IN the last chapter we dealt with the classification of English metres, of which we found that there were four principal types in this chapter I propose to consider variations of type, i.e. the various ways in which the strict law of metre admits of relaxation; and I shall do this with special reference to that which is by far the most important of all English metres, the five-foot iambic, or heroic metre.

The strict law of the metre is seen most clearly in such a line as Milton's

And swims or sinks or wades | or creeps | or flies

(Paradise Lost, II. 950)

where the feet are all regular iambs, where the close of the foot coincides with the close of a word, and where the flow of the rhythm is not obscured or interrupted by a stop. It is this law or type, which is felt by the poet to be the permanent factor in all the varying developments of which the line is capable; law and impulse thus

combining to produce in the reader the pleasurable sense of an ordered freedom in the rhythmical movement. As Dr Johnson says in his life of Dryden, 'the essence of verse is regularity, and its ornament is variety.' Contrast with Milton's line this from Tennyson

With rosy slender fingers backward drew

where the only place in which the close of the foot coincides with the end of the word is the last foot, the line being, as it might seem, made up of four trochees interposed between two monosyllables; yet the feet are perfectly regular, except that they are obscured by the natural pauses in reading. A still more marked effect is produced when the pause is long enough to be denoted by a stop, other than that at the end of the line. The commonest of these internal stops is that which divides the line into two, more or less equal, parts, coming after the 4th, 5th, or 6th syllable, i.e. at the end of the 2nd or 3rd or in the middle of the 3rd foot. A stop at the end of the foot interrupts the flow of the rhythm, but does not clash with it. Take the following as examples: Just hint a fault, and hesitate | dislike.

Thy_trag|ic_muse | gives smiles, | thy comic, sleep.
No wit to flatter, left of all his store;

No fool to laugh | at, which he valued more. POPE.

Less frequent in Pope, but not much less so in Tennyson, are the stops in the middle of the 2nd or the 4th foot. The last line of the latter's Lucretius gives an example of both :

Thy duty? What is duty? Fare thee well.
So Milton:

What in me is dark

Illu mine, what | is low | raise and support.

We come then to the stops after the 1st and 4th foot, and those in the middle of the 1st and 5th. Examples of these are

Say first, of God | above or man | below,

What can we reason, but | from what we know? POPE.

In Silon also not unsung, where stood

Her temple on | th' offensive mountain, built

By that | uxorious king, whose heart, | though large,
Beguiled by fair | idolatress es fell. MILTON.

Loud, as from numbers with out number, sweet,
As from blest voices uttering joy. MILTON.

The most essential pause in the line is that at the end, which prevents one verse from running over into another, and so keeps the metre intact; but this is often omitted for the sake of variety, or to give the impression of ease and negligence, as in dramatic poetry, or for other reasons which will appear later on. Examples will be found in Paradise Lost 11. 347 foll.:

The happy seat

Of some new race, called Man, about this time
To be created like to us, though less

In power and excellence, but favoured more
Of Him who rules above.

This unstopped line is much more frequent in Shakespeare's later plays than in the earlier ones. Compare I know not but I am sure 'tis safer to1

-Avoid what's grown, than question how 'tis born.

Be pilot to me, and thy places shall

~Still neighbour mine: my ships are ready, and
~My people did expect my hence departure.

Winter's Tale.

1 This is an example of the 'weak ending,' which may be conveniently marked by the sign at the beginning of the following line.

Another important variation of the strict line is caused by modification of the stress, either by means of inversion, changing the iamb into a trochee; or by loss of stress, giving an unaccented foot, which may be conveniently denoted by the classical term 'pyrrhic,' properly used of a foot containing two short syllables; or by addition of stress, giving a doubly accented foot, for which we may borrow the classical term 'spondee,' properly used of a foot containing two long syllables.

Inversion of stress is found most frequently in the first foot, as

Why did I write? | What sin, | to me | unknown,

Dipped me in ink? | My parents' or | my own? POPE.

But also in the 2nd foot, as in Hamlet1

There are more things | in heaven | and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of | in your | philosophy.

Among daughters | of men | the fairest found.

2 0

MILTON P. R. II. 154.

This sequence (iamb followed by trochee in the 2nd place) is not uncommon in Milton and some later writers. Compare

Of man's first disobedience and | the fruit. P. L. I. I.

A mind not to be changed | by place or time. P. L. 1. 253.

The full blaze of thy beams, and through | a cloud.

I

2

о

P. L. III. 378.

P. L. III. 59.

His own works and their works at once to view.

With fierce gusts and | precipitative force. SHelley.

1 The figures below the line indicate the degree of stress which

I should myself give in reading the line.

The trochee is also found in the other feet, as again in Hamlet:

Nay, answer me: | stand and unfold | yourself.

2

The rivals of my watch: | bid them | make haste.

Such inversion is rarest in the last foot, as

Our fears do make | us traitors. You | know not.

I break | upon | your rest, | I must | speak with
Count Cenci.

I

SHELLEY.

TENNYSON.

With whom | Alcme na played, but nought | witting.

I O

W. MORRIS.

See further examples from Surrey in my Chapters on

Metre, p. 159.

Milton is perhaps at times too daring in his use of trochaic inversion, as in the line

Burnt after them to the bottomless pit. P. L. VI. 866.

He has also followed the Italian fashion' of the double trochee with no great success, in such lines as

Shoots in visible virtue e'en | to the deep. P. L. 111. 587.

In the | visions | of God. | It was | a hill. P. L. XI. 377.

I O

2 O

Universal reproach | far worse to bear.

IO 2 O

P. L. VI. 34.

On the other hand, Spenser has one magnificent example in the Alexandrine:

As the God of | my life. | Why hath | he me | abhorred?

1 See R. W. Evans, Versification, p. 84, quoted in my Chapters

on Metre, p. 76.

2 To read this line properly it is necessary to dwell on the Ist syllable and to place a double stress on the 3rd.