Fréeres, fréeres, wó ȝe bé!
Mínistrí malórum,
For mány a mánnes sóule bringe ȝé
Ad póenas ínfernórum.
Political Poems, ii. 249.
In many lyrical poems of the older period some stanzas rhyme in long lines, others rhyme in short lines, which shows the gradual genesis of the short-lined metre, rhyming throughout. Thus, in the poem in Wright’s Spec. of Lyr. P., p. 90, the opening verses of the first stanza rhyme in long lines:
My déþ y lóue, my lýf ich háte, | fór a léuedy shéne,
Héo is bríht so daíes líht, | þat ís on mé wel séne,
whereas those of the second rhyme in short lines:
Sórewe and sýke and dréri mód | býndeþ mé so fáste,