There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin;
The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill;
For his country he sighed when at twilight repairing,
To wander alone by the wind-beaten hill.

I was a child, and she was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea;

Campbell.

But we loved with a love that was more than love,

I and my Annabel Lee;

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.

I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,

And out of the caverns of rain,

Poe.

Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,

I arise and unbuild it again.

Shelley...

MIXED METRES.

WRITERS of verse are under no necessity to a slavish adherence to metrical rules. The muse may soar high with steady wing and stately swoop, or flutter about the lower grounds in fantastic mazes; but his movements must always be rhythmical and his utterances musical. Linguistic difficulties and the seductive chains of linked sweetness,' urge him to the adoption of every possible variety of measure that lends freedom to the movement, and relieves the monotony of regularity. We have already pointed out the addition or omission of short syllables, the interchange of feet of one kind for those of another. Now we have to illustrate, in addition to these variations, the mingling of long and short measures in elegant complexity, together with the fitful ring of rhymes, the combined effect of which often adds to the melody of the rhythm the richness of harmony.

Amongst the simpler of these combinations are the Iambic with Anapestic, Trochaic with Dactylic, in both of which the swing of the melody is uninterrupted, e.g:

My life is cold | and dark | and drear | y;
It rains and the wind is nev er weary.

My thoughts still cling to the mouldering past,
And the hopes of youth | fall thick | in the blast,
And the days are dark | and drear | y.

Longfellow.

And Willy, my eldest born, is gone, you say, little Annie ?
Ruddy and white, and strong on his legs, he looks like a man.
And Willy's wife has written—she never was overwise—
Never the wife for Willy-he wouldn't take my advice.

Tennyson.

"The Grandmother "

In the following, Iambic and Trochaic verses alternate regularly.

When the lamp is shattered,

The light in the dust lies dead;
When the cloud is scattered,

The rainbow's glory is shed;

When the lute is broken,

Sweet tones are remembered not;

When the lips have spoken,

Loved accents are soon forgot.

Shelley.

In L'Allegro and Il Penseroso the measures are

mingled irregularly.

Sometimes with secure delight
The upland hamlets will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecs sound,
To many a youth and many a maid
Dancing in the chequer'd shade;

And young and old come forth to play
On a sunshine holiday,

Till the livelong daylight fail;

Then to the spicy nut-brown ale.

Milton.

As also in the following:

There be none of Beauty's daughters

With a magic like thee;

And like music on the waters

Is thy sweet voice to me.

When, as if its sound were causing
The charmed ocean's pausing,
The waves lie still and gleaming,

And the lulled winds seem dreaming!

Byron.

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call to-day his own,
He who, secure within, can say,

To-morrow do thy worst, for I have lived to-day.

Dryden.

A combination of the same species of verse is made by those which differ in the number of their feet, as in the examples here given, where the figures denote the number of feet in each verse.

Combina

5. In realms long held beneath a tyrant's sway, Lo! Freedom hath again appear'd!

4.

tions in

3.

the Iambic.

In this auspicious day

6. Her glorious ensign floats, and high in Spain is rear'd.

In

3.

the 2.

Anapes- 4.

tic.

In

Then Spaniards shall set at defiance
Their foes that advance :

They shall laugh at the threats of the Holy
Alliance,

4. And baffle, indignant, th' invasion of France.

the 4. Heaven will assist the defenders of Freedom; Dactylic. 4. Prayers and arms in your cause, if you need 'e m Every Briton will yield!

3.

Other combinations are those of different kinds of verse, viz. the iambic with the three others; the trochaic with the anapestic and dactylic, and the two last together. These combinations are made according to the fancy of the writer, in a variety of degrees: sometimes no greater than single verses, or parts of a verse, as in this of Dryden's Ode, the anapestic with the iambic:

And amazed | he stares | around.

Another line in the same ode is of ambiguous measure. The latter half is anapestic; so the first may be, but it reads and scans better as trochaic :

These are | Grecian | ghosts that in | battle were | slain.

Such combinations are to be observed as matters of curiosity rather than imitated.

Ariel's Song in the Tempest combines the trochaic with the dactylic:

On the bat's back I do fly

After summer merrily;

Merrily, merrily shall I live now

Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.