almost infinite number of other " feet." It is, perhaps, necessary to mention some of the principal of these, although they are, in the majority of cases, purely arbitrary. In the rapid measures we find the tribrach (◡ ◡ ◡ , short-short-short), the molossus (— — —, long-long-long), the amphibrach (◡ — ◡ , short-long-short), the amphimacer ( — ◡ —, long- short-long), the bacchius (^ , short-long-long) and the antibacchius (— ◡ ◡ , long-long-short). There is a foot of four syllables, the choriamb (— ◡ ◡ —, long-short-short- long), which is the fundamental foot in Aeolic verse—very frequently mentioned, but very seldom met with.
It must not be forgotten that the prosodical terminology of the Greeks, which is often treated by non-poetical writers as something scientific and even sacrosanct, dates from a time when ancient literature had lost all its freshness and impulse, and was exclusively the study of analysts and gram- marians. Between the life of Pindar, for instance, and that of Hephaestion, the great metrical authority, there extends a longer period than between Chaucer and Professor Skeat; and to appreciate the value of the rules of Greek prosody we must recollect that those rules were invented by learned and academic men to account for phenomena which they observed, and wished to comprehend, in writings that had long been classical, and were already growing positively archaic. The fact seems to be that the combination of long and short syllables into spondees, iambs, dactyls and anapaests, forms the sole genuine basis of all classical verse.
Metre is a science which pays attention to all the possible regular arrangements which can be made of these four indis- pensable and indestructible types. Of the metres of the ancients by far the most often employed, and no doubt the oldest, was the dactylic hexameter, a combination of six feet, five successive dactyls and a spondee or trochee:—
/ ◡ ◡ / ◡ ◡ / ◡ ◡ / ◡ ◡ / ◡ ◡ / ◡
This was known to the ancients as " epic " verse, in contrast to the various lyrical measures. The poetry of Homer is the typical example of the use of the epic hexameter, and the character of the Homeric saga led to the fashion by which the dactylic hexameter, whatever its subject, was styled " heroic metre." The earliest epics, doubtless, were chanted to the accompaniment of a stringed instrument, on which the pulsa- tion of the verse (ἔπη) was recorded. It was the opinion of W. Christ that the origin of the hexameter was to be sought in hieratic poetry, the fulness of the long dactylic line attracting the priests to its use in the delivery of oracles, from which it naturally passed to solemn tales of the actions of gods and heroes. It is more difficult to see how, later on, it became the vehicle for comic and satiric writing, and is found at last adopted by the bucolic poets for their amorous and pastoral dialogues. The Homeric form of the dactylic hexameter has been usually taken, and was taken in classical times, as the normal one, but there have been many variations. A hexameter found in Catullus consists exclusively of spondees, and deviation from the original heroic type could go no further. This concentration of heavy sounds was cultivated to give solemnity to the cha- racter of the line. In the whole matter, it is best to recognize that the rules of the grammarians were made after the event, to account for the fact that the poets had chosen, while adhering to the verse-structure of five rapid beats and a subsidence, to vary the internal character of that structure exactly as their ear and their passion dictated. This seems particularly true in the case of the caesura, where the question is not so much a matter of defining " male " caesura or " female " caesura, " bucolic " caesura or " trochaic," as of patiently noting instances in which the unconscious poet, led by his inspiration, has varied his pauses and his emphasis at his own free will. The critics have written much of " proscdical licence," but verse in the days of Homer, like verse now, is simply good or bad, and if it is good it may show liberty and variety, but it knows nothing of " licence."
We pass, by a natural transition, to the pentameter, which is the most frequently employed of what are known as the syncopied forms of dactylic verse. It was used with the hexa- meter, to produce the effect which was early called elegiac, and its form shows the appropriateness of this custom: —
"Cynthia [ prima fu- | it, || Cynthia | finis e- | rit."
A hexameter, full of energy and exaltation, followed by a descending and melancholy pentameter, had an immediate tendency to take a complete form, and this is the origin of the stanza. The peculiar character of this two-line stanza has been fixed for all time by a brilliant epigram of Schiller, which is itself a specimen of the form: —
" Im Hexameter steigt des Springquells fliissige Saule, Im Pentameter drauf fallt sie melodisch herab."
Such a distich was called an elegy, k'Xeyetor', as specially suitable to an eXeyos or lamentation. It is difficult to say with certainty whether the distich so composed was essential as an accompani- ment to fluter-music in the earliest times, or how soon there came to be written purely literary elegies towards which the melody stood in a secondary or ornamental relation. It has, however, been observed that even when the distich had obviously come to be a purely intellectual or lyrical thing, there remained in the sound of the pentameter the trace of lamentation, in which its primitive use at funeral services was clearly preserved. Other grammarians, however, among whom Casar, in his work on the origin of elegiac verse, is prominent,—do not believe in the lugubrious essence of the pentameter, and think that the elegiacal couplet was originally erotic, and was adapted to mournful themes by Simonides. If we may credit a passage in Athenaeus, it would seem that the earliest-known elegists, such as Callinus and Solon, wrote for recitation, pure and simple, without the accompaniment of any instrument.
Trochaic verse is called by the ancient grammarians headless (ἀκέφαλον) , because it really consists of iambic verse deprived of its head, or opening syllable. The iambic measure (◡ — ◡ — ◡ —) becomes trochaic if we cut off the first "short," and make it run — ◡ — ◡ — ◡ —. The pure trochaic trimeter and tetrameter had a character of breathless speed, and sometimes bore the name of choric (ῥυθμὸς χορεῖος), because it was peculiarly appropriate to the dance, and was used for poems which expressed a quickly stepping sentiment. It is understood that, after having been known as a musical movement, it was first employed in the composition of poetry by Archilochus of Paros, in the 7th century B.C.
Iambic metre was, next to the dactylic hexameter, the form of verse most frequently employed by the poets of Greek antiquity. Archilochus, again, who seems to have been a great initiator in the arts of versification, is credited with the invention of the iambic trimeter also, but it certainly existed before his time. Murray believes the original iambic measure, in its popular familiarity, to have sprung from the worship of the homely peasant gods, Dionysus and Demeter. It was not far removed from prose; it gave a writer opportunity for expressing popular thoughts in a manner which simple men could appreciate, being close to their own unsophisticated speech. In particular, it presented itself as a heaven-made instrument for the talent of Euripides, "who, seeing poetry and meaning in every stone of a street, found in the current iambic trimeter a vehicle of expression in some ways more flexible even than prose."
It was not, however, until the invention of the lyric proper,
whether individual to the poet, or choral, that the full richness of possible rhythms became obvious to the Greeks. The lyric inspiration came originally from the island of Lesbos, and it passed down through the Asiatic archipelago to Crete before it reached the mainland of Greece. The Lesbians cultivated a monodic ode-poetry in strophes and monostrophes, the enchanting beauty of which can still be realized in measure from what remains to us of the writings of Sappho and Alcaeus There is a stanza known as the Sapphic and another as the Alcaic.
