Any man would desire to have her, and by any means,” &c.
Correct the whole passage,—
“Though I confess
Any man would
Desire to have her, and by any means,
At any rate too, yet this common hangman
That hath whipt off a thousănd măids heads already—
That he should glean the harvest, sticks in my stomach!”
In all comic metres the gulping of short syllables, and the abbreviation of syllables ordinarily long by the rapid pronunciation of eagerness and vehemence, are not so much a license as a law,—a faithful copy of nature, and let them be read characteristically, the times will be found nearly equal. Thus, the three words marked above make a choriambus -- u u, or perhaps a pæon primus - u u u; a dactyl, by virtue of comic rapidity, being only equal to an iambus when distinctly pronounced. I have no doubt that all B. and F.'s works might be safely corrected by attention to this rule, and that the editor is entitled to transpositions of all kinds, and to not a few omissions. For the rule of the metre once lost—what was to restrain the actors from interpolation?