ON THE STRUCTURE

OF ENGLISH VERSE

I

FEET

The student of English poetry, in order to acquire a correct knowledge of its system of versification, must be careful not to confound accent with quantity. Terms usea in Greek and Latin prosody to denote combinations of long and short syllables are also applied to English verse, but with a different meaning, since they are made to express combinations of accented and unaccented syllables, the rhythm of English verse depending entirely on accent, not on quantity.

If the reader attentively examines the following sentence:

My father, he was a wealthy lórd, lived beside the Týne,

in which the accented syllables are marked, he will perceive that there is no regular return in it of accented and unaccented syllables: the order in which the words

are placed constitutes prose, not verse.

them thus:

My father lived beside the Týne,
A wealthy lord was hé,

But if we place

GOLDSMITH.

it will be seen that every unaccented syllable is followed by an accented one. This is verse. By the regular alternation of syllables with and without accent a harmony is produced which is pleasing to the ear and adds a charm to the expression.

In the above verses the accented syllable follows the unaccented one, so that the accents fall on the even syllables. The order may be reversed, and the accented syllable may precede the other, thus :

All the meadows wáve with blossoms.

LONGFELLOW.

Another mode of constructing verses consists in arranging the words so that each accented syllable is preceded by two unaccented ones, thus:

At the close of the day when the hámlet is still.

BEATTIE.

A fourth variety may be produced by reversing this order, by placing the accented syllable before the two unaccented ones, thus :

Bird of the wilderness,

Blithesome and cúmberless.

HOGG.

Now if we examine the four different kinds of verse examples of which are given above, we shall find that in

each there is a continuous repetition of two or of three syllables arranged in a certain order. In the first two verses, when an unaccented syllable has been followed by an accented one, there is a repetition of the same order, and another unaccented syllable is followed by another accented one; and in the second example quoted, when an accented syllable has been followed by an unaccented one, the same arrangement is repeated; and in the third and fourth examples, when two unaccented syllables have been followed by an accented syllable, or when an accented syllable has been followed by two unaccented ones, the same arrangement is repeated. Each verse is therefore arranged in one or more groups of syllables, which groups all resemble each other. The verses in the first two examples are composed of groups of two syllables, and those of the two following examples of groups of three syllables.

These groups of syllables are called feet by their measured pace the verse moves on, as it were, step by step, to the end, as our feet carry us, step by step, from one point to another.

These feet have received distinctive names borrowed from the prosody of the Greek and Latin languages.

The foot composed of an unaccented syllable followed by an accented one, as: retúrn, is called an iambus; and a verse composed of this foot repeated a certain number of times is called an iambic verse.

The foot consisting of an accented syllable followed by an unaccented one, as wonder, is called a trochee; and a verse formed by a repetition of this foot a certain number of times is called a trochaic verse.

The foot composed of two accented syllables is called a spondee.

The foot composed of two unaccented syllables is called a pyrrhic.

In the verse,

Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes,

MILTON.

there is a spondee, sóul sit, and a pyrrhic, ting in. Spondees and pyrrhics are mixed with other feet in English verse; but there are no verses composed entirely of spondees or of pyrrhics, because an uninterrupted succession either of accented or of unaccented syllables is an impossibility.

The foot composed of two unaccented syllables followed by an accented one, as persevére, is called an anapæst; and a verse formed of a certain number of such feet is called an anapæstic verse.

The foot composed of an accented syllable followed by two unaccented ones, as thunderer, is called a dactyl, and a verse formed of one or more dactyls is called a dactylic verse.

The foot formed of an accented syllable between two unaccented ones, as deliver, is called an amphibrach.

The foot composed of an unaccented syllable between two accented ones, as óver hill, is called an amphi·

macer.

The foot composed of an unaccented syllable followed by two accented ones, as the gréen earth, is called a bacchius.

The foot composed of two accented syllables followed by an unaccented one, as rough winter, is called an antibacchius.

The foot composed of three unaccented syllables, as the syllables ferance and in the verse :

This, my long sufferance, and my day of gráce,

is called a tribrach.

MILTON.

It is superfluous to remark that verses composed of tribrachs are as impossible as verses composed of pyrrhics.

Though verses composed of amphibrachs, or amphimacers, or bacchiuses, or antibacchiuses, are not an absolute impossibility, it is very doubtful whether any such exist in English poetry.

To the feet already enumerated may be added four others, each composed of four syllables, called pæons. The first has been named pæon a majori. Lord Kames, in his 'Elements of criticism,' calls it pæon 1st. It is formed of one accented syllable followed by three unac cented ones, as dilatory. Pæon 2nd, as Lord Kames calls it, has an accent on the second syllable only, as : solémnity, extrávagant. Pæon 3rd has the third syllable accented, as independent, condescending. Pæon 4th, or pæon a minori, has the last syllable accented, as : in his remorse.

To these may be added another foot of four syllables, called antispastus, composed of two accented syllables between two unaccented ones, as a good sailor.

These feet are of very rare occurrence in English verse, with the exception of the third and fifth, which sometimes terminate anapæstic verses.

If we turn over the pages of any number of English poets and examine the structure of their verse, we shall find that iambic verses abound; that they are far more numerous than the other kinds; that very few long poems are written in other than iambic verses. Trochaic and anapæstic verses are very frequently used for short poems,