PART TWO

'Tis pity learned virgins ever wed,With persons of no sort of education,Or gentlemen, who, though well born and bred,Grow tired of scientific conversation;I don't choose to say much upon this head,I'm a plain man, and in a single station,But—oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual,Inform us truly, have they not hen-pecked you all?

(Ib., canto i. st. xxii.)

So the painter PacchiarottoConstructed himself a grottoIn the quarter of Stalloreggi—As authors of note allege ye.And on each of the whitewashed sides of itHe painted—(none far and wide so fitAs he to perform in fresco)—He painted nor criedquiescoTill he peopled its every square footWith Man—from the Beggar barefootTo the Noble in cap and feather;All sorts and conditions together.The Soldier in breastplate and helmetStood frowningly—hail fellow well met—By the Priest armed with bell, book, and candle.Nor did he omit to handleThe Fair Sex, our brave distemperer:Not merely King, Clown, Pope, Emperor—He diversified too his HadesOf all forms, pinched Labor and paid Ease,With as mixed an assemblage of Ladies.

(Browning:Pacchiarotto, v.)

What's a man's age? He must hurry more, that's all;Cram in a day, what his youth took a year to hold:When we mind labor, then only, we're too old—What age had Methusalem when he begat Saul?And at last, as its haven some buffeted ship sees(Come all the way from the north-parts with sperm oil),I hope to getsafelyout of the turmoilAnd arrive one day at the land of the Gypsies,And find my lady, or hear the last news of herFrom some old thief and son of Lucifer,His forehead chapleted green with wreathy hop,Sunburned all over like an Æthiop.

(Browning:The Flight of the Duchess, xvii.)

These passages illustrate sufficiently the grotesque effects of double and triple rime in English verse,—effects of which Byron and Browning are the unquestioned masters. Professor Corson observes that the double rime is to be regarded as the means of "some special emphasis," whether serious or humorous. More commonly the effect is humorous, of course, as inDon Juan, where the rimes indicate "the lowering of the poetic key—the reduction of true poetic seriousness." The rimes in theFlight of the DuchessMr. Edmund Gurney has said sometimes "produce the effect of jokes made during the performance of a symphony." The specimen which follows illustrates the use of these double and triple rimes for a wholly serious purpose. Professor Corson remarks that in this case the rime serves "as a most effective foil to the melancholy theme. It is not unlike the laughter of frenzied grief." It is interesting to note that in the Italian language, where double rimes are almost constant, masculine rimes are sometimes used for grotesque effect in the same way that English poets use the feminine.

Perishing gloomily,Spurred by contumely,Cold inhumanity,Burning insanity,Into her rest.—Cross her hands humbly,As if praying dumbly,Over her breast.Owning her weakness,Her evil behaviour,And leaving, with meekness,Her sins to her Saviour!

(Thomas Hood:The Bridge of Sighs.)

Roll the strong stream of itUp, till the scream of itWake from a dream of itChildren that sleep,Seamen that fare for themForth, with a prayer for them;Shall not God care for them,Angels not keep?Spare not the surgesThy stormy scourges;Spare us the dirgesOf wives that weep.Turn back the waves for us:Dig no fresh graves for us,Wind, in the manifold gulfs of the deep.

(Swinburne:Winter in Northumberland, xiv.)

Into the woods my Master went,Clean forspent, forspent.Into the woods my Master came,Forspent with love and shame.But the olives they were not blind to Him,The little gray leaves were kind to Him:The thorn-tree had a mind to HimWhen into the woods he came.

(Sidney Lanier:A Ballad of Trees and the Master.)

There first for thee my passion grew,Sweet, sweet Matilda Pottingen!Thou wast the daughter of my tu-tor, law-professor at the U-niversity of Gottingen.Sun, moon, and thou, vain world, adieu!That kings and priests are plotting in;Here doomed to starve on water gru-el, never shall I see the U-niversity of Gottingen.

There first for thee my passion grew,Sweet, sweet Matilda Pottingen!Thou wast the daughter of my tu-tor, law-professor at the U-niversity of Gottingen.

Sun, moon, and thou, vain world, adieu!That kings and priests are plotting in;Here doomed to starve on water gru-el, never shall I see the U-niversity of Gottingen.

(George Canning: Song inThe Rovers; Anti-Jacobin, June 4, 1798.[13])

Winter and summer, night and morn,I languish at this table dark;My office-window has a corn-er looks into St. James's Park.

(Thackeray: Ballads,What Makes my Heart to Thrill and Glow?)

Internal rime may be regarded on the one side as only a matter of the division of the verse, since if it occurs regularly at the medial cesura, it practically breaks the verse into two parts. On the other side, if used only sporadically, it is a matter of tone-color. It sometimes appears, however, in forms which entitle it to recognition by itself. The earliest of these forms is the "Leonine rime," which is said to have taken its name from Leoninus of St. Victor, who in the twelfth century wrote elegiacs (hexameters and pentameters) in which the syllable preceding the cesura regularly rimed with the final syllable. Obviously lines of this kind would easily break up into riming half-lines. Similarly, in septenary verse internal rime was often used together with end-rime, with a resulting resolution into short-line stanzas riming eitheraabborabab.[14]The following specimen from a celebrated ballad shows the popular use of a somewhat complex system of internal rime.

Be it right or wrong, these men among on women do complaine,Affirming this, how that it is a labour spent in vaine,To love them wele, for never a dele they love a man agayne.For lete a man do what he can, ther favour to attayne,Yet yf a newe to them pursue, ther furst trew lover thanLaboureth for nought, and from her thought he is a bannisshed man.

(Ye Nutbrowne Maide.From Arnold's Chronicle, printed ab. 1502. In Flügel'sNeuenglisches Lesebuch, vol. i. p. 167.)

Haill rois maist chois till clois thy fois greit micht,Haill stone quhilk schone upon the throne of licht,Vertew, quhais trew sweit dew ouirthrew al vice,Was ay ilk day gar say the way of licht;Amend, offend, and send our end ay richt.Thow stant, ordant as sanct, of grant maist wise,Till be supplie, and the hie gre of price.Delite the tite me quite of site to dicht,For I apply schortlie to thy devise.

(Gawain Douglas:A ballade in the commendation of honour and verteu; at the end of thePalace of Honor.)

Douglas, like his countryman Dunbar, was something of a metrical virtuoso, and his use of internal rime in this ballade is one of his most remarkable achievements. In the first stanza there are two internal rimes in each line, in the second three, and in the third (here quoted) four.

I cannot eat but little meat,My stomach is not good,But sure I think that I can drinkWith him that wears a hood.Though I go bare, take ye no care,I nothing am a-cold,I stuff my skin so full withinOf jolly good ale and old.

(Drinking Song inGammer Gurton's Needle.)

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,The furrow stream'd off free;We were the first that ever burstInto that silent sea.

(Coleridge:Rime of the Ancient Mariner.)

The splendor falls on castle walls,And snowy summits old in story;The long light shakes across the lakes,And the wild cataract leaps in glory.

(Tennyson: Song inThe Princess, iv.)

England, queen of the waves whose green inviolate girdle enrings thee round,Mother fair as the morning, where is now the place of thy foemen found?Still the sea that salutes us free proclaims them stricken, acclaims thee crowned ....England, none that is born thy son, and lives, by grace of thy glory, free,Lives and yearns not at heart and burns with hope to serve as he worships thee;None may sing thee: the sea-wind's wing beats down our songs as it hails the sea.

(Swinburne:The Armada, vii.)

Here the third and eighth syllables of each verse rime, giving the effect of a separate melody only half heard under that of the main rime-scheme. This is especially subtle where there is no possible pause after the riming word, as in the "sing" of the last line quoted.

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!Let the bell toll!—a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river;And, Guy de Vere, hast thou no tear?—weep now or nevermore!See on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!Come, let the burial rite be read—the funeral song be sung:An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young,A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.

(Poe:Lenore.)

I did not take her by the hand,(Though little was to understandFrom touch of hand all friends might take,)Because it should not prove a flakeBurnt in my palm to boil and ache.I did not listen to her voice,(Though none had noted, where at choiceAll might rejoice in listening,)Because no such a thing should clingIn the wood's moan at evening.

I did not take her by the hand,(Though little was to understandFrom touch of hand all friends might take,)Because it should not prove a flakeBurnt in my palm to boil and ache.

I did not listen to her voice,(Though none had noted, where at choiceAll might rejoice in listening,)Because no such a thing should clingIn the wood's moan at evening.

(Rossetti:Penumbra.)

(See alsoLove's Nocturn, p.146, below.)

This division includes the use made of the qualities of sound for the purpose of adding to the melodiousness of verse, or of expressing in some measure the ideas to be conveyed by means of the very sounds employed. Sometimes this takes the form of alliteration, differing from that of early English verse only in that it follows no regular structural laws. On the other hand, it may take the form ofonomatopœia, the figure of speech in which sound and sense are closely related,—as in descriptive words likebuzz,hiss,murmur,splash, and the like. The term Tone-color is formed by analogy with the GermanKlangfarbe, an expression apparently due to the feeling that the sound-qualities of speech have somewhat the same function as the various colors in a picture. It is unquestionably true that the selection of sounds, whether vowel or consonantal, has much to do with the melodious effect of very much poetry. The poet may choose the different sound-qualities (so far as the sense permits) just as the musician may choose the varying qualities of the different instruments in the orchestra or the different stops in the organ.

Strictly speaking, this matter of Tone-color is not a part of verse-form in the same sense as matters of rhythm, rime, and the like; for it may appear in prose as well as in verse, and is not in any case reducible to formal principles or laws. Yet its use in actual verse is so important, and it is so closely related to the use of sound-quality in the form of rime and alliteration, that it seems well to include it here.[15]

Dr. Guest treats sounds as having in themselves the suggestion of more or less definite ideas, this suggestiveness being explainable by physical causes. Thus the trembling character oflsuggests trepidation, as in "Double, double, toil and trouble."Rsuggests harsh, grating, or rattling noises; the sibilants are appropriate to the expression of shrieks, screams, and the like;bandp, because of the compression of the lips, suggest muscular effort;st, from a sudden stopping of thes, suggests fear or surprise;fandhalso fear, because of their whispering quality. Hollow sounds (au,ow,o, and the like) suggest depth and fulness. Guest quotes in this connection an interesting passage from Bacon'sNatural History(ii. 200): "There is found a similitude between the sound that is made by inanimate bodies, or by animate bodies that have no voice articulate, and divers letters of articulate voices; and commonly men have given such names to those sounds as do allude unto the articulate letters; as trembling of hot water hath resemblance unto the letterl; quenching of hot metals with the letterz; snarling of dogs with the letterr; the noise of screech-owls with the lettersh; voice of cats with the diphthongeu; voice of cuckoos with the diphthongou; sounds of strings with the diphthongng.

A. W. Schlegel went even farther in suggesting a subtle symbolism in sounds apart from descriptive qualities. Thus he regardedaas suggestive of bright red, and as symbolizing youth, joy, or brightness (as in the wordsStrahl,Klang,Glans);ias suggestive of sky-blue, symbolic of intimacy or love; and so with other vowel sounds. (See Ehrenfeld's monograph, p. 57.) In general it may be said that it is dangerous to attempt to explain the special effects of tone-color in verse, except where it is obviously descriptive, the appreciation of such effects being a subtle and a more or less individual matter. On this subject Mr. Gurney makes some interesting observations, in the essays cited above. He believes that the pleasurable effect of the sound-qualities in verse can never be dissociated from the sense of the words; that the most melodious verse cannot be appreciated if in a foreign language, unless read with particular expressiveness; and that the pleasure derived from what we roughly call melodious or harmonious verses is always due to the mystical combination of the appropriate sound with the poetic content.

Dr. Johnson ridiculed the idea of tone-color, as appearing in Pope's teaching that the sound should be "an echo to the sense." See hisLife of Pope, and especially theIdlerfor June 9, 1759, in which he describes Minim the critic as reading "all our poets with particular attention to this delicacy of versification." Such a critic discovers wonders in these lines fromHudibras:

"Honor is like the glossy bubble,Which cost philosophers such trouble;Where, one part crack'd, the whole does fly,And wits are crack'd to find out why."

"In these verses, says Minim, we have two striking accommodations of the sound to the sense. It is impossible to utter the first two lines emphatically without an act like that which they describe;bubbleandtroublecausing a momentary inflation of the cheeks by the retention of the breath, which is afterwards forcibly emitted, as in the practice ofblowing bubbles. But the greatest excellence is in the third line, which iscrack'din the middle to express a crack, and then shivers into monosyllables."

In an article on "Some Technical Elements of Style in Literature" (originally published in theContemporary Review, April, 1885;reprinted in the Scribner edition of Stevenson's Works, vol. xxii. p. 243) Robert Louis Stevenson discussed some of the more subtle effects of vowel and consonant color, as appearing in both prose and verse. The combination and repetition of the consonants PVF he found to be particularly frequent. The pervading sound-elements in the two following passages he analyzed by means of the key-letters in the margin:

(KANDL)"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan(KDLSR)A stately pleasure-dome decree,(KANDLSR)Where Alph the sacred river ran(KANLSR)Through caverns measureless to man,(NDLS)Down to a sunless sea."

(Coleridge.)

W.P.V.F. (st) (ow)"But in the wind and tempest of her frown,W.P.F. (st) (ow) L.Distinction with a loud and powerful fan,W.P.F.L.Puffing at all, winnows the light away;W.F.L.M.A.And what hath mass and matter by itselfV.L.M.Lies rich in virtue and unmingled."

(Shakspere:Troilus and Cressida.)

No attempt has been made to classify the specimens that follow. Nor does comment seem necessary, in order to make clear the particular qualities of the sounds of the verse.

The heraudes lefte hir priking up and doun;Now ringen trompes loude and clarioun;There is namore to seyn, but west and estIn goon the speres ful sadly in arest;In goth the sharpe spore in-to the syde.Ther seen men who can juste, and who can ryde;Ther shiveren shaftes up-on sheeldes thikke;He feeleth thurgh the herte-spoon the prikke.Up springen speres twenty foot on highte;Out goon the swerdes as the silver brighte.The helmes they to-hewen and to-shrede;Out brest the blood, with sterne stremes rede.With mighty maces the bones they to-breste.He thurgh the thikkeste of the throng gan threste.Ther stomblen stedes stronge, and doun goth al.

(Chaucer:Knight's Tale, ll. 1741-1755.)

And in his house heap pearls like pebble-stones,Receive them free, and sell them by the weight;Bags of fiery opals, sapphires, amethysts,Jacinths, hard topaz, grass-green emeralds,Beauteous rubies, sparkling diamonds,And seld-seen costly stones of so great price,As one of them indifferently rated,And of a carat of this quantity,May serve in peril of calamity.

(Marlowe:The Jew of Malta, I. i.)

Be kind and courteous to this gentleman;Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,With purple grapes, green figs and mulberries;The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs,And light them at the fiery glow-worm's eyes,To have my love to bed and to arise;And pluck the wings from painted butterflies,To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.

(Shakspere:Midsummer Night's Dream, III. i. 167-177.)

Now entertain conjecture of a timeWhen creeping murmur and the poring darkFills the wide vessel of the universe.From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night,The hum of either army stilly sounds,That the fix'd sentinels almost receiveThe secret whispers of each other's watch:Fire answers fire; and through their paly flamesEach battle sees the other's umber'd face:Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighsPiercing the night's dull ear; and from the tentsThe armourers, accomplishing the knights,With busy hammers closing rivets up,Give dreadful note of preparation.The country cocks do crow, the clocks do toll,And the third hour of drowsy morning name.

(Shakspere:Henry V., Chorus to Act IV.)

Forthwith the sounds and seas, each creek and bay,With fry innumerable swarm, and shoalsOf fish that, with their fins and shining scales,Glide under the green wave in sculls that oftBank the mid-sea. Part, single or with mate,Graze the sea-weed, their pasture, and through grovesOf coral stray, or, sporting with quick glance,Show to the sun their wav'd coats dropt with gold,Or, in their pearly shells at ease, attendMoist nutriment, or under rocks their foodIn jointed armor watch; on smooth the sealAnd bended dolphins play: part, huge of bulk,Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait,Tempest the ocean. There leviathan,Hugest of living creatures, on the deepStretch'd like a promontory, sleeps or swims,And seems a moving land, and at his gillsDraws in, and at his trunk spouts out, a sea.

(Milton:Paradise Lost, VII. 399-416.)

Then in the key-hole turnsThe intricate wards, and every bolt and barOf massy iron or solid rock with easeUnfastens. On a sudden open fly,With impetuous recoil and jarring sound,The infernal doors, and on their hinges grateHarsh thunder, that the lowest bottom shookOf Erebus.

(Ib., II. 876-883.)

Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bonesLie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold;Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old,When all our fathers worshipped stocks and stones,Forget not: in thy book record their groansWho were thy sheep, and in their ancient foldSlain by the bloody Piemontese, that rolledMother with infant down the rocks. Their moansThe vales redoubled to the hills, and theyTo heaven. Their martyred blood and ashes sowO'er all the Italian fields, where still doth swayThe triple Tyrant; that from these may growA hundredfold, who, having learnt thy way,Early may fly the Babylonian woe.

(Milton:Sonnet on the Late Massacre in Piedmont.)

And when they list, their lean and flashy songsGrate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread;Besides what the grim wolf with privy pawDaily devours apace, and nothing said.

(Milton:Lycidas, ll. 123-129.)

The soft complaining fluteIn dying notes discoversThe woes of helpless lovers,Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute.Sharp violins proclaimTheir jealous pangs and desperation,Fury, frantic indignation,Depth of pains and height of passion,For the fair, disdainful dame.

(Dryden:Song for St. Cecilia's Day, 1687.)

Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar:When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,The line too labors, and the words move slow;Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.

(Pope:Essay on Criticism, ll. 366-373.)

Was nought around but images of rest:Sleep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns between;And flowery beds that slumberous influence kest,From poppies breath'd: and beds of pleasant green,Where never yet was creeping creature seen.Meantime unnumber'd glittering streamlets played,And hurled everywhere their waters' sheen;That, as they bickered through the sunny shade,Though restless still themselves, a lulling murmur made.

(Thomson:Castle of Indolence, canto i. st. 3.)

Yes, I will be thy priest, and build a faneIn some untrodden region of my mind,Where branched thoughts, new grown with pleasant pain,Instead of pines shall murmur in the wind:Far, far around shall those dark-cluster'd treesFledge the wild-ridged mountains steep by steep;And there by zephyrs, streams, and birds, and bees,The moss-lain Dryads shall be lull'd to sleep;And in the midst of this wide quietnessA rosy sanctuary will I dressWith the wreath'd trellis of a working brain,With buds, and bells, and stars without a name,With all the gardener Fancy e'er could feign,Who breeding flowers will never breed the same.

(Keats:Ode to Psyche.)

Strike for the King and die! and if thou diest,The King is King, and ever wills the highest.Clang battleaxe, and clash brand! Let the King reign.

(Tennyson:The Coming of Arthur.)

He could not see the kindly human face,Nor ever hear a kindly voice, but heardThe myriad shriek of wheeling ocean-fowl,The league-long roller thundering on the reef,The moving whisper of huge trees that branch'dAnd blossom'd in the zenith, or the sweepOf some precipitous rivulet to the wave,As down the shore he ranged, or all day longSat often in the seaward-gazing gorge,A shipwreck'd sailor, waiting for a sail:No sail from day to day, but every dayThe sunrise broken into scarlet shaftsAmong the palms and ferns and precipices;The blaze upon the waters to the east;The blaze upon his island overhead;The blaze upon the waters to the west;Then the great stars that globed themselves in heaven,The hollower-bellowing ocean, and againThe scarlet shafts of sunrise—but no sail.

(Tennyson:Enoch Arden, ll. 577-595.)

But follow; let the torrent dance thee downTo find him in the valley; let the wildLean-headed eagles yelp alone, and leaveThe monstrous ledges there to slope, and spillTheir thousand wreaths of dangling water-smoke,That like a broken purpose waste in air:So waste not thou; but come; for all the valesAwait thee; azure pillars of the hearthArise to thee; the children call, and IThy shepherd pipe, and sweet is every sound,Sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet;Myriads of rivulets hurrying through the lawn,The moan of doves in immemorial elms,And murmurings of innumerable bees.

(Tennyson:The Princess, VII.)

Heap cassia, sandal-buds and stripesOf labdanum, and aloe-balls,Smeared with dull nard an Indian wipesFrom out her hair: such balsam fallsDown sea-side mountain pedestals,From tree-tops where tired winds are fain,Spent with the vast and howling main,To treasure half their island-gain.

(Browning:Paracelsus, IV.)

Good sappy bavins that kindle forthwith;Billets that blaze substantial and slow;Pine-stump split deftly, dry as pith;Larch-heart that chars to a chalk-white glow;Then up they hoist me John in a chafe,Sling him fast like a hog to scorch,Spit in his face, then leap back safe,Sing 'Laudes' and bid clap-to the torch.

(Browning:The Heretic's Tragedy.)

'Will sprawl, now that the heat of day is best,Flat on his belly in the pit's much mire,With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop his chin.And, while he kicks both feet in the cool slush,And feels about his spine small eft-things course,Run in and out each arm, and make him laugh:...He looks out o'er yon sea which sunbeams crossAnd recross till they weave a spider-web.

(Browning:Caliban upon Setebos.)

Master of the murmuring courtsWhere the shapes of sleep convene!Lo! my spirit here exhortsAll the powers of thy demesneFor their aid to move my queen.What reportsYield thy jealous courts unseen?Vaporous, unaccountable,Dreamland lies forlorn of light,Hollow like a breathing shell.Ah! that from all dreams I mightChoose one dream and guide its flight!I know wellWhat her sleep should tell to-night.

Master of the murmuring courtsWhere the shapes of sleep convene!Lo! my spirit here exhortsAll the powers of thy demesneFor their aid to move my queen.What reportsYield thy jealous courts unseen?

Vaporous, unaccountable,Dreamland lies forlorn of light,Hollow like a breathing shell.Ah! that from all dreams I mightChoose one dream and guide its flight!I know wellWhat her sleep should tell to-night.

(Rossetti:Love's Nocturn.)

When the hounds of spring are on winter's traces,The mother of months, in meadow or plain,Fills the shadows and windy placesWith lisp of leaves and ripple of rain.

(Swinburne: Chorus inAtalanta in Calydon.)

Till, as with clamorOf axe and hammer,Chained streams that stammer and struggle in straits,Burst bonds that shiver,And thaws deliverThe roaring river in stormy spates.

(Swinburne:Winter in Northumberland.)

But, oh! that deep romantic chasm which slantedDown the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!A savage place! as holy and enchantedAs e'er beneath a waning moon was hauntedBy woman wailing for her demon-lover!And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,A mighty fountain momently was forced:Amid whose swift half-intermitted burstHuge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail;And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and everIt flung up momently the sacred river.Five miles meandering, with a mazy motion,Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,Then reach'd the caverns measureless to man,And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean.

(Coleridge:Kubla Khan.)

FOOTNOTES:[11]"Perfect rime" is a term applied to rimes between two words identical in form, but different in meaning. It is inadmissible in modern English verse, although it was considered entirely proper in Middle English times (compare Chaucer's—"The holy blisful martir for toseke,That hem hath holpen, whan that they wereseke."),and is still common in French verse.Schipper gives a separate paragraph also to "unaccented rime," where the similarity of sound belongs wholly to final, unstressed syllables. Generally speaking, this is inadmissible in English verse. Schipper quotes from Thomas Moore:"Down in yon summervaleWhere the rill flows,Thus said the NightingaleTo his loved Rose."It might be said, however, that the final syllables of "summervale" and "nightingale" are not wholly unstressed; moreover, they are in the first and third verses of the stanza, where rime is not indispensable. Unaccented rime is most noticeable in some of the verse of the transition period in the sixteenth century, when the syllable-counting principle was so emphasized as to admit any license of accent so long as the proper number of syllables was observed. Thus, in the verse of Wyatt we find such rimes as "dreadeth" and "seeketh," "beginning" and "eclipsing," etc. See p.10, above.Imperfect rime, occurring where the vowel sounds are only similar, not identical, or where the consonants following them are not identical, is commonly regarded as an imperfection in verse form. The most common of these imperfect rimes are in cases where the spelling would indicate perfect rime (hence where, in many cases, the words rimed originally, but have separated in the changes of pronunciation), such asloveandmove,broadandload, and the like. For a defence of these "rimes to the eye," and other imperfect rimes, with a study of their use by English poets, see articles by Prof. A. G. Newcomer in theNationfor January 26 and February 2, 1899.[12]Rime also appears in a short passage in Cynewulf'sElene. Some have thought it a later interpolation, but Schipper thinks it indicates that Cynewulf was a Northumbrian. Grein believes him to have been the author also of the Riming Poem, but, as Rieger points out, the rimes of Cynewulf are of a much less systematic character. (On this see Wülcker'sGrundriss zur Geschichte der Angelsächsischen Literatur, pp. 216, 217.)[13]The second of these stanzas is said to have been added to Canning's song by Willian Pitt.[14]See notes on the Septenary, in Part Two, p.259.[15]On the subject of Tone-color in English verse, see Guest'sEnglish Rhythms, chap. ii.; Lanier'sScience of English Verse, part iii. ("Colors of English Verse"); Corson'sPrimer of English Verse(chapter on "Poetic Unities"); Edmund Gurney'sTertium Quid(essays on "Poets, Critics, and Class-Lists" and "The Appreciation of Poetry"); Professor J. J. Sylvester'sLaws of Verse(London, 1870); G. L. Raymond'sPoetry as a Representative ArtandRhythm and Harmony in Poetry and Music; and Ehrenfeld'sStudien zur Theorie des Reims.

[11]"Perfect rime" is a term applied to rimes between two words identical in form, but different in meaning. It is inadmissible in modern English verse, although it was considered entirely proper in Middle English times (compare Chaucer's—"The holy blisful martir for toseke,That hem hath holpen, whan that they wereseke."),and is still common in French verse.Schipper gives a separate paragraph also to "unaccented rime," where the similarity of sound belongs wholly to final, unstressed syllables. Generally speaking, this is inadmissible in English verse. Schipper quotes from Thomas Moore:"Down in yon summervaleWhere the rill flows,Thus said the NightingaleTo his loved Rose."It might be said, however, that the final syllables of "summervale" and "nightingale" are not wholly unstressed; moreover, they are in the first and third verses of the stanza, where rime is not indispensable. Unaccented rime is most noticeable in some of the verse of the transition period in the sixteenth century, when the syllable-counting principle was so emphasized as to admit any license of accent so long as the proper number of syllables was observed. Thus, in the verse of Wyatt we find such rimes as "dreadeth" and "seeketh," "beginning" and "eclipsing," etc. See p.10, above.Imperfect rime, occurring where the vowel sounds are only similar, not identical, or where the consonants following them are not identical, is commonly regarded as an imperfection in verse form. The most common of these imperfect rimes are in cases where the spelling would indicate perfect rime (hence where, in many cases, the words rimed originally, but have separated in the changes of pronunciation), such asloveandmove,broadandload, and the like. For a defence of these "rimes to the eye," and other imperfect rimes, with a study of their use by English poets, see articles by Prof. A. G. Newcomer in theNationfor January 26 and February 2, 1899.

"The holy blisful martir for toseke,That hem hath holpen, whan that they wereseke."),

and is still common in French verse.

Schipper gives a separate paragraph also to "unaccented rime," where the similarity of sound belongs wholly to final, unstressed syllables. Generally speaking, this is inadmissible in English verse. Schipper quotes from Thomas Moore:

"Down in yon summervaleWhere the rill flows,Thus said the NightingaleTo his loved Rose."

It might be said, however, that the final syllables of "summervale" and "nightingale" are not wholly unstressed; moreover, they are in the first and third verses of the stanza, where rime is not indispensable. Unaccented rime is most noticeable in some of the verse of the transition period in the sixteenth century, when the syllable-counting principle was so emphasized as to admit any license of accent so long as the proper number of syllables was observed. Thus, in the verse of Wyatt we find such rimes as "dreadeth" and "seeketh," "beginning" and "eclipsing," etc. See p.10, above.

Imperfect rime, occurring where the vowel sounds are only similar, not identical, or where the consonants following them are not identical, is commonly regarded as an imperfection in verse form. The most common of these imperfect rimes are in cases where the spelling would indicate perfect rime (hence where, in many cases, the words rimed originally, but have separated in the changes of pronunciation), such asloveandmove,broadandload, and the like. For a defence of these "rimes to the eye," and other imperfect rimes, with a study of their use by English poets, see articles by Prof. A. G. Newcomer in theNationfor January 26 and February 2, 1899.

[12]Rime also appears in a short passage in Cynewulf'sElene. Some have thought it a later interpolation, but Schipper thinks it indicates that Cynewulf was a Northumbrian. Grein believes him to have been the author also of the Riming Poem, but, as Rieger points out, the rimes of Cynewulf are of a much less systematic character. (On this see Wülcker'sGrundriss zur Geschichte der Angelsächsischen Literatur, pp. 216, 217.)

[13]The second of these stanzas is said to have been added to Canning's song by Willian Pitt.

[14]See notes on the Septenary, in Part Two, p.259.

[15]On the subject of Tone-color in English verse, see Guest'sEnglish Rhythms, chap. ii.; Lanier'sScience of English Verse, part iii. ("Colors of English Verse"); Corson'sPrimer of English Verse(chapter on "Poetic Unities"); Edmund Gurney'sTertium Quid(essays on "Poets, Critics, and Class-Lists" and "The Appreciation of Poetry"); Professor J. J. Sylvester'sLaws of Verse(London, 1870); G. L. Raymond'sPoetry as a Representative ArtandRhythm and Harmony in Poetry and Music; and Ehrenfeld'sStudien zur Theorie des Reims.

English verse of four stresses is chiefly to be divided into two groups: that representing the primitive Germanic tendency to emphasize the element of accent rather than the counting of syllables, and that produced under foreign influence, showing comparative regularity in the number of syllables to the verse. The first group is made up of the various descendants of the original "long line," sometimes rimed and sometimes unrimed; the second group of forms of the familiar octosyllabic couplet. (Of modern verse only iambic measures are included here.)

The earliest English verse, like early Germanic verse generally, is based on the recurrence of strong accents, and is composed of a long line made up of two short lines, or half-lines, which are bound together by alliteration. As to the number of accents to be counted in the line, there are two theories, the "two-accent" and the "four-accent." According to the first, we should count two accents to the half-line, and four to the long line; according to the second, we should count four to the half-line and eight to the long line. The distinction is not so marked, however, as would appear at first thought; for the two-accent theorists recognize a considerable number of secondary accents in addition to the principal ones, while the four-accent theorists recognize half the accents as being commonly weaker than the other half.

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