| [BOOK I] INTRODUCTORY AND DOGMATIC | |
| [CHAPTER I] | |
| PAGE | |
| Introductory | [3] |
| [CHAPTER II] SYSTEMS OF ENGLISH PROSODY—THE ACCENTUAL OR STRESS | |
| Classical prosody uniform in theory—English not so—"Accent"and "stress"—English prosody as adjusted to them—Itsdifficulties—and insufficiencies—Examples of its application—Itsvarious sects and supporters | [6] |
| [CHAPTER III] SYSTEMS OF ENGLISH PROSODY—THE SYLLABIC | |
| History of the syllabic theory—Its results—Note: Cautions | [14] |
| [CHAPTER IV] SYSTEMS OF ENGLISH PROSODY—THE FOOT | |
| General if not always consistent use of the term "foot"—Particularobjections to its systematic use—"Quantity" in English—The"common" syllable—Intermediate rules of arrangement—Someinterim rules of feet (expanded in note)—The different systemsapplied to a single verse of Tennyson's—and their applicationexamined—Application further to his "Hollyhock" song—Suchapplication possible always and everywhere | [19] |
| [CHAPTER V] RULES OF THE FOOT SYSTEM | |
| § A. Feet.—Feet composed of long and short syllables—Not allcombinations actual—Differences from "classical" feet—Thethree usual kinds: iamb, trochee, anapæst—The spondee—Thedactyl—The pyrrhic—The tribrach—Others. § B. Constitution ofFeet.—Quality or "quantity" in feet—Not necessarily "time"—norvowel "quantity"—Accumulated consonants—or rhetorical stress—orplace in verse will quantify—Commonness of monosyllables. §C. Equivalence and Substitution.—Substitution of equivalentfeet—Its two laws—Confusion of base must be avoided—(Of whichthe ear must judge)—Certain substitutions are not eligible. § D.Pause.—Variation of pause —Practically at discretion—Blank versespecially dependent on pause. § E. Line-Combination.—Simple orcomplex—Rhymes necessary to couplet—Few instances of successfulunrhymed stanza—Unevenness of line in length—Stanzas to bejudged by the ear—Origin of commonest line-combinations. § F.Rhyme.—Rhyme natural in English—It must be "full" —and notidentical—General rule as to it—Alliteration—Single, etc.,rhyme—Fullness of sound—Internal rhyme permissible—but sometimesdangerous. § G. Miscellaneous—Vowel-music—"Fingering"—Confusionof rhythms intolerable | [30] |
| [CHAPTER VI] CONTINUOUS ILLUSTRATIONS OF ENGLISH SCANSION ACCORDING TO THE FOOTSYSTEM | |
| I. Old English Period: Scansion only dimly visible—II. Late OldEnglish with nisus towards Metre: "Grave" Poem—III. TransitionPeriod: Metre struggling to assert itself in a new way—IV. EarlyMiddle English Period: Attempt at merely Syllabic Uniformitywith Unbroken Iambic Run and no Rhyme—V. Early Middle EnglishPeriod: Conflict or Indecision between Accentual Rhythm andMetrical Scheme—VI. Early Middle English Period: The Appearanceand Development of the "Fourteener"—VII. Early Middle EnglishPeriod: The Plain and Equivalenced Octosyllable—VIII. Early MiddleEnglish Period: The Romance-Six or Rime Couée—IX. Early MiddleEnglish Period: Miscellaneous Stanzas—X. Early Middle EnglishPeriod: Appearance of the Decasyllable—XI. Later Middle EnglishPeriod: The Alliterative Revival (Pure)—XII. Later Middle EnglishPeriod: The Alliterative Revival (Mixed)—XIII. Later MiddleEnglish Period: Potentially Metrical Lines in Langland (see [BookII].)—XIV. Later Middle English Period: Scansions from Chaucer—XV.Later Middle English Period: Variations from Strict Iambic Norm inGower—XVI. Transition Period: Examples of Break-down in LiteraryVerse—XVII. Transition Period: Examples of True Prosody in Ballad,Carols, etc.—XVIII. Transition Period: Examples of Skeltonic andother Doggerel—XIX. Transition Period: Examples from the ScottishPoets—XX. Early Elizabethan Period: Examples of Reformed Metrefrom Wyatt, Surrey, and other Poets before Spenser—XXI. Spenserat Different Periods—XXII. Examples of the Development of BlankVerse—XXIII. Examples of Elizabethan Lyric—XXIV. Early ContinuousAnapæsts—XXV. The Enjambed Heroic Couplet (1580-1660)—XXVI.The Stopped Heroic Couplet (1580-1660)—XXVII. Various Formsof Octosyllable-Heptasyllable (late Sixteenth and SeventeenthCentury)—XXVIII. "Common," "Long," and "In Memoriam" Measure(Seventeenth Century)—XXIX. Improved Anapæstic Measures (Dryden,Anon., Prior)—XXX. "Pindarics" (Seventeenth Century)—XXXI. TheHeroic Couplet from Dryden to Crabbe—XXXII. Eighteenth-CenturyBlank Verse—XXXIII. The Regularised Pindaric Ode—XXXIV. LighterEighteenth-Century Lyric—XXXV. The Revival of Equivalence(Chatterton and Blake)—XXXVI. Rhymeless Attempts (Collins toShelley)—XXXVII. The Revived Ballad (Percy to Coleridge)—XXXVIII.Specimens of Christabel; Note on the Application of theChristabel System to Nineteenth-Century Lyric generally—XXXIX.Nineteenth-Century Couplet (Leigh Hunt to Mr. Swinburne)—XL.Nineteenth-Century Blank Verse (Wordsworth to Mr. Swinburne)—XLI.The Non-Equivalenced Octosyllable of Keats and Morris—XLII. TheContinuous Alexandrine (Drayton and Browning)—XLIII. The DyingSwan of Tennyson scanned entirely through to show the Applicationof the System—XLIV. The Stages of the Metre of "Dolores" and theDedication of "Poems and Ballads"—XLV. Long Metres of Tennyson,Browning, Morris, and Swinburne—XLVI. The Later Sonnet—XLVII.The Various Attempts at "Hexameters" in English—XLVIII. MinorImitations of Classical Metres—XLIX. Imitations of ArtificialFrench Forms—L. Later Rhymelessness—LI. Some "Unusual" Metres andDisputed Scansions | [37] |
| [BOOK II] HISTORICAL SKETCH OF ENGLISH PROSODY | |
| [CHAPTER I] FROM THE ORIGINS TO CHAUCER—THE CONSTITUTION OF ENGLISH VERSE | |
| Relations of "Old" to "Middle" and "New" English—generally—andin prosody—Anglo-Saxon prosody itself—Prosody of the Transitionto Middle English—Contrast in Layamon—Examinations of it:Insufficient—Sufficient—Other documents The Ormulum—TheMoral Ode and the Orison of Our Lady—The Proverbs ofAlfred and Hendyng—The Bestiary—Minor poems—The Owland the Nightingale and Genesis and Exodus—Summary ofresults to the mid-thirteenth century—The later thirteenthcentury and the fourteenth—Robert of Gloucester—TheRomances—Lyrics—The alliterative revival—The later fourteenthcentury—Langland—Gower—Chaucer—His perfecting of M.E.verse—Details of his prosody | [133] |
| [CHAPTER II] FROM CHAUCER TO SPENSER—DISORGANISATION AND RECONSTRUCTION | |
| Causes of decay in Southern English prosody—Lydgate, Occleve,etc.—The Scottish poets—Ballad, etc.—Dissatisfaction andreform—Wyatt and Surrey—Their followers—Spenser—The Shepherd'sCalendar—The Faerie Queene | [161] |
| [CHAPTER III] FROM SHAKESPEARE TO MILTON—THE CLOSE OF THE FORMATIVE PERIOD | |
| Blank verse—Before Shakespeare—In him—and after him indrama—Its degeneration—Milton's reform of it—Comus—ParadiseLost—Analysis of its versification, with application of differentsystems—Stanza, etc., in Shakespeare—in Milton—and others—The"heroic" couplet—Enjambed—and stopped—Lyric | [173] |
| [CHAPTER IV] HALT AND RETROSPECT—CONTINUATION ON HEROIC VERSE AND ITSCOMPANIONS FROM DRYDEN TO CRABBE | |
| Recapitulation—Dryden's couplet—and Pope's—Theirpredominance—Eighteenth-century octosyllable and anapæst—Blankverse—and lyric—Merit of eighteenth-century "regularity" | [190] |
| [CHAPTER V] THE ROMANTIC REVIVAL—ITS PRECURSORS AND FIRST GREAT STAGE | |
| Gray and Collins—Chatterton, Burns, and Blake—Otherinfluences of change—Wordsworth, Southey, andScott—Coleridge—Moore—Byron—Shelley: his longer poems—Hislyrics—Keats | [198] |
| [CHAPTER VI] THE LAST STAGE—TENNYSON TO SWINBURNE | |
| From Keats to Tennyson—Tennyson himself—Special example of hismanipulation of the quatrain—Browning—Mrs. Browning—MatthewArnold—Later poets: The Rossettis—W. Morris—Mr. Swinburne—Others | [207] |
| [CHAPTER VII] RECAPITULATION OR SUMMARY VIEW OF STAGES OF ENGLISH PROSODY | |
| I. Old English Period—II. Before or very soon after 1200: EarliestMiddle English Period—III. Middle and Later Thirteenth Century:Second Early Middle English Period—IV. Earlier Fourteenth Century:Central Period of Middle English—V. Later Fourteenth Century:Crowning Period of Middle English—VI. Fifteenth and EarlySixteenth Centuries: The Decadence of Middle English Prosody—VII.Mid-Sixteenth Century: The Recovery of Rhythm—VIII. Late SixteenthCentury: The Perfecting of Metre and of Poetical Diction—IX.Early Seventeenth Century: The further Development of Lyric,Stanza, and Blank Verse; Insurgence and Division of the Couplet—X.Mid-Seventeenth Century: Milton—XI. The Later Seventeenth Century:Dryden—XII. The Eighteenth Century—XIII. The Early NineteenthCentury and the Romantic Revival—XIV. The Later Nineteenth Century | [220] |
| [BOOK III] HISTORICAL SURVEY OF VIEWS ON PROSODY | |
| [CHAPTER I] BEFORE 1700 | |
| Dearth of early prosodic studies—Gascoigne—His remark on feet—Spenser and Harvey—Stanyhurst—Webbe—King James VI.— Pattenham(?)—Campion and Daniel—Ben Jonson, Drayton, Beaumont—JoshuaPoole and "J. D."—Milton—Dryden— Woodford—Comparativebarrenness of the whole | [233] |
| [CHAPTER II] FROM BYSSHE TO GUEST | |
| Bysshe's Art of Poetry—Its importance—Minor prosodists ofthe mid-eighteenth century—Dr. Johnson—Shenstone—Sheridan—John Mason—Mitford—Joshua Steele—Historical and Romanticprosody—Gray—Taylor and Sayers—Southey: his importance—Wordsworth—Coleridge—Christabel, its theory and itspractice—Prosodists from 1800 to 1850—Guest | [242] |
| [CHAPTER III] LATER NINETEENTH-CENTURY PROSODISTS | |
| Discussions on the Evangeline hexameter—Mid-century prosodists—Those about 1870—and since—Summary | [256] |
| [BOOK IV] AUXILIARY APPARATUS | |
| [CHAPTER I] GLOSSARY | |
| Accent – Acephalous – Acrostic – Alexandrine – Alcaic – Alliteration – Amphibrach – Amphimacer – Noteon Musical and Rhetorical Arrangements of Verse – Anacrusis – Anapæst – Anti-Bacchic orAnti-Bacchius – Antispast – Antistrophe – Appoggiatura – Arsis and its opposite,Thesis – Assonance – Atonic – Bacchic orBacchius – Ballad (rarely Ballet) – Ballade – BalladMetre or Common Measure – Bar and Beat – BlankVerse – Bob and Wheel – Burden – BurnsMetre – Cadence – Cæsura – Carol –Catalexis – Catch – Chant-Royal – Choriamb – Coda – Common – Common Measure ("C.M.") – Consonance – Couplet –Cretic – Dactyl – Di-iamb – Dimeter – Dispondee – Distich –Ditrochee – Dochmiac – Doggerel – Duple – Elision –End-stopped – Enjambment – Envoi – Epanaphora – Epanorthosis – Epitrite – Epode – Equivalence – Eye-Rhyme – FeminineRhyme (Feminine Ending) – "Fingering" – Foot; Tableof Feet – Fourteener – Galliambic – Gemellor Geminel – Head-Rhyme – Hendecasyllable – Heptameter – Heroic – Hexameter –Hiatus – Iambic – Inverted Stress – Ionic;Note on Ionic a minore as applicable to the Epilogue ofBrowning's Asolando – Leonine Verse – Line – Longand Short – Long Measure ("L.M.") – LydgatianLine – Masculine Rhyme – Metre – Molossus –Monometer – Monopressure – Octave – Octometer – Ode – OttavaRima – Pæon – Pause – Pentameter – Pindaric – Position – Poulter'sMeasure – Proceleusmatic – Pyrrhic – Quantity – Quartetor Quatrain – Quintet – Redundance – Refrain – Rhyme – Rhyme-Royal – Rhythm – RidingRhyme – Rime Couée or TailedRhyme – Romance-Six – Rondeau, Rondel – Sapphic –Section – Septenar – Septet – Sestet,also Sixain – Sestine, Sestina – ShortMeasure ("S.M.") – Single-moulded – Skeltonic – Slur – Sonnet – Spenserian – Spondee – Stanza orStave – Stress – Stress-Unit – Strophe – Substitution – Synalœpha –Syncope – Synizesis – Syzygy – TailedSonnet – Tercet – TerzaRima – Tetrameter – Thesis – Time – Tribrach – Triolet –Triple – Triplet – Trochee – Truncation – TumblingVerse – Turn of Words – Verse – VerseParagraph – Vowel-Music – Weak Ending – WrenchedAccent | [265] |
| [CHAPTER II] REASONED LIST OF POETS WITH SPECIAL REGARD TO THEIR PROSODICQUALITY AND INFLUENCE | |
| Arnold, Matthew (1822-1888)—Barham, Richard H.("Thomas Ingoldsby") (1788-1845)—Beaumont, Sir John(1583-1623)—Blake, William (1757-1827)—Bowles, William Lisle(1762-1850)—Browne, William (1591-1643)—Browning, ElizabethBarrett (1806-1861)—Browning, Robert (1812-1889)—Burns, Robert(1759-1796)—Byron, George Gordon, Lord (1788-1824)—Campbell,Thomas (1777-1844)—Campion, Thomas (?-1619)—Canning, George(1770-1827)—Chamberlayne, William (1619-1689)—Chatterton,Thomas (1752-1770)—Chaucer, Geoffrey (1340?-1400)—Cleveland,John (1613-1658)—Coleridge, Samuel Taylor (1772-1834)—Collins,William (1721-1759)—Congreve, William (1670-1729)—Cowley,Abraham (1618-1667)—Cowper, William (1731-1800)—Donne,John (1573-1631)—Drayton, Michael (1563-1631)—Dryden, John(1630-1700)—Dixon, Richard Watson (1833-1900)—Dunbar, William(1450?-1513? or -1530?)—Dyer, John (1700?-1758?)—Fairfax,Edward (d. 1635)—Fitzgerald, Edward (1809-1883)—Fletcher,Giles (1588-1623), and Phineas (1582-1650)—Fletcher, John(1579-1625)—Frere, John Hookham (1769-1846)—Gascoigne, George(1525?-1577)—Glover, Richard (1712-1785)—Godric, Saint(?-1170)—Gower, John (1325?-1408)—Hampole, Richard Rolleof (1290?-1347)—Hawes, Stephen (d. 1523?)—Herrick, Robert(1591-1674)—Hunt, J. H. Leigh (1784—1859)—-Jonson, Benjamin(1573?-1637)—Keats, John (1795-1821)—Kingsley, Charles(1819-1875)—Landor, Walter Savage (1775-1864)—Langland, William(fourteenth century)—Layamon (late twelfth and early thirteenthcentury)—Lewis, Matthew Gregory (1775-1818)—Locker (latterlyLocker-Lampson), Frederick (1821-1895)—Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth(1807-1882)—Lydgate, John (1370-1450?)—Macaulay, ThomasBabington (1800-1859)—Maginn, William (1793-1842)—Marlowe,Christopher (1664-1693)—Milton, John (1608-1674)—Moore, Thomas(1779-1852)—Morris, William (1834-1896)—Orm—O'Shaughnessy,Arthur W. E. (1844-1881)—Peele, George (1558?-1597?)—Percy,Thomas (1729-1811)—Poe, Edgar (1809-1849)—Pope, Alexander(1688-1744)—Praed, Winthrop Mackworth (1802-1839)—Prior,Matthew (1664-1721)—Robert of Gloucester (fl. c.1280)—Rossetti, Christina Georgina (1830-1894) and DanteGabriel (1828-1882)—Sackville, Thomas (1536-1608)—Sandys,George (1578-1644)—Sayers, Frank (1763-1817)—Scott, Sir Walter(1771-1832)—Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)—Shelley, PercyBysshe (1792-1822)—Shenstone, William (1714-1763)—Sidney, SirPhilip (1554-1586)—Southey, Robert (1774-1843)—Spenser, Edmund(1552?-1599)—Surrey, Earl of (1517-1547)—Swinburne, AlgernonCharles (1837-1909)—Tennyson, Alfred (1809-1892)—Thomson,James (1700-1748)—Tusser, Thomas (1524?-1580)—Waller, Edmund(1606-1687)—Watts, Isaac (1674-1741)—Whitman, Walt[er](1819-1892)—Wordsworth, William (1770-1850)—Wyatt, Sir Thomas(1503?-1542) | [298] |
| [CHAPTER III] ORIGINS OF LINES AND STANZAS | |
| A. Lines.—I. Alliterative—II. "Short" Lines—III.Octosyllable—IV. Decasyllabic—V. Alexandrine—VI.Fourteener—VII. Doggerel—VIII. "Long" Lines. B. Stanzas, etc.—I.Ballad Verse—II. Romance-Six or Rime Couée—III. Octosyllabicand Decasyllabic Couplet—IV. Quatrain—V. In Memoriam Metre—VI.Rhyme-Royal—VII. Octave—VIII. Spenserian—IX. Burns Metre—X.Other Stanzas | [316] |
| [CHAPTER IV] BIBLIOGRAPHY | |
| Abbot, E. A.—Alden, R. M.—[Blake, J. W.]—Brewer, R. F.—Bridges,R. S.—Bysshe, Edward—Calverley, C. S.—Campion, Thomas—Cayley,C. B.—Coleridge, S. T.—Conway, Gilbert—Crowe, William—Daniel,Samuel—Dryden, John—Gascoigne, George—Goldsmith, Oliver—Guest,Edwin—Hodgson, Shadworth—Hood, T. (the younger)—Jenkin,Fleeming—Johnson, Samuel—Ker, W. P.—King James the First (Sixthof Scotland)—Lewis, C. M.—Liddell, Mark H.—Mason, John—Masson,David—Mayor, J. B.—Mitford, William—Omond, T.S.—Patmore,Coventry—Poe, E. A.—[Puttenham, George?]—Ruskin, John—Schipper,J.—Shenstone, William—Skeat, W. W.—Southey, Robert—Spedding,James—Spenser, Edmund—Steele, Joshua—Stone, W. J.—Symonds, J.A.—Thelwall, John—Verrier, M.—Wadham, E.—Webbe, William | [337] |
| INDEX | [341] |
[BOOK I]
INTRODUCTORY AND DOGMATIC
[CHAPTER I]
INTRODUCTORY
Prosody, or the study of the constitution of verse, was, not so long ago, made familiar, in so far as it concerned Latin, to all persons educated above the very lowest degree, by the presence of a tractate on the subject as a conclusion to the Latin Grammar. The same persons were further obliged to a more than theoretical knowledge of it, in so far as it concerned that language, by the once universal, now (as some think) most unwisely disused habit of composing Latin verses. The great majority of English poets, from at least the sixteenth century, if not earlier, until far into the nineteenth, had actually composed such verses; and even more had learnt the rules of them, long before attempting in English the work which has given them their fame. It is sometimes held that this fact—which as a fact is undeniable—has had an undue influence on the way in which English prosody has been regarded; that it must have exercised an enormous influence on the way in which English poetry has been produced may be denied, but hardly by any one who really considers the fact itself, and who is capable of drawing an inference.
It was, however, a very considerable time before any attempt was regularly made to construct a similar scientific or artistic analysis for English verse itself. Although efforts were made early to adjust that verse to the complete forms of Latin—and of Greek, which is in some respects prosodically nearer than Latin to English,— although such attempts have been constantly repeated and are being continued now,—it has always been impossible for any intelligent person to make them without finding curious, sometimes rather indefinite, but extremely palpable differences and difficulties in the way. The differences especially have sometimes been exaggerated and more often mistaken, and it is partly owing to this fact that, up to the present moment, no authoritative body of doctrine on the subject of English prosody can be said to exist. It is believed by the present writer that such a body of doctrine ought to be and can be framed—with the constant proviso and warning that it will be doctrine subject, not to the practically invariable uniformity of Science, but to the wide variations of Art,—not to the absolute compulsion of the universal, but to the comparative freedom of the individual and particular. The inquiries and considerations upon which this doctrine is based will be found, at full, in the larger work referred to in the Preface. In the first Book, here, will be set forth the leading systems or principles which have actually underlain, and do underlie, the conflicting views and the discordant terminology of the subject, and this will be followed by perhaps the most valuable part, if any be valuable, of the whole—a series of selected passages, scanned and commented, from the very beginning to the very end of English poetry. In the second, a survey will be given of that actual history of the actual poetry which ought to be, but has very seldom been, the basis of every discussion on prosody. In the third a brief conspectus will be supplied of the actual opinions which have been held on this subject by those who have handled it in English. The fourth will give, in the first place, a Glossary of Terms, which appears to be very much needed; in the second, a list of poets who have specially influenced the course of prosody, with reasoned remarks on their connection with it; in the third, a selected list of important metres with their origins and affiliations; any further matter which may seem necessary following, with a short Bibliography to conclude. The object of the whole is not merely to inculcate what seems to the author to be the best if not the only adequate general system of English prosody, but to provide the student with ample materials for forming his own judgment on this difficult, long debated, often mistaken, but always, if duly handled, profitable and delectable matter.