Of this metrical style examples will be found on pages in Chapter XIX, Section 2, below; or on any page of Fletcher's Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, as for instance the following from Act III, Scene 1, 14-23:
Altea. My life|, an in|nocent|!
Marg. That's it | I aim | at,
That's it | I hope | too; ¦ then ¦ I am sure | I rule | him;15
For in|nocents | are like | obe|dient chil|dren
Brought up | under a hard | ^ moth|er-in-law|, a cru|el,
Who be|ing not us'd | to break|fasts and | colla|tions,
^ When | they have coarse | bread of|fer'd 'em | are thank|full,
And take | it for | a fa|vour too|. Are the rooms |20
Made read|y to en|tertain | my friends|? I long | to dance now,
^ And | to be wan|ton. ¦ Let | me have | a song.
Is the great | couch up | the Duke | of Medi|na sent?
Here the first half of v. 14 is also the last of the preceding line; seven out of ten verses have double endings; one has a triple ending. One, v. 21, has a quadruple ending; unless we rearrange by adding "made ready" to v. 20, so as to scan:
And take 't | for a fa|vour too|. Are the rooms | made read|y
To en|tertain | my friends|? I long | to dance | now.—
Trisyllabic feet occur in nine; final pauses in nine; stress-syllable openings and compensating anapæsts in two; the feminine cæsura (phrasal pause within the foot) in two. The pause in v. 15, after two strong monosyllables of which the first is stressed, produces a jolt, typically Fletcherian.
JOHN EARLE, BISHOP OF WORCESTER AND SALISBURY
From the portrait in the National Portrait Gallery
Now, these peculiarities of versification are not a habit acquired by Fletcher after Beaumont ceased to write with him. They are rife not only in the plays of his middle and later periods, but in those of the earlier period while Beaumont was still at his side. As for instance in Monsieur Thomas, entirely Fletcher's of 1607, or at the latest 1611. The reader may be interested to verify for himself by scanning the following passage from Act IV, 2 at which I open at random: Launcelot is speaking: