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the choristers in a cathedral retard or precipitate the words of the chaunt, according as the quantity of its notes, and the colon which divides the verse of the psalm, conspire to demand it. Had the moderns borne this principle in mind when they settled the prevailing systems of verse, instead of learning them, as they appear to have done, from the first drawling and one-syllabled notation of the church hymns, we should have retained all the advantages of the more numerous versification of the ancients, without being compelled to fancy that there was no alternative for us between our syllabical uniformity and the hexameters or other special forms unsuited to our tongues. But to leave this question alone, we will present the reader with a few sufficing specimens of the difference between monotony and variety in versification, first from Pope, Dryden, and Milton, and next from Gay and Coleridge. The following is the boasted melody of the nevertheless exquisite poet of the "Rape of the Lock," exquisite in his wit and fancy, though not in his numbers. The reader will observe that it is literally see-saw, like the rising and falling of a plank, with a light person at one end who is jerked up in the briefer time, and a heavier one who is set down more leisurely at the other. It is in the otherwise charming description of the heroine of that poem :—

On her white breast-a sparkling cross she wore,
Which Jews might kiss-and infidels adore;
Her lively looks-a sprightly mind disclose,
Quick as her eyes-and as unfix'd as those;
Favors to none-to all she smiles extends,
Oft she rejects-but never once offends;
Bright as the sun-her eyes the gazers strike,
And like the sun-they shine on all alike;
Yet graceful ease-and sweetness void of pride,
Might hide her faults-if belles had faults to hide;
If to her share-some female errors fall,

Look on her face-and you'll forget them all.

Compare with this the description of Iphigenia in one of Dryden's stories from Boccaccio :

:

It happen'd-on a summer's holiday,

That to the greenwood shade-he took his way,

For Cymon shunn'd the church-and used not much to pray,

His quarter-staff-which he could ne'er forsake,
Hung half before-and half behind his back:
He trudg'd along-not knowing what he sought,
And whistled as he went-for want of thought.

By chance conducted-or by thirst constrain'd,
The deep recesses of a grove he gain'd ;—
Where-in a plain defended by a wood,
Crept through the matted grass-a crystal flood,
By which- -an alabaster fountain stood;

And on the margent of the fount was laid-
Attended by her slaves-a sleeping maid;

}

Like Dian and her nymphs-when, tir'd with sport,
To rest by cool Eurotas they resort.-

The dame herself-the goddess well express'd
Not more distinguished by her purple vest-
Than by the charming features of the face-
And e'en in slumber-a superior grace:

Her comely limbs-compos'd with decent care,
Her body shaded—by a light cymarr,

Her bosom to the view-was only bare;

Where two beginning paps were scarcely spied-
For yet their places were but signified.--

The fanning wind upon her bosom blows

To meet the fanning wind-the bosom rose;

The fanning wind-and purling stream-continue her repose.

For a further variety take, from the same author's Theodore and Honoria, a passage in which the couplets are run one into the other, and all of it modulated, like the former, according to the feeling demanded by the occasion;

Whilst listening to the murmuring leaves he stood-
More than a mile immers'd within the wood-
At once the wind was laid. -The whispering sound
Was dumb.-A rising earthquake rock'd the ground.
With deeper brown the grove was overspread-

A sudden horror seiz'd his giddy head-
And his ears tinkled-and his color fled.

Nature was in alarm-Some danger nigh

Seem'd threaten'd-though unseen to mortal eye.

Unus'd to fear-he summon'd all his soul,
And stood collected in himself-and whole :
Not long.-

But for a crowning specimen of variety of pause and accent, apart from emotion, nothing can surpass the account, in Para. dise Lost, of the Devil's search for an accomplice ;

There was a plàce,

Now not-though Sìn—not Tìme-first wrought the change

Where Tigris-at the foot of Paradise,

Into a gùlf-shot under ground-till pàrt
Ròse up a fountain by the Tree of Life.

In with the river sunk-and with it ròse

Satan-invòlv'd in rìsing mìst-then sought

Where to lie hìd.-Sèa he had search'd-and lànd
From Eden over Pòntus-and the pool
Mæòtis-up beyond the river Ob;

Downward as fàr antàrctic;-and in length
Wèst from Oròntes-to the ocean bàrr'd

At Dariën-thènce to the land whère flòws
Ganges and Indus.-Thùs the òrb he ròam'd
With narrow search;-and with inspèction deep
Consider'd every creature-whìch of all

Mòst opportune mìght sèrve his wìles-and foùnd
The sèrpent-sùbtlest beast of all the field.

If the reader cast his eye again over this passage, he will not find a verse in it which is not varied and harmonized in the most remarkable manner. Let him notice in particular that curious balancing of the lines in the sixth and tenth verses :—

In with the river sunk, &c.,

and

Up beyond the river Ob.

It some

It might, indeed, be objected to the versification of Milton, that it exhibits too constant a perfection of this kind. times forces upon us too great a sense of consciousness on the part of the composer. We miss the first sprightly runnings of verse,―the ease and sweetness of spontaneity. Milton, I think, also too often condenses weight into heaviness.

Thus much concerning the chief of our two most popular measures. The other, called octosyllabic, or the measure of

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eight syllables, offered such facilities for namby-pamby, that it had become a jest as early as the time of Shakspeare, who makes Touchstone call it the "butterwoman's rate to market,” and the " very false gallop of verses. It has been advocated, in opposition to the heroic measure, upon the ground that ten syllables lead a man into epithets and other superfluities, while eight syllables compress him into a sensible and pithy gentleman. But the heroic measure laughs at it. So far from compressing, it converts one line into two, and sacrifices everything to the quick and importunate return of the rhyme. With Dryden, compare Gay, even in the strength of Gay,

The wind was high-the window shakes;

With sudden start the miser wakes;

Along the silent room he stalks,

(A miser never "stalks;" but a rhyme was desired for "walks")

Looks back, and trembles as he walks:
Each lock and every bolt he tries,

In every creek and corner pries.

Then opes the chest with treasure stor❜d,

And stands in rapture o'er his hoard;

("Hoard" and "treasure stor❜d" are just made for one another)

But now, with sudden qualms possess'd,
He wrings his hands, he beats his breast;
By conscience stung, he wildly stares,
And thus his guilty soul declares.

And so he denounces his gold, as miser never denounced it; and sighs, because

Virtue resides on earth no more!

Coleridge saw the mistake which had been made with regard to this measure, and restored it to the beautiful freedom of which it was capable, by calling to mind the liberties allowed its old

musical professors the minstrels, and dividing it by time instead of syllables ;—by the beat of four into which you might get as many syllables as you could, instead of allotting eight syllables to the poor time, whatever it might have to say. He varied it further with alternate rhymes and stanzas, with rests and omissions precisely analogous to those in music, and rendered it altogether worthy to utter the manifold thoughts and feelings of himself and his lady Christabel. He even ventures, with an exquisite sense of solemn strangeness and license (for there is witchcraft going forward), to introduce a couplet of blank verse, itself as mystically and beautifully modulated as anything in the music of Glück or Weber.

'Tis the middle of night by the castle clock,

And the owls have awaken'd the crowing cock;
Tu-whit!-Tu-whoo!

And hark, again! the crowing cock,

How drowsily he crew.

Sir Leoline, the baron rich,

Hath a toothless mastiff bitch;

From her kennel beneath the rock

She maketh answer to the clock

Four for the quarters ănd twèlve for the hoùr,
Ever and aye, by shine and shower,
Sixteen short howls, not over loud:
Some say, she sees my lady's shroud.

Is the night chilly and dark!
The night is chìlly, but nòt dàrk.
The thin grey cloud is spread on high,
It covers, but not hides, the sky.

The moon is behind, and at the full,

And yet she looks both small and dull.

The night is chilly, the cloud is grey;

(These are not superfluities, but mysterious returns of importunate feeling)

Tis a month before the month of May,

And the spring comes slowly up this way.

The lovely lady, Christabel,

Whom her father loves so well,

What makes her in the wood so late,

A furlong from the castle-gate?

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