XXVII. Various Forms of Octosyllable-Heptasyllable (late Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century)
(a) Shakespeare (doubtfully?):
(1) King Pan|dion | he is | dead,
All thy | friends are | lapped in | lead.
(2) Let | the bird | of loud|est lay
On | the sole | Ara|bian tree.
(These distichs from the Passionate Pilgrim will illustrate the two different forms which the heptasyllable—really an octosyllable acephalous or catalectic—can take. The catalectic form (1) becomes trochaic; the acephalous (2), iambic. They can be interchanged, and either can group with the full iambic dimeter; but, individually, it would spoil (1) to scan it as iambic, (2) to scan it as trochaic. Yet on "accentual" scansion there is no difference; and some advocates of recent fancy "stress"-systems maintain that the rhythms are identical!)
(b) Shakespeare (almost certainly):
The cat | with eyne |of burn|ing coal
Now couch|es 'fore | the mou|se's hole,
And crick|ets sing | at the ov|en's mouth
As | the ¦ blith|er ¦ from | their ¦ drouth.
(In this famous and eminently Shakespearian passage from Pericles, the last line, a heptasyllable, goes perfectly with the rest, or octosyllables, either as acephalous or as catalectic, either as an iambic fellow or a trochaic substitute.)
(c) Shakespeare (certainly):
And we fairies, that do run
By the trìple Hecate's team,
From the presence of the sun
Follow¦ing | dark¦ness | like a dream,
Now are frolic: not a mouse
Shall disturb this hallowed house:
I am sent with broom before,
To sweep the dust behind the door.
(From A Midsummer Night's Dream. Same as last, except that the full octosyllable is only reached at the end, and perhaps in line 4. "Hecat[e]," as often, is dissyllabic.)
(d) Browne, W.:
Be ev|er fresh! | Let no | man dare
To spoil | thy fish, | make lock | or wear,
But on | thy mar|gent still | let dwell,
Those flowers | which have | the sweet|est smell,
And let | the dust | upon | thy strand
Become, | like Ta|gus, gold|en sand.
Let as | much good | betide | to thee
As thou | hast fa|vour showed | to me.
(Pure octosyllables. There is a catalectic line now and then elsewhere, but it is an evident exception.)
(e) Wither:
For | in ¦ her | a ¦ grace |there ¦ shines,
That o'er-daring thoughts confines,
Making worthless men despair
To be loved of one so fair.
Yea, the Destinies agree,
Some good judgments blind should be,
And not gain the power of knowing
Those rare beauties in her growing.
(Pure heptasyllables, taking either cadence, and, when extended, owing the extension mainly, if not wholly, to the double rhyme. The first line gives the alternative scansion; but Wither's run is, on the whole, trochaic, as Browne's is iambic.)