Remem|ber the thrill|ing roman|ces
We read | on the bank | in the glen;
Remem|ber the suit|ors our fan|cies
Would pic|ture for both | of us then.
They wore | the red cross | on their shoul|der,
They had van|quished and par|doned their foe—
Sweet friend, | are you wi|ser or cold|er?
My own | Aramin|ta, say "No!"
And then Mr. Swinburne had the probably final inspiration of shortening the last line to two feet (or an anapæstic monometer), with an astonishing result of added and finished music:
Though the ma|ny lights dwin|dle to one | light,
There is help | if the heav|en has one,
Though the skies | be discrowned | of the sun|light,
And the earth | dispossessed | of the sun,
They have moon|light and sleep | for repay|ment
When, refreshed | as a bride | and set free,
With stars | and sea-winds | in her rai|ment,
Night sinks | on the sea.
XLV. Long Metres of Tennyson, Browning, Morris, and Swinburne
(a) Tennyson (The Lotos-Eaters):
For they | lie be|side their | nectar, | and the | bolts are | hurl'd
Fār bĕ|lōw thĕm | īn thĕ | vāllĕys, | ānd thĕ | clōuds ăre | līghtly̆ | curl'd
Round their golden houses, girdled with the gleaming world,
Where they smile in secret, looking over wasted lands,
Blight and famine, plague and earthquake, roaring deeps and fiery sands,
Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and sinking ships, and praying hands.
(Trochaic six- and seven-foot lines, always hypercatalectic, or, in stricter language, trochaic trimeters hypercatalectic and tetrameters catalectic.)
At the close the poet avails himself of the iambic alternative which is so effective, and has a pure fourteener:
Ŏ̄ rēst | yĕ, brō|thĕr mā|rĭnērs, | wĕ wīll | nŏt wān|dĕr mōre. |