Accent.
Let us first consider accent. We have already tried to indicate what it is. We will now attempt to find out what principles govern it.
Accent is very closely associated with rhythm. It has already been stated that a reading of poetry will cultivate an ear for accent. If every syllable or articulation of language received exactly the same stress, or occupied exactly the same time in pronunciation, speech would have an intolerable monotony, and it would be impossible to give it what is called “expression.” Expression is so important a part of language that the arts of the orator, the actor, and the preacher depend directly upon it. It doubles the value of words.
The foundation of expression is rhythm, or regular succession of stress and easy gliding over syllables. In Latin it was a matter of “quantity,” or long and short vowels. In English it is a mixture of “quantity” (or length and shortness of vowels) and special stress given by the speaker to bring out the meaning as well as to please the ear. Hence English has a range and power that Latin could never have had.
In poetry, accent, quantity, and rhythm are exaggerated according to an artificial plan; but the same principles govern all speech in a greater or less degree, and even the pronunciation of every word of two syllables or more. The fundamental element is “time” as we know it in music. In music every bar has just so much time allotted to it, but that time may be variously divided up between different notes. Thus, suppose the bar is based on the time required for one full note. We may have in place of one full note two half notes or four quarter notes, or a half note lengthened by half and followed by two eight notes, or two quarter notes followed by a half note, and so on. The total time remains the same, but it may be variously divided, though not without reference to the way in which other bars in the same piece of music are divided.
We will drop music and continue our illustration by reference to English poetry. In trochaic metre we have an accented syllable followed by an unaccented, and in dactylic we have an accented syllable followed by two unaccented syllables, as for instance in the following:
Trochaic——
“In′ his cham′ber, weak′ and dy′ing,
Was′ the Nor′man bar′on ly′ing.”
Dactylic——
“This′ is the for′est prime′val.
The mur′muring pines′ and the hem′locks…
Stand′ like Dru′ids of eld′.”
Or in the iambic we have an unaccented syllable followed by an accented,
as in——
“It was′ the schoo'ner Hes′perus′
That sai′led the win′try sea′.”
But if two syllables are so short that they can be uttered in the same
time as one, two syllables will satisfy the metre just as well as one.
Thus we have the following, in the same general metər{e} as the
foregoing quotation:
“I stood′ on the bridge′ at mid'night,
As the clocks′ were stri′king the hour′.”