The more pure these several kinds are preserved, the more exact and complete is the chime of the verse. But exactness being difficult, and its sameness sometimes irksome, the poets generally indulge some variety; not so much, however, as to confound the drift of the rhythmical pulsations: or, if ever these be not made obvious to the reader, there is a grave fault in the versification.
The secondary feet, if admitted at all, are to be admitted only, or chiefly, as occasional diversifications. Of this class of feet, many grammarians adopt four; but they lack agreement about the selection. Brightland took the Spondee, the Pyrrhic, the Moloss, and the Tribrach. To these, some now add the other four; namely, the Amphibrach, the Amphimac, the Bacchy, and the Antibacchy.
Few, if any, of these feet are really necessary to a sufficient explanation of English verse; and the adopting of so many is liable to the great objection, that we thereby produce different modes of measuring the same lines. But, by naming them all, we avoid the difficulty of selecting the most important; and it is proper that the student should know the import of all these prosodical terms.
- A Spondee is a poetic foot consisting of two long syllables; as, cōld nīght, pōōr sōuls, ămĕn, shrōvetīde.
- A Pyrrhic is a poetic foot consisting of two short syllables; as, presumpt-\ŭoŭs, perpet-\ŭăl, unhap-\pĭlў, inglo-\rĭoŭs.
- A Moloss is a poetic foot consisting of three long syllables; as, Deăth's pāle hōrse,—greāt whīte thrōne,—dēep dāmp vāūlt.
- A Tribrach is a poetic foot consisting of three short syllables; as, prohib-\ĭtŏrў, unnat-\ŭrăllў, author-\ĭtătĭve, innum-\ĕrăblĕ.
- An Amphibrach is a poetic foot of three syllables, having both sides short, the middle long; as, ĭmprūdĕnt, cŏnsīdĕr, trănspōrtĕd.
- An Amphimac, Amphimacer, or Cretic, is a poetic foot of three syllables, having both sides long, the middle short; as, wĭndĭngshēet, līfe-ĕstāte, sōul-dĭsĕased.
- A Bacchy is a poetic foot consisting of one short syllable and two long ones; as, thē whōle wŏrld,—ă greāt vāse,—ŏf pūre gōld.
- An Antibacchy, or Hypobacchy, is a poetic foot consisting of two long syllables and a short one; as, knīght-sērvĭce, glōbe-dāisў, grāpe-flowĕr, gōld-bēatĕr.
Among the variegations of verse, one emphatic syllable is sometimes counted for a foot. "When a single syllable is [thus] taken by itself, it is called a Cæsura, which is commonly a long syllable."[1]FOR EXAMPLE:
"Keeping \ time, \ time, \ time,
In a \ sort of \ Runic \ rhyme,
To the \ tintin\ -nabu\ -lation that so \ musi\-cally \ wells
From the \ bells, \ bells, \ bells, \ bells,
Bells, \ bells, \ bells."
—EDGAR A. POE: Union Magazine, for Nov. 1849; Literary World, No. 143.
OBSERVATIONS.
- In defining our poetic feet, many late grammarians substitute the terms accented and unaccented for long and short, as did Murray, after some of the earlier editions of his grammar; the only feet recognized in his second edition being the Iambus, the Trochee, the Dactyl, and the Anapest, and all these being formed by quantities only. This change has been made on the supposition, that accent and long quantity, as well as their opposites, nonaccent and short quantity, may oppose each other; and that the basis of English verse is not, like that of Latin or Greek poetry, a distinction in the time of syllables, not a difference in quantity, but such a course of accenting and nonaccenting as overrides all relations of this sort, and makes both length and shortness compatible alike with stress or no stress. Such a theory, I am persuaded, is untenable. Great authority, however, may be quoted for it, or for its principal features. Besides the several later grammarians who give it countenance, even "the judicious Walker," who, in his Pronouncing Dictionary, as before cited, very properly suggests a difference between "that quantity which constitutes poetry," and the mere "length or shortness of vowels," when he comes to explain our English accent and quantity, in his "Observations on the Greek and Latin Accent and Quantity," finds "accent perfectly compatible with either long or short quantity;" (Key, p. 312;) repudiates that vulgar accent of Sheridan and others, which "is only a greater force upon one syllable than another;"
- ↑ [499] Dr. Adam's Gram., p. 267; B. A. Gould's, 257. The Latin word cæsura signifies "a cutting, or division." This name is sometimes Anglicized, and written "Cesure." See Brightland's Gram., p. 161; or Worcester's Dict., w. Cesure.
