(b) Examples from Heywood and other interludes.
(1) Continuous long doggerel:
I can|not tell | you: one knave | disdains | another,
Wherefore | take ye | the tone | and I | shall take | the other.
We shall | bestow | them there | as is most | conven|ient
For such | a coup|le. I trow | they shall | repent
That ev|er they met | in this | church here.
(2) Singles:
(Shortened six.)
This | wyse him | deprave,
(Octosyllable.)
And give | the ab|solu|tion.
(Irregular decasyllable.)
The aboun|dant grace | of the | powèr | divyne
(Alexandrine.)
Preserve | this aud|ience | and leave | them to | inclyne.
(Irregular fourteener.)
Then hold | down thine | head like | a pret|ty man | and take | my blessing.
(In all these examples the doggerel is probably intended; that is to say, the writers are not aiming at a regularity which they cannot reach, but cheerfully or despairingly renouncing it.)
XIX. Transition Period
Examples from the Scottish Poets.
(a) Barbour (regular octosyllables):
The kyng | toward | the vod | is gane,
Wery, | for-swat and vill | of vayn;
Intill | the wod | soyn en|terit he,
And held | doun to|ward a | valè,
Quhar throu | the vod | a vat|tir ran.
Thiddir | in gret | hy went | he than,
And | begouth | to rest | hym thair,
And said | he mycht | no for|thirmair.
(One "acephalous" line.)