To háve for his spénding, | suffícient of hóps,
Must wíllingly fóllow, | of chóices to chóose.
Such léssons appróved, | as skílful do úse.
The four beats of the rhythm and the regular occurrence of the caesura are as marked characteristics of these verses as of the earlier specimens of the metre.
Spenser has written several eclogues of his Shepheard’s Calendar in this metre (February, May, September), and Shakespeare uses it in some lyric pieces of his King Henry IV, Part II, but also for dialogues, as e.g. Err. III. i. 11–84. In more modern times Matthew Prior (1664–1715) wrote a ballad Down Hall to the tune, as he says, of King John and the Abbot of Canterbury, which clearly shows that he meant to imitate the ancient popular four-beat rhythm, which he did with perfect success. In other poems he used it for stanzas rhyming in the order a b a b. Swift has used the same metre, and it became very popular in Scottish poetry through Allan Ramsay and Robert Burns, one of whose most famous poems is written in it, viz.:
My héart’s in the Híghlands, | my héart is not hére;
My héart’s in the Híghlands, | a-chásing the déer;
Chásing the wíld deer | and fóllowing the róe,
My héart’s in the Híghlands | wheréver I gó.
Sir Walter Scott used it frequently for drinking-songs, and Thomas Moore wrote his Letters of the Fudge Family in it.