This eye This ear This heart
Shall joy Shall bend Shall swear
Your face Your tongue Your wit
To serve To trust To fear."
ANONYMOUS: Sundry American Newspapers, in 1849.
Example III.—Umbrellas.
"The late George Canning, of whom Byron said that 'it was his happiness to be at once a wit, poet, orator, and statesman, and excellent in all,' is the author of the following clever jeu d' esprit:" [except three lines here added in brackets:]
"I saw \ a man \ with two \ umbrellas,
(One of \ the lon \—gest kind \ of fellows,)
When it rained,
Mēet ā \ lādy
On the \ shady
Side of \ thirty\-three,
Minus \ one of \ these rain\-dispellers.
'I see,'
Says she,
'Your qual\-ity \ of mer\-cy is \ not strained.'
[Not slow \ to comprehend \ an inkling,
His eye \ with wag\-gish hu\-mour twinkling.]
Replied \ he, 'Ma'am,
Be calm;
This one \ under \ my arm
Is rotten,
[And can\-not save \ you from \ a sprinkling.]
Besides \ to keep \ you dry,
'Tis plain \ that you \ as well \ as I,
'Can lift \ your cotton.'"
See The Essex County Freeman, Vol. i, No. 1.
Example IV.—Shreds of a Song.
I. SPRING.
"The cuck \—oo then, \ on ev \—ery tree,
Mocks mar \—ried men, \ for thus \ sings he, Cuckoo’;
Cuckoo', \ cuckoo',— \ O word \ of fear,
Unpleas\-ing to \ a mar\-ried ear!"
II. WINTER.
"When blood \ is nipp'd, \ and ways \ be foul,
Then night\-ly sings \ the star\-ing owl, To-who;
To-whit, \ to-who, \ a mer\-ry note,
While greas\-y Joan \ doth keel \ the pot."
—Shakspeare: Love's Labour's Lost, Act v, Sc. 2.
Example V.—Puck's Charm.
[When he has uttered the fifth line, he squeezes a juice on Lysander's eyes.]
"On the ground,
Sleep sound;
I'll apply
To your eye,
Gentle \ lover, \ remedy.
When thou wak'st,
Thou tak'st
True delight
In the sight
Of thy \ former \ lady's eye."[1]
IDEM: Midsummer-Night's Dream, Act iii, Sc. 2.
ORDER II.—TROCHAIC VERSE.
In Trochaic verse, the stress is laid on the odd syllables, and the even ones are short. Single-rhymed trochaic omits the final short syllable, that it may end with a long one; for the common doctrine of Murray, Chandler, Churchill, Bullions, Butler, Everett, Fowler, Weld, Wells, Mulligan, and others, that this chief rhyming syllable is "additional" to the real number of feet in the line, is manifestly incorrect. One long syllable is, in some instances, used as a foot; but it is one or more short syllables only, that we can properly admit as hypermeter. Iambics and trochaics often occur in the same poem; but, in either order, written with exactness, the number of feet is always the number of the long syllables.
Examples from Gray's Bard.
(1.)
"Ruin \ seize thee,\ ruthless \ king!
Confu\-sion on \ thy ban\-ners wait,
Though, fann'd \ by Con\-quest's crim\-son wing.
They mock \ the air \ with i\-dle state.
Helm, nor \ hauberk's \ twisted \ mail,
Nor e'en \ thy vir\-tues, ty\-rant, shall \ avail."
(2.)
"Weave the \ warp, and \ weave the \ woof,
The wind\-ing-sheet \ of Ed\-ward's race.
Give am\-ple room, \ and verge \ enough,
The char\-acters \ of hell \ to trace.
Mark the \year, and \ mark the \ night,
When Sev\-ern shall \ re-ech\-o with \ affright."
"The Bard, a Pindaric Ode;"
British Poets, Vol. vii, p. 281 and 282.
OBSERVATIONS.
- Trochaic verse without the final short syllable, is the same as iambic would be without the initial short syllable;—it being quite plain, that iambic, so changed, becomes trochaic, and
- ↑ [508] These versicles, except the two which are Italicized, are not iambic. The others are partly trochaic; and, according to many of our prosodists, wholly so; but it is questionable whether they are not as properly amphimacric, or Cretic.
