Alas! alas!

were forfeit once:

Why, | all the souls that were
And He that might the vantage best have tock.
Found out the remedy. How would you be
If He who is the top of judgment should
But judge you as you are? O think of that,

And mercy, then, will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.

"Measure for Measure."

From his cradle

He was a scholar, ́ and a ripe and good one ;
Exceeding wise, fair spoken, and persuading;
Lofty and sour to them that loved him not, ¡
But to those men that sought him, sweet as summer..
And though he was unsatisfied in getting,

Which was a sin, yet in bestowing, madam,

He was most princely.

66

· Henry VIII.”

In an Alexandrine verse the pause should always occur at the end of the sixth syllable, or after the seventh if that syllable is strongly accented. any other position the long majestic march of the measure is broken.

In

Rarely the pause may take the place of a syllable, e.g. :

Spreads his light wings | and | in a mo | ment flies.

A few examples from our modern poets are added:

He heard it but he heeded not; | his eyes
Were with his heart, and that was far away;
He recked not of the life he lost, | nor prize, |
But where his rude hut by the Danube laý; !

There were his young barbarians all at play, |
There was their Dacian mother | he, their şire,
Butchered to make a Roman holiday. |

All this rushed with his blood. |

And unavenged?—Arise, | ye Goths,

Shall he expire, and glut your ire!

Byron.

"Childe Harold."

They never fail | who die

In a great cause: | the block may soak their gore ; |
Their heads may sodden in the sun; | their limbs
Be strung to city gates and castle walls |
But still their spirit walks abroad.

Though years

Elapse, and others share as dark a doom, |

They but augment | the deep and sweeping thoughts | Which overpower all others, and conduct

The world | at last | to freedom.

Byron.

Small service is true service,

while it lasts: |

Of friends, however humble, scorn not one ; |
The daisy by the shadow that it casts,

Protects

the lingering dew-drop from the sun. Wordsworth.

Yet think not that I come to urge thy crimes: |

I do not come to curse thee, Guinevere, |

I, whose vast pity al | most makes me die |
To see thee laying there | thy golden head, |

My pride in happier summers, ❘ at my feet. |

The wrath which forced my thoughts on that fierce law,
The doom of treason | and of flaming death, |
(When first I learnt thee hidden here) is past, |
The pang, which while I weighed thy heart with one
Too wholly true | to dream untruth in thee, ¦

Made my tears burn | is also past, | in part :
And all is past, the sin is sinned, ¦ and I, ¦
Lo! I forgive thee, | as Eternal God

Forgives do thou for thine own soul | the rest.

Tennyson. "Guinevere."

The third line is best scanned, perhaps, in this way

I whose väst | pĭtý āl | most mākes | mě die. |

L

RHYME.

HAVING considered the essentials of verse, and the chief variations and combinations thereof, we have now to enquire into the accidents which largely enter into its composition as ornaments to its melody. The chief of these is rhyme, or rime, as the word was formerly, and more correctly, spelled. Rhyme may be defined as a similarity of sound in the final syllable or syllables of two or more verses, or, as Milton speaks of it, as the "jingling sound of like endings." In words that rhyme there must be difference as well as similarity of sounds. Words that are identical in sound, however different their appearance may be, do not form rhyme in English poetry, though we occasionally find them there on account of the fewness of rhyming words in our tongue. instance, such words as I, eye; hie, high; oar, ore, o'er, are assonances, not rhymes. On the other hand, however unlike each other words may look, if their sounds be similar without being identical, they form perfectly good rhymes, of which the following are examples-girl, pearl, curl; box, locks; cow, bough, frau. In order to arrive at a clear conception of the elements which make up

For

a good rhyme we will take the three words nose, toes, rose. In each of these we have the same vowel sound, the cpen o, followed by the same sibillant consonant, but preceded by the different consonant sounds of n, t, r. Now, as these words rhyme correctly we can gather from this brief examination of their constituent parts what is essential to a perfect rhyme. This is

(i) Identity in the vowel sound.

(ii) Identity in the consonant sound that follows it, if any.

(iii) Difference in the consonant sounds that precede; and to these must be added similarity in accent; e.g. sing rhymes with ring, but not well with thinking.

When confined to one syllable, rhymes are called single, as: swing, bring; when embracing two, double, as: duty, beauty; when extended to three, triple, as: slenderly, tenderly. In double rhymes the last syllable is unaccented, and in triple the last two.

Rhymes may be classed as perfect, imperfect, and false or bad, each of which kinds requires detailed consideration.

1. PERFECT RHYMES.

Faultless rhymes are

(i) Such as have an exact agreement in sound in the vowel and the consonants, if any, that follow, e.g.: