What dróps the mýrrh, | and whát the bálmy réed,
How Náture páints her cólours, | hów the bée
Síts on the blóom | extrácting líquid swéet.’
§ 178. The dramatic blank verse of the Restoration is strongly influenced by the heroic verse of the same period, and is on this account very different from the blank verse of Shakespeare and his contemporaries.
For this period the blank verse of Dryden is most interesting; he uses it with great skill, but also with great restriction of its former licences.
Even the number of the inversions of accent decreases considerably and is only about 12 per cent. We find scarcely any examples of double thesis, slurring of syllables, missing theses in the beginning or in the interior of the line, &c.
The caesura, which is the chief means by which variety is imparted to the metre, is generally masculine or lyric, and as a rule occurs after the second or third foot; occasionally we have double caesuras. Epic caesuras are rare, if they occur at all. Feminine endings are frequent, their proportion being about 25 to 28 per cent. Light and weak endings are rarely to be found amongst the masculine endings, nor are run-on lines (about 20 per cent.) frequently used by Dryden.
Most of the characteristic features of his blank verse will be found exemplified in the following extract:
Emperor. Márry’d! | I’ll nót belíeve it; || ’tís impósture;
Impróbable | they shóu’d presúme t’attémpt,
Impóssible | they shóu’d efféct their wísh.
Benducar. Have pátience tíll I cléar it. |