Still another modification of the simple six-lined stanza consists in the addition of a third rhyme-verse to the two rhyming couplets of each half-stanza; so that an eight-lined stanza results with the scheme a a a b c c c b. Two specimens of this kind of stanza, consisting of two-stressed lines and occurring in Early English dramatic poetry, have been quoted above, § [70].
The same stanza of two-foot verses occurs in the Coventry Mysteries, p. 342. In Modern English, too, we find it sometimes, consisting of three-foot iambic verses, as in Longfellow, King Olaf’s Death Drink (p. 577). Stanzas of five-, four-, and two-foot iambic verses and other metres are likewise in use. (For examples see Metrik, ii, § 275.) Some rarely occurring extended forms of this stanza are exemplified in Metrik, ii, § 277, their schemes being a ~ a ~ b ~ c d ~ d ~ b ~ c4, a ~ b ~ c ~ d e ~ f ~ g ~ d3, a b b c a d d c4, a a a a b c c c c b4.
Sixteen-lined stanzas of this kind of two-stressed verses (rhyming a a a b c c c b d d d b e e e b) that were frequently used in Middle English Romances have been quoted and discussed above, § [65].
II. Anisometrical Stanzas.
§ 240. In connexion with the last section, the chief species of the tail-rhyme stanza may be discussed here first of all. This stanza, as a rule, consists of four four-foot and two three-foot verses, rhyming according to the scheme a a4 b3 c c4 b3; cf. the following specimen (Wright’s Spec. of Lyr. Poetry, p. 101):
Lustneþ alle a lutel þrowe,
Ȝe þat wolleþ ou selue yknowe,
Unwys þah y be:
Ichulle telle ou ase y con,