In this last, the second, fourth, and sixth feet are trochees, and the rest are dactyls. The line is mixed trochaic and dactylic hexameter. Whene'er | is spoken a no | ble thought (third foot, anapest; the rest, iambic) Frequently a line is incomplete, an unaccented syllabie (most often at the end) being missing, its place being supplied by a pause. In the market | place of | Bruges | stands the | bélfry | old and brown. This line is trochaic octameter, the last foot incomplete. Pauses occur naturally in verse as in prose; the chief pause (if there is one) occurring in the body of a line is called the cæsura. It may divide a foot, and does not usually come at the same place in successive lines. In the following examples we use double vertical lines to mark the cæsura: Build me | straight, || Ŏ| worthy | Master! (dividing a foot) Ŏ lýr | ic Love! || half-an | gel and | half-bírd (not dividing a foot) The number of syllables and the length of time required to pronounce the separate syllables affect the rhythm of a line, in a marked degree. Long syllables predominating produce the effect of slowness; short syllables, the effect of hurry and liveliness. Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone on a wide, wide sea! I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he; I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three. Rhyme is correspondence of sound. It is most readily seen at the end of lines, but occurs also within the lines. It is assonantal when the vowels alone correspond, in the rhyming syllables. It is consonantal when the final consonants also correspond. In the following, thou and now are assonantal; last and past are consonantal also. Yet did I love thee to the last As fervently as thou, Who didst not change through all the past, And canst not alter now. Rhyme is seen within the first and third lines of the following: I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers From the seas and the streams; I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noonday dreams. Alliteration, a kind of rhyme, is the recurrence, at short intervals, of the same initial consonant. And thistles, and nettles, and darnels rank, And the dock, and the henbane; and hemlock dank. Blank verse is verse without rhyme. In its perfect form it is a continuous metre of iambic pentameter lines. It is the most elevated and dignified measure, and is used for the high themes of epic and drama. Read Portia's "The quality of mercy is not strained," etc. A stanza is part of a poem consisting of a group of lines arranged according to a definite plan. Stanzas of the same poem are usually constructed alike. Two consecutive rhyming lines constitute a couplet ; a couplet is not usually referred to as a stanza. Three consecutive lines (usually, but not always, rhyming together) constitute a Triplet or Tercet. A stanza of four lines rhyming alternately or otherwise is called a Quatrain. A quatrain of four iambic pentameters with alternate rhyme is called Elegiac Stanza. See Gray's Elegy. A quatrain of four iambic tetrameters is called Long Metre. Awake, my soul, and with the sun A quatrain of four iambic trimeters with an additional foot in the third line is called Short Metre. The world can never give The bliss for which we sigh: 'Tis not the whole of life to live, Nor all of death to die. A quatrain of four iambic tetrameters alternating with three is called Common Metre or Ballad Metre (because a favorite in ballads). When all Thy mercies, O my God, Transported with the view, I'm lost In wonder, love, and praise. Long, short, and common metre are the favorite hymnstanzas. Five-line stanzas (Shelley's To a Skylark) and six-line stanzas (Longfellow's The Village Blacksmith) are also used. The seven-line stanza of iambic pentameter is called Chaucerian stanza (because used by Chaucer), or Rhyme Royal (because adopted by King James I of Scotland). In this the first four lines are an alternately rhyming quatrain; the fifth line rhymes with the fourth, and the last two lines form a couplet. Ottava Rima is an eight-line stanza of iambic pentameter, the first six lines rhyming alternately, the last two lines forming a couplet (Byron's Don Juan). The Spenserian stanza, invented by the author of the Faery Queene, consists of nine lines, the first eight being iambic pentameters, and the ninth an Alexandrine (iambic hexameter); the first and third lines rhyming together; also the second, fourth, fifth, and seventh; also the sixth, eighth, and ninth. Burns used this stanza in the Cotter's Saturday Night. A canto consists of a number of stanzas which together make up a natural division of a long poem. Scott's Lady of the Lake has six cantos. The Sonnet is a lyric of fourteen iambic pentameter lines arranged according to a prescribed order of rhyme, and usually restricted to the expression of a single sentiment. Mr. R. W. Gilder shows the strict order of rhymes in the following; the column of letters to the right indicating the scheme of end-rhymes : — What is a sonnet? 'Tis a pearly shell What is a sonnet? 'Tis the tear that fell α b b α ' b b a d This was the flame that shook with Dante's breath, c shadow falls: A sea this is - beware who ventureth! For like a fiord the narrow floor is laid Deep as mid-ocean to sheer mountain walls. e C d e Sonnet writers do not hold uniformly to this scheme of rhyme-order. Wyatt, Surrey, Shakespeare, Milton, and other sonneteers since their time, show a variety in the number and order of rhymes. A. Name the poem you like best. In what metre is it written? Scan the first four lines. B. Open at random a volume of Longfellow's poems. Scan the first stanza of four successive poems. Name the metres. C. What was Poe's favorite metre? Bryant's? Thackeray's? Emerson's? Pope's? D. How many different kinds of metre can you find in the poems in this book? |