the most difficult to write, and enters into our poetical literature to such a limited extent that its capacities can hardly be properly estimated. It is effective whenever a rapid movement is desirable, and has been used with success in humorous poetry.

§ 481. It was observed in the last lesson that lines may be combined into an infinite variety of stanzas, according to the poet's taste. To illustrate all of these with examples is impracticable; we can allude only to those that most frequently

occur.

The commonest stanza, perhaps, consists of four lines, of which either the first and third, and the second and fourth, rhyme together or, the first and second, and the third and fourth: as follows:

"The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea;
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.'

"-GRAY.

"The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee."-BYRON.

This stanza, when composed of iambic tetrameters, rhyming either consecutively or alternately, is known as Long Metre.

"O all ye people, clap your hands,

And with triumphant voices sing;

No force the mighty power withstands

Of God, the universal King."-PSALMS OF DAVID.

When the first and third lines are iambic tetrameters, and the second and fourth iambic trimeters, the rhyme being alternate or confined to the two last mentioned, this four-lined stanza becomes Cominon Metre

"Over the Alban mountains high

The light of morning broke;

From all the roofs of the Seven Hills

Curled the thin wreaths of smoke."-MACAULAY.

When all the lines of this stanza are iambic trimeters except the third,

481. Describe the commonest stanza met with in poetry. Give examples of it from Gray and Byron. Describe long metre; common metre; short metre. To what are these three metres peculiarly adapted, and for what are they therefore employed? In what other way may long and common metre be written? What is the regular ballad-measure of our language? How are stanzas of eight and twelve lines formed?

and that is tetrameter, the rhyme being the same as in the last case, we have Short Metre.

"The day is past and gone;

The evening shades appear;

Oh! may we all remember well

The night of death draws near."-HYMN-BOOK.

These three metres are peculiarly adapted to slow and solemn music, and hence are generally employed, in preference to others, in the composition of psalms and hymns. By a comparison of the two last examples but one, with numbers 7 and 8 of the iambic measures presented at the close of the preceding lesson, it will be seen that long metre is simply iambic octometer divided into two equal parts, while common metre is iambic heptameter divided after the first four feet. The latter is the regular ballad-measure of our language. Octometer and heptameter, on account of their length, are generally thus divided into two separate lines.

The four-lined stanza doubled and trebled makes effective and common stanzas of eight and twelve lines respectively.

Six-lined stanzas are often used. Some of these have their first and second lines rhyme, their third and sixth, and their fourth and fifth. In others, the first four lines rhyme as in the four-lined stanza, and the last two rhyme with each other; as, in the following :—

"Friend after friend departs;

Who has not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts,
That finds not here an end;

Were this frail world our final rest,

Living or dying, none were blest."-MONTGOMERY.

The most noted of all stanzas is the Spenserian, so called from the author of "The Faery Queen", by whom it was borrowed from Italian poetry. Though highly artificial, in the hands of a master it has a fine effect. Its difficulty has deterred most of our later poets from attempting it in pieces of any length; Thomson, however, in his "Castle of Indolence", Beattie in The Minstrel ", and Byron in "Childe Harold”, have used it with success. The following from Byron will serve as a specimen; it will be seen that it consists of nine lines, of which eight are iambic pentameter, while the last is a hexameter:

What are the different ways of rhyming in six-lined stanzas? Repeat a six-lined stanza from Montgomery. What is the most noted of all stanzas? Whence was it borrowed? What is said of its effect? What has deterred our later poets from attempting it? Who have used it with the best success? Of how many lines does it consist? What measure are they? Repeat one of Byron's Spenserian stanzas.

"To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,

To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,
Where things that own not man's dominion dwell,
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen,
With the wild flock, that never needs a fold;
Alone, o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean;-

This is not solitude; 'tis but to hold

Converse with nature's charms, and view her stores unrolled."

§ 482. The Sonnet, though not a stanza, inasmuch as it is a complete poem in itself, will next be considered; its distinguishing features having reference, not so much to the matter it contains, as to the form it assumes, and the peculiar manner in which its lines rhyme.

Everett, in his comprehensive and thorough "System of English Versification", thus describes the Sonnet. "The Sonnet, like the Spenserian stanza, was borrowed from the Italians. Petrarch is reckoned the father of it. It is still more difficult of construction than the Spenserian stanza; for, besides requiring a great number of rhymes, it demands a terseness of construction, and a point in the thought, which that does not. In the Sonnet, no line should be admitted merely for ornament, and the versification should be faultless. Sonnets, like Spenserian stanzas, are somewhat affected; and this is to be attributed to the age in which they were introduced, when far-fetched thoughts and ingenious ideas were more in vogue than simplicity and natural expression. The Sonnet is subject to more rigorous rules than any other species of verse. It is composed of exactly fourteen lines, so constructed that the first eight lines shall contain but two rhymes, and the last six but two more. The most approved arrangement is that in which the first line is made to rhyme with the fourth, the fifth, and the eighth,—the second rhyming with the third, the sixth, and the seventh." With respect to the last six lines, Hallam observes:-"By far the worst arrangement and also the least common in Italy is that we usually adopt, the fifth and sixth rhyming together, frequently after a full pause; so that the sonnet ends with the point of an epigram. The best form, as the Italians hold, is the rhyming together of the three uneven and the three even lines; but, as our language is less rich in consonant terminations,

§ 482. What is said of the sonnet? From whom was it borrowed? What renders It difficult of construction? To what is the artificial character of the sonnet to be attributed? What is said of the rules of the sonnet? Of how many lines is it com posed? In these fourteen lines, how many rhymes are there? As regards the rhyming of the first eight lines, what is the most approved arrangement? With respect to the last six lines, what does Hallam pronounce the worst arrangement? What, the best?

there can be no objection to what has abundant precedents even in theirs, the rhyming of the first and fourth, second and fifth, third and sixth lines." The following is an example of the best arrangement:—

AUTUMN.

"The blithe birds of the summer-tide are flown;

Cold, motionless, and mute, stands all the wood,
Save as the restless wind, in mournful mood,
Strays through the tossing limbs with saddest moan.
The leaves it wooed with kisses, overblown

By gusts, capricious, pitiless, and rude,
Lie dank and dead amid the solitude;
Where-through it waileth desolate and lone.
But with a clearer splendor sunlight streams
Athwart the bare, slim, branches; and on high
Each star, in Night's rich coronal that beams,
Pours down intenser brilliance on the eye;
Till dazzled Fancy finds her gorgeous dreams

Outshone in beauty by the autumn sky!"-PIKE

§ 483. Iambic tetrameter is a favorite measure, and may be used with advantage, not only in small fugitive pieces, but also, without any division into stanzas, throughout a long poem. It is thus employed by Byron in his Mazeppa, and Scott in his Lady of the Lake and Marmion. It is the easiest of all measures to write in; and this very facility is apt to betray a poet, unless he is on his guard, into commonplace expressions, and a careless habit which is fatal to the effect of his verses.

§ 484. Iambic pentameter constitutes what is called the Heroic Line. It is the most dignified of measures, and is peculiarly adapted to grave, solemn, or sublime, subjects. Heroic lines are frequently combined in the quatrain, or stanza of four lines rhyming alternately, as in the specimen from Gray's "Elegy in a Country Church-yard", quoted in § 481. They are also, as we have seen, used in the Spenserian stanza. But they appear most commonly in the form of

What other arrangement does he say has precedents in the Italian language, and is not objectionablo? Repeat a sonnet constructed according to the best arrangement. § 488. What is said of iambic tetrameter? In what long poems has it been employed? Why is it apt to betray a poet into a careless habit of expression?

§ 484. What name is given to iambic pentameter? measure? In what stanza does it frequently appear?

What is the character of this

What is its commonest form?

the couplet, and in poems which have no division into stanzas but are written continuously. They are thus employed by Pope in his "Essay on Criticism", his "Essay on Man ", and his translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey.

The pentameter couplet should have complete sense within itself, and is most effective when enlivened with an epigrammatic turn. "It is formed", says Webb, in his Beauties of Poetry", "to run into points: but above all it delights in the antithesis; and the art of the versifier is complete when the discordance in the ideas is proportioned to the accordance in the sounds. To jar and jingle in the same breath is a master-piece of Gothic refinement." The epigrammatic tendenc alluded to is illustrated in the opening lines of the "Essay on Criticism" which constitute a fair specimen of Pope's delicate skill in the manage ment of this his favorite metre:

"Tis hard to say if greater want of skill
Appear in writing, or in judging, ill;

But, of the two, less dangerous is the offa 'a
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
Some few in that, but numbers err in this;
Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss.
A fool might once himself alone expose;

Now one in verse makes many more in prose."

§ 485. The line of six iambi is called the Alexandrine, from a poem on Alexander the Great, in which it is said to have been first employed. It is a majestic line occasionally used as the third of a triplet, and at the close of Spenseriar and other stanzas, for the purpose of imparting additional weight or solemnity. Thus, from Dryden's Æneid :

"Their fury falls; he skims the liquid plains,

High on his chariot, and, with loosened reins,

Majestic moves along, and awful peace maintains."

The Alexandrine is peculiarly effective when the poet desires to express by the sound of his verse a slow or difficult motion. When the line is so constructed as to admit of a pause in the middle, or at the

Who has thus employed it? What is said of the sense of the couplet? To be most effective, with what should it be enlivened? What does Webb say respecting it? Quote a passage from Pope illustrating this epigrammatic turn.

§ 485. Of what is the Alexandrine composed? Whence is its name derived? Where is it used and for what purpose? Scan the lines quoted from Dryden in illustration. In what case is the Alexandrine peculiarly effective? Where should it admit of a pause? How should it be used?