My good blade carves the casques of men, My tough lance thrusteth sure, My strength is as the strength of ten, Because my heart is pure. The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, The hard brands shiver on the steel, The splinter'd spear-shafts crack and fly, The horse and rider reel.
Each statement is complete in itself and has the falling inflection.
Sometimes there is a slight downward slide before the statement is completed, because the mind feels that the ideas already expressed are of sufficient force to give them the value of completeness:
My strength is as the strength of tèn, Because my heart is pure.
And the sick men down in the hold were most of them stark and còld, And the pikes were all broken or bènt, and the powder was all of it spènt; And the masts and the rigging were lying over the side.
Note the momentary completeness on "ten," "cold," "bent," and "spent," requiring the falling inflection.
If on the other hand an idea is incomplete, either pointing forward to some other idea or being subordinate, the voice has the upward slide or rising inflection. The rising inflection, like the falling, may be long or short, more or less abrupt, according to the importance of the thought:
Shé, with all a monarch's príde, Felt them in her bosom glow.
"She" points forward to the predicate "felt" and because of the importance of the idea it takes a long rising inflection; "with all a monarch's pride" being subordinate and incomplete also requires the voice to be kept up, but takes a shorter rising inflection.
It is of the greatest importance to know the exact purpose of the thought, so that the voice may, of itself, give the corresponding inflection:
And you may gather garlánds thére Would grace a summer quèen.