 
 Comic-iambic stanza, 99 etc. 
 
 Compensation, J8 ; see Stress, omitted. 
 
 Consonants, double, in English not so pronounced, (in; 
 exceptions, (121, 1^23 cannot make a vowel long by 
 position, (i2i, 124, see 133 etc.; absurdities hence in- 
 volved by English pronunciation of classic verse, (139. 
 
 Contractions, of common speech, 10; of perf. part. etc. in ed, 
 10 J of perf part, (etc.) in c», 11 ; of 2nd pers. sing, of 
 verbs, 11 j of superlative term, of adj., 11. 
 of the, of the, »' th' midst, etc., II. 
 colloquial c. in good verse, loi, (145, iji. 
 
 Dactylic (so-called) character of some of the choric verse 
 in Samson, 45. 
 
 d. often indistinguishable from anapaestic, 95. 
 Double consonants, see Consonants. 
 
 Elision, see under Trisyllabic. 
 
 as used by M., 2, (158 ; term explained, App. B. yo. 
 e.' of common speech, 2 ; of open vowels, rules for, 3. 
 phonetic condition of open vowels, yi, Jz. 
 impurity of English e. of open vowels, (144, iy8. 
 
 e. with r, 4; with I, 6 ; with «, 9; with m, 2y ; with 
 initial 7, z6. 
 
 e. of adjective in ble, 7. 
 
 examples of e. re&sed by Milton, 29. 
 
Index of Subjects 167 
 
 Milton's arbitrary practice of e., i8, f i. 
 his use follows Chaucer, jr ; examples, 8j. 
 doubtful e. in stressed verse, loj. 
 Elizabethan attempt at classical verse compared with the Latin 
 
 imitation of Greek, (rf i. 
 Enclitics, z6, 93, (iir, 143, 144, ij8. 
 Extrametrical syllables, 
 
 at end of line, 1,4; in mid-verse, 2, 27 ; disallowed in P. £., 
 1 J defined in App. A. 47. 
 
 Falling and rising, terms explained, 77. 
 Falling rhythms in Samson quoted, 34. 
 Five-syllable foot, 97. 
 
 Grammar a determinant of metric units in stressrverse, 93, 
 94, 102 ; Prof Skeat extending this to syllabic verse, 1 1 1. 
 Greek accents, (142 etc., and see under Dionysius, index II. 
 
 not of less force than ours, (14 J. 
 
 circumflex paralleled in English, (143. 
 Greek model preferred to Latin for English classical verse, (141. 
 
 H DOES not forbid elision in M., 3. 
 
 a consonant in English, (162. 
 Heavy and Ught syllables, 89 etc. 
 Heaviness of initial feet in stress-rhythms condemned, 9 8, 1 00 t- 
 
 I. SHORT i elided or contracted, 10, 24, 29. 
 
 its quality, (l J^ § 3 + ; I J7 § 6. 
 Iambic and trochaic systems sometimes indistinguishable, 9f . 
 Iambus : differentiated from English so-called iambus, yg. 
 Ictus metrical, how given when combated, (147 etc. 
 Initial weak feet in syllabic verse, 13, 17. 
 heavy feet in stressed verse, 98, 100 t- 
 Inversion, see Rhythm, and Combative accent. 
 
 Inv. of stress in Milton's blank verse, if ; effect illustrated, 
 175 commoninversions, I J J i-followingperiodinsensCjif ; 
 exx. of all places of i., 16 etc. ; i. of fth foot discussed, 16 ; 
 more than one i. in the line, 17, 33, 3 y etc. 5 i. of first two 
 feet, 35. 
 
i(J8 _ Index of Subjects 
 
 L. ELISION with / in Milton, 6. 
 
 L' ytlk^o, etc., verse of described, 31 etc., 7 J. 
 
 Light and heavy syllables defined, 89. 
 
 Liquid sounds, J 2. 
 
 Long and heavy, 89. 
 
 M. WHETHER m was admitted into M.'s liquid elisions, ly, i8. 
 Metrical equivalence explained, App. E. 71. 
 Metrical ictus, see Ictus. 
 
 Monosyllabic ending of hexameter, (153 5 ofpentameter,(i37. 
 Monosyllables in caesura, (13^. 
 with open vowels, (121. 
 
 N. ELISION with », 9. 
 
 Nine-syllable line in Chaucer, i, 33, 35', 37 5 in Marlowe, %6. 
 
 Objections to classical system in English stated and met, 
 
 (if 3 etc. 
 Open vowels, see Elision. 
 
 quantity of in English monosyllables, {121. 
 Oxyton, 78. 
 
 Pedantry in prosody, g^. 
 
 Position, quantity by : contradictory views of in English, (1^4; 
 the Latin rule, (i J 9 etc. ; the Greek, (160; the English, 
 (160. 
 Prepositions, recession of accent on, %6 etc. 
 
 stress-value of proclitic prep, in Milton's verse, 66. 
 Proclitics, 93, 96, (121, 157. 
 Pronunciation in Milton, App. E. ^4. 
 
 list of words of peculiar accent in M., 67. 
 
 difference of old pronunciation much exaggerated, 66^ 67. 
 Proper names, classical, their quantity in English, (1^3. 
 
 Qu, (1^0, i^i. 
 
 Quantity in English, 79, (ii(J; of English vowels, (ij5 etc. 
 
 wrongly confounded with accent or stress, 81, (11^, 117. 
 
 false classical analogies, 94. 
 
 all degrees o^ 91, 81, (if J. 
 
Index of Subjects 1 6^ 
 
 uncertain length of some light longs, 103. 
 
 whether affected by juxtaposition, 102. 
 
 inability to distinguish long from short syllables, (11^, 149. 
 
 q. and accent, their fiinctions the same in English as in 
 
 classic verse, only reversed, (118. 
 fixity of q. in English asserted by Webbe and Tennyson, 
 
 how affected by accent, (145:. 
 
 R. ELISION with r in Milton, 4. 
 
 burr of er, J } quantity of syllables in English which close 
 with untrilled r, (1J7, 158. 
 
 r not always trilled in Mid. Engl., 66^ 67. 
 Realism, how used in romantic art, 48 n. 
 Recession of accent, 1 3 j treated of in App. D. J 3 . 
 
 present in Milton's early poems, 57 ; excluded from his later, 
 59; present in Shakespeare, JJ; in Shelley, 6z; in 
 Chaucer, two examples given, 8y. 
 Rhyme in blank verse, 87. 
 Rhythm, common view o^ 30 j its variety infinite, 89. 
 
 r. of blank verse, i. 
 
 inverted r., i y ; see under Inversion and Combative accent. 
 
 inverted rising r., distinguished from falling r., 34. 
 
 descriptive rhythm, 43. 
 
 free rhythm carried by disyllabic fictions, 41 etc. 
 
 Greek rhythms unknown to us, 80. 
 
 heavier rhythms, 103. 
 Rules of stress-prosody, 91 etc. 
 
 of classical quantity in English, (i ^6 etc. 
 
 SMisoN, verse o^ described, 34, 3 J. 
 Saturnian verse, not purely accentual, (i J i «. 
 Short and long syllables, 89 etc. 
 Spelling in Milton, f i ; inconsistent, 64. 
 
 s. in English, confusing, (i Ji. 
 Stichomythia, 48. - 
 
 Stress ; see also under Accent, Inversion, Rhythm, and Falling 
 and rising. 
 
I70 Index of Subjects 
 
 term explained, 78. 
 
 naturally assertive in Eng. verse, 73> and App. J. law IV. 
 
 stress in Shakespeare's later verse, 66. 
 
 typical number of stresses in blank verse, I, iz. 
 
 alternate, iz ; omitted, 12, f 8 ; sometimes compensated, 
 14,^8, 
 
 omitted mid-stress, 14 ; in Marlowe, 87. 
 
 conventional stress, 74 ; 14, C. ; not allowed in stress 
 rhythms, ^^. 
 
 bare stress, 7J ; overladen, 102, 75' 3 double, loj etc. 
 
 distinguishes classic rhythms (see Accent), 791. 
 Stressed verse, distinguished from syllabic, in, 1 1 i. 
 
 rules of it not observed by writers, 76. 
 
 chief rules, 76 ; units of, 77. 
 
 of choruses in Samson hampered by fictions, 76. 
 
 laws of lighter stress rhythms, and tabulation in App. J. 88 
 etc. 
 
 units given, 97. 
 
 words of two stresses in, no. , 
 Superfluous syllables, 6g. 
 Supernumerary syllables, i etc. 
 Syllabic verse distinguished from accentual, in. 
 
 deficiency of syllables in, rare, i ; see Nine-syllable line. 
 
 excess of syllables in, see Supernumerary s. 
 
 Trisyllabic verse rhythms, 33, 43. 
 
 t. feet in Milton, see Elision. 
 Trochaic, see Falling rhythms, and Iambic. 
 
 Uncertainty both of rhythm and scansion, 25. 
 Units of stress-verse, 97. 
 
 W AND Wh, not forbidding elision in Milton, 4. 
 as a glide between open vowels, (144, 158. 
 
 Y INITIAL not forbidding elision, z6. 
 
 as glide, (144, ij8, and before initial U, (161. 
 
INDEX OF NAMES 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, (rjoj his lectures on Homer, (r ji ; his 
 disUke of combative accent, (131-2 j his inabihty to dis- 
 tinguish quantity, (141. 
 
 Ascham, (119. 
 
 Blake, his poetry banned by the schools, ^^. 
 Blass, Dr., on Greek accents, (142 etc. 
 BuUen, his edition of Marlowe quoted, 8f. 
 his vindication of Peek's originality, 87. 
 
 Calverley, his opinion opposed to Arnold, (131. 
 
 his theory of rhythm sound, (13^ etc. 
 
 character of his hexameters not corresponding, (137-8. 
 
 his inconsistency, (137. 
 Chaucer, value of termination -able in his verse, f 3, 83. 
 
 Milton's adoption of his prosody, Ji, tfj. 
 
 specimens of his elisions, etc., 82 etc. 
 
 two lines quoted and discussed, 6^. 
 
 his Nine-syllable line, q.v. 
 
 recession of accent, two examples quoted, 8 J. 
 Clough, 102, 145. 
 
 his spiritual treatment of nnpoetic subjects, 106 n. 
 
 Eothie quoted and its prosody discussed, 107 etc. 
 
 his ^ctaeon, (124. 
 
 his classical experiments and false quantities, (133. 
 Gjchrane, his accentual hexameters, (132. 
 Coleridge, his Christabel, its prosody examined, 73 ; his hexa- 
 meters, (130 j elegiac couplet quoted, (i 3 J J his hendeca- 
 syllables, (130. 
 
 Dante, his use of the Vulgate, 22. 
 Dart, his Homer, (132. 
 Dionysius on Greek accent, (143, 148. 
 Drant, Dr., translation of Horace, (120. 
 
172 
 
 Index of Names 
 
 Ellis, Alex., 67 »., 83. 
 
 Ellis, F. S., his concordance to Shelley, 6^. 
 
 Fraunce, Abram, (119, izj ; (quoted, (iztf. 
 
 Gray, line of Elegy criticized, (l Jo. 
 Guest, Dr., quoted, (117- 
 
 Harvey, Gabriel, (119, 120 ; a specimen of his verse, (122, j 
 
 his dictum on position, (122. 
 Hawtrey, Dr., his hexameters, (132. 
 Heber, Bp., his prosody examined, 92. 
 Heine, his practice in stressed verse, quoted, 100 etc. 
 Herschell, his Homer, (132. 
 Hopkins, Gerard, on metrical equivalence, 71. 
 Horace, 80. 
 
 JONSON, Ben, his opinion of Fraunce's hexameters, (i z6, 
 
 KiNGSLEY, his hexameters, (130. 
 
 Longfellow, (1^2 ; JE-uaBgc/we quoted and criticized, 108 etc.; 
 M. Arnold's opinion of his hexameters, (131. 
 
 Marlowe, characteristics of his verse, i6 ; illustration quoted, 
 
 8J. 
 Mayor, Prof., his idea of classic verse, (118. 
 Milton, his system of blank verse defined, 19. 
 
 his rules of prosody adapted from Chaucer, Ji, 6^. 
 
 arbitrary application of the same, 18. 
 
 relaxed in later poems, 24 ; and not much differing from 
 
 other poets, 29. 
 his pretension to distinguish 'short and long' inscrutable, 
 89 ». 
 Morris, Dr., his curiously wrong and repellent representation of 
 Chaucer's pronunciation, 69 j his text of Tales quoted, 82-3. 
 Munro, H. A. J., (139. 
 
 his criticism of Spedding, (140 etc. 
 his views similar to Puttenham's, (141. 
 on Greek accent, (142. 
 
Index of Names 173 
 
 Nares, his Orthoefiy, quoted, 67. 
 Nash, (127 ; quoted, (119, IJ4. 
 
 Ovid, 80, (147. 
 
 Peele, anticipated Marlowe's style, illustration quoted, 87. 
 Plautus, his colloquial diction and consequent corruption of 
 
 true quantity, (l4f, iji. 
 Puttenham, his foolish book, quoted, (127 etc. 
 
 ROSSETTI, his modern pronunciation of some terminations, J 3. 
 
 Schmidt, Dr. A., on Shakespeare, quoted, ^4 etc., 6j. 
 Shakespeare, 9, 49, 53, 70, 88. 
 
 recession of accent in, J 3 etc. 
 
 his later verse ruled by stress, 66. 
 
 his use of extrametrical syllable in dialogue, 47. 
 Shelley, his pronunciation of adj. in able, J 2. 
 
 his use of recession of accent, <f 2. 
 
 his Sensitive Plant, prosody criticized, 98 etc., 102. 
 
 his 'Away, the moor,' prosody explained, 103 ; and of 'Ah, 
 sister, desolation,' lof. 
 Sidney, (120J quoted, his quantities, (123. 
 Skeat, his analysis of syllabic verse by units of stress-prosody, 
 
 III. 
 Southey, (128 etc., 1^2. 
 Spedding, Jas., (138. 
 
 his criticism of M. Arnold, sound, (138. 
 
 his type-words of English quantity, (139. 
 
 his Virgilian hexameters, {140 ; their felse quantities, (140. 
 Spenser, his enthusiasm for the classical system of verse, (i 20, 
 
 12^; his experiments, (120. 
 Stanihurst, (119 ; his Virgil, (123 ; quoted, (124-125. 
 Sweet, Dr., 67 n. 
 Swinburne, quoted, (130, i J3. 
 
 Tennyson, Lord, his dislike of accentual hexameters, (129; 
 and of combative accent, (135, i Jjf. 
 his experiments, (134 ; his ialse quantities, (122, 13 J, 13^. 
 
1 74 Index of Names 
 
 bis obiter dicta, (134 ; his belief in fixity of English quantity, 
 (135 ; his scissors and gritel, (13^. 
 Tyrwhitt, his edition of Canterbury Taks, 6i ; wrong explanation 
 of some of Chaucer's and Milton's rhythms, 6g. 
 
 Virgil, 79, 8oj (i4jr, 145. 
 
 Wace, quoted, 67. 
 
 Watson, Dr., his classical verse quoted, (119; his felse 
 
 quantities, (izo. 
 Webbe, (119 ; his discourse, (124, iz6, 1^6. 
 Whewell, Dr., (132, 149. 
 
INDEX OF WORDS 
 
 Adverse, 6o. 
 
 alriay 144- 
 and, 13. 
 annus, 139. 
 arbitrate, 160. 
 
 Being, i8j ij8. 
 bittern, 139. 
 bitterness, 157. 
 
 Cano, 139. 
 Canterbury, 6^. 
 capital, 10, 24, 29. 
 capitolme, 10. 
 carpenter,! 20,1 22, 
 
 14J. 
 complete, 5:9. 
 continue, 161. 
 
 Dhahy, ^9. 
 divine, J9, 62. 
 
 Eev'ning, 9. 
 evil, 9. 
 ev'n, 9. 
 
 extraordinary, 27. 
 extreme, J 9, 62. 
 
 For, ij8. 
 fortunate, 156. 
 
 GovERNOUR, 157. 
 gruel, 13J-5. 
 
 Heaven, 9, 1J9. 
 her, I J 8. 
 hollow, I Jo. 
 
 Idolatry, 2f, 44. 
 immediate, i ^7. 
 impious, 144. 
 incense-breathingj 
 
 90, lyo. 
 infinite, 38. 
 invincible, 37-8. 
 invisible, 38. 
 iron, 9. 
 irresistible, 37-8. 
 
 Lawyer, ij8. 
 ledge, 161. 
 liberty, ij8. 
 liquid, 161. 
 
 Miserably, i^i. 
 misery, 6, z^. 
 
 Narrowly etc., 
 157. 
 
 Obloquy, i^i. 
 
 or, ij8. 
 
 organ- voice, 137. 
 
 Palpo, 160. 
 pass, etc., l6i. 
 passage, 161, 1^6, 
 
 133- 
 Penelope, 132. 
 perilous, 6. 
 petrify, 160. 
 pharetra, 1J9. 
 pious, 144, 1^6. 
 pitous, 83, 8y ex. 
 
 poet, 144. 
 pre-jipminent, 144, 
 
 117- 
 preservation, 1 57. 
 prison, ro. 
 
 Quantity, 139. 
 quiddity, 139. 
 
 Reaction, 144. 
 rejicio, 144 ». 
 retinue, 161. 
 river-bank, 1J7. 
 ruin, 144, 156, 
 IJ8. 
 
 Sawyer, 15:8. 
 scissors, 13^. 
 serene, f 9, 62. 
 serve, 157. 
 seven, 9, 10. 
 sewer, 4. 
 
 silenced, 137, 14 J. 
 slumbers, 139. 
 solemnise, 123. 
 spirit, J . 
 sublime, f 9. 
 supper, 139. 
 supreme, 57,59,62. 
 
 Un-, 60. 
 universal, 38. : 
 
 Whereon, 61. 
 witch, 161. 
 without, 56^-7, 61. 
 
Oxford 
 
 Printed at the Clarendon Press 
 
 By Horace Hart, M.A. 
 
 Printer to the University