Tennyson gives us the following quantitative example of elegiacs. That is, the long syllables are really long, or are arbitrarily made so.

These lame

hexame | ters, the strong-winged |

music of Homer? |

No-but a most bur | lesque" | barbarous | experi |

ment.

To which one might respond:

When was harsher sound ever heard, ye Muses in England?

When did a frog coarser croak upon our Helicon?

2. Lyrical Measures

Hendecasyllabics, or eleven syllable verse, is composed

of a spondee, a dactyl and three trochees.

Ó you | chorus of | indo | lent re | viewers, |
Írre | sponsible, | indo | lent re | viewers, |
Look, Í | come to the | test, a | tiny | poem, |
Áll com | posed in a | meter | of Ca | tullus; |
Áll ín | quantity, | careful | of my | motion, |
Like the | skater on | ice that | hardly | bears him, |
Lest I fall una | wares be | fore the | people, |
Waking | laughter in | indo | lent re | viewers. 1
-TENNYSON, Hendecasyllabics.

Alcaics, named from the poet Alcæus, are of several kinds. In one, the line is made up of either a spondee or an iambus, then a long syllable, and two dactyls; in another, it consists of two dactyls and two trochees. Tennyson uses the latter form in his poem on Milton, beginning with a single syllable, then two trochees and two dactyls. Note that the third line contains three trochees, and that the last line reverses the order of the feet of the first two lines, beginning with two dactyls and ending with two trochees:

O mighty | mouth'd in | ventor of | harmonics, |
O skill'd to sing of | Tíme or E | ternity, |
God- | gifted | organ- | voice of | Éngland, |

Milton a | name to re | sound for | ages; |
Whose Titan angels, Gabriel, Abdiel,
Starred from Jehovah's gorgeous armories,
Tower, as the deep-domed empyrean,

Rings to the roar of an angel onset!

Sapphics were named from the poetess Sappho. A Sapphic line consists of eleven syllables or five feet, the first a trochee, the second a spondee, the third a dactyl, and the fourth and fifth trochees. Three of these lines are followed by a line of five syllables consisting of a dactyl and a spondee.

Saw the white im | placable | Áphro | díte, |

Saw the | hair un bound and the | feet un | sandalled |

Shine as fire of | sunset on | western | waters; |

Saw the reluctant |

Feet, the straining | plumes of the | doves that | drew

her

Looking | always looking with | necks re | verted, |
Back to | Lesbos, | back to the | hills where | under |

Shone Mitylene;

Heard the flying feet of the Loves behind her
Make a sudden thunder upon the waters,

As the thunder flung from the strong unclosing
Wings of a great wind.

So the goddess fled from her place, with awful
Sound of feet and thunder of wings around her:
While behind a clamor of singing women

Severed the twilight.

-SWINBURNE.

It is apparent that the beauty of this meter is due to the central dactyl, or foot of three syllables. In "The Friend of Humanity and The Knife-Grinder," which is a burlesque of this measure, a dactyl is substituted for the first trochee.

Needy knife-grinder! whither are you going?
Rough is the road, your wheel is out of order,-

Bleak blows the blast,—your hat has got a hole in't,

So have

your

breeches!

-CANNING AND FRERE.

Choriambic. A choriambus is a foot consisting of a trochee combined with and preceding an iambus. It is therefore a foot of four syllables, the first long, the second and third short, and the fourth long. A choriambic line consists of a spondee, three choriambuses, and an iambus.

Love, what ailed thee to leave | life that was made | lovely, we thought, with love? |

What sweet | visions of sleep | lured thee away,

down from the light | above?

What strange faces of dreams, voices that called, hands

that were raised to wave,

Lured or led thee, alas, out of the sun, down to the sunless

grave?

-SWINBURNE.

Galliambic. A galliambic line is composed of iambic feet, one of which is catalectic, or drops the final syllable; the next to the last foot is an anapæst, or two short syllables followed by a long one.

So | in ire | she spake | adjust | ing''dis | uní | tedly then |

her yoke.

At | his own | rebuke | the lion' doth | his heart | | to a fury spur,

With a step, a roar, a bursting, unarrested of any brake. -ROBINSON ELLIS, Translation of the Attis.

EXERCISES FOR CLASS USE AND SELF-INSTRUCTION

NOTE. The student should not only recognize but understand the functions of all metrical feet found in English verse.

1. Mark the accents of the unmarked lines quoted in this chapter.

2. Copy the following table of accented and unaccented syllables, and keep it by you until you have mastered it.

3. Write seven rhythmic lines, the first line trochaic, the second line iambic, etc., in illustration of all the metrical feet noted in this table. Of course, these are not to be parts of one stanza.

4. Having become familiar with these technicalities of verse, would you consider it essential to bear them continually in mind during the composition of poetry?