A wet sheet and a blowing gale,
A breeze that follows fast;
That fills the white and swelling sail,
And bends the gallant mast.—Allan Cunningham.
2.
Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep;
Her march is o'er the mountain-wave,
Her home is on the deep.—Thomas Campbell.
To speak first of the term gallant mast. If gallant mean brave, there are two words. If the words be two, there is a stronger accent on mast. If the accent on mast be stronger, the rhyme with fast is more complete; in other words, the metre favours the notion of the words being considered as two. Gallant-mast, however, is a compound word, with an especial nautical meaning. In this case the accent is stronger on gal- and weaker on -mast. This, however, is not the state of things that the metre favours. The same applies to mountain wave. The same person who in prose would throw a stronger accent on mount- and a weaker one on wave (so dealing with the word as a compound), might, in poetry, the words two, by giving to the last syllable a parity of accent.