"Apol | -lo smil'd shrewd | -ly, and bade | him sit down,
With 'Well, | Mr. Scott, | you have man | -aged the town;
Now pray, | copy less— | have a lit | -tle temer | -~it~y—
[And] Try | if you can't | also man | -age poster | -ity.
[For] All | you add now | only les | -sens your cred | -it;
And how | could you think, | too, of tak | -ing to ed | -ite?'"
LEIGH HUNT'S Feast of the Poets, page 20.
The anapestic measures are few; because their feet are long, and no poet has chosen to set a great many in a line. Possibly lines of five anapests, or of four and an initial iambus, might be written; for these would scarcely equal in length some of the iambics and trochaics already exhibited. But I do not find any examples of such metre. The longest anapestics that have gained my notice, are of fourteen syllables, being tetrameters with triple rhyme, or lines of four anapests and two short surplus syllables. This order consists therefore of measures reducible to the following heads:—
MEASURE I.—ANAPESTIC OF FOUR FEET, OR TETRAMETER.
Example I.—A "Postscript."—An Example with Hypermeter.
"Lean Tom, | when I saw | him, last week, | on his horse | awry,
Threaten'd loud | -ly to turn | me to stone | with his sor | -cery.
But, I think, | little Dan, | that, in spite | of what our
| foe says,
He will find | I read Ov | -id and his | Meta_mor_ | -phoses.
For, omit | -ting the first, | (where I make | a com_par_ | -ison,
With a sort | of allu | -sion to Put | -land or Har | -rison,)
Yet, by | my descrip | -tion, you'll find | he in short | is
A pack | and a gar | -ran, a top | and a tor | -toise.
So I hope | from hencefor | -ward you ne'er | will ask, can
| I maul
This teas | -ing, conceit | -ed, rude, in | -solent an | -imal?
And, if | this rebuke | might be turn'd | to his ben | -efit,
(For I pit | -y the man,) | I should | be glad then | of it"
SWIFT'S POEMS: Johnson's British Poets, Vol. v, p. 324.
Example II.—"The Feast of the Poets."—First Twelve Lines.
"T' other day, | as Apol | -lo sat pitch | -ing his darts
Through the clouds | of Novem | -ber, by fits | and by starts,
He began | to consid | -er how long | it had been
Since the bards | of Old Eng | -land had all | been rung in.
'I think,' | said the god, | recollect | -ing, (and then
He fell twid | -dling a sun | -beam as I | may my pen,)
'I think— | let me see— | yes, it is, | I declare,
As long | ago now | as that Buck | -ingham there;
And yet | I can't see | why I've been | so remiss,
Unless | it may be— | and it cer | -tainly is,
That since Dry | -den's fine ver | -ses and Mil | -ton's sublime,
I have fair | -ly been sick | of their sing | -song and rhyme.'"
LEIGH HUNT: Poems, New-York Edition, of 1814.
Example III.—The Crowning of Four Favourites.
"Then, 'Come,' | cried the god | in his el | -egant mirth,
'Let us make | us a heav'n | of our own | upon earth,
And wake, | with the lips | that we dip | in our bowls,
That divin | -est of mu | -sic—conge | -nial souls.'
So say | -ing, he led | through the din | -ing-room door,
And, seat | -ing the po | -ets, cried, 'Lau | -rels for four!'
No soon | -er demand | -ed, than, lo! | they were there,
And each | of the bards | had a wreath | in his hair.
Tom Camp | -bell's with wil | -low and pop | -lar was twin'd,
And South | -ey's, with moun | -tain-ash, pluck'd | in the wind;
And Scott's, | with a heath | from his old | garden stores,
And, with vine | -leaves and jump | -up-and-kiss | -me, Tom Moore's."
LEIGH HUNT: from line 330 to line 342.
Example IV.—"Glenara."—First Two of Eight Stanzas.