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  RHYMES AND
  METERS

  A PRACTICAL MANUAL
  FOR VERSIFIERS

  BY
  HORATIO WINSLOW

  THE EDITOR PUBLISHING COMPANY
  Deposit, N. Y.
  1909



  COPYRIGHT, 1906, BY
  THE EDITOR PUBLISHING COMPANY

  THE OUTING PRESS
  DEPOSIT, N. Y.




PREFACE


Throughout the following pages "verse" stands for any kind of metrical
composition as distinguished from prose. It is not used as a synonym for
"poetry." Though most poetry is in verse form, most verse is not poetry.
The ability to write verse can be acquired; only a poet can write
poetry. At the same time, even a poet must learn to handle his verse
with some degree of skill or his work is apt to fall very flat, and the
mere verse writer who cannot rhyme correctly and fit his lines together
in meter had much better stick to prose.

This book has been compiled with one end in view: to arrange in a
convenient and inexpensive form the fundamentals of verse--enough for
the student who takes up verse as a literary exercise or for the older
verse writer who has fallen into a rut or who is a bit shaky on theory.
It is even hoped that there may be a word of help for some embryo poet.

In construction the plan has been to suggest rather than to explain in
detail and as far as possible to help the reader to help himself. No
verse has been quoted except where the illustration of a point made it
necessary. With the increasing number of libraries it ought to be an
easy matter for any one to refer to most of the lesser verse writers as
well as all the standard poets.




CONTENTS

  CHAPTER I
      VERSE MAKING IN GENERAL                9

  CHAPTER II
      METER                                 17

  CHAPTER III
      RHYME                                 25

  CHAPTER IV
      STANZA FORMS                          31

  CHAPTER V
      SUBTLETIES OF VERSIFICATION           37

  CHAPTER VI
      THE QUATRAIN AND SONNET               45

  CHAPTER VII
      THE BALLADE AND OTHER FRENCH FORMS    53

  CHAPTER VIII
      THE SONG                              67

  CHAPTER IX
      TYPES OF MODERN VERSE                 75

  CHAPTER X
      VERSE TRANSLATION                     85

  CHAPTER XI
      ABOUT READING                         93

  CHAPTER XII
      HINTS FOR BEGINNERS                  101

  APPENDIX
      (a) THE VERSE MARKET                 111

      (b) SUGGESTIONS FOR READING          114




I

VERSE MAKING IN GENERAL



CHAPTER I

VERSE MAKING IN GENERAL


It is scarcely necessary to write a defense of verse making. As a
literary exercise it has been recommended and practiced by every
well-known English writer and as a literary asset it has been of
practical value at one time or another to most of the authors of to-day.
Indirectly it helps one's prose and is an essential to the understanding
of the greatest literature.

The fact that courses in "Poetics" have been established at all the
large universities shows the interest which verse making has aroused in
America. In England the ability to write metrical verse has long been
considered one of the component parts of the education of a university
man.

Looked at from the purely practical side, even though not a single line
be sold, verse making has its value. It strengthens the vocabulary;
teaches niceness in the choice of words; invigorates the imagination and
disciplines the mind far more than a dozen times the amount of prose.

But, though careful verse is much more difficult to write than careful
prose, slipshod verse is not worth the ink that shapes it. In taking up
verse writing the student must solemnly resolve on one thing: to
consider no composition complete until it proves up--until the rhymes
and meter are perfect. This "perfection" is not as unattainable as it
sounds, for the laws of rhyme and meter are as fixed as the laws of the
Medes and the Persians. Any one may not be able to write artistic verse,
but any one can write true verse, and the only way to make a course in
verse writing count is to live up to all the rules; to banish all ideas
of "poetic license"; to write and rewrite till the composition is as
near perfect as lies in one, and finally to lay aside and rewrite again.

After the line scans and the rhymes are proved should come the effort
to put the thought clearly. It is often hard to say what one means in
prose. It is harder in verse. In fact, one of the greatest difficulties
any verse maker can overcome is the tendency to be obscure in his
meaning.

With the surmounting of this obstacle comes simplicity of diction; to
present the thought without superfluous words; to avoid the threadbare
phrases and to put the idea in a new way and yet in plain speech. How
far the verse maker will go in clearness and simplicity depends largely
on his natural good taste and discrimination. The better he is able to
appreciate the work of others the better his own will become, and this
appreciation, though it cannot be created, can be cultivated as well as
good manners. To-day more than ever before good reading is one of the
prime essentials to good writing.

Stevenson has recommended imitation as a road to originality and few
have disagreed with him on this point. It is undoubtedly easier to write
a sonnet if one is familiar with Wordsworth or to write a ballade if
one has read Dobson. At the same time to be of value the imitation must
be done broadly and systematically. The artist does not learn to draw by
copying Gibson heads nor the verse maker to write by diluting Kipling.
An imitation should always be made with the idea of reproducing some one
quality which the imitator wishes to develop in himself; the verse maker
should copy not one style but many, and aim at methods rather than
mannerisms.

For a first step in imitation it is well to select a subject akin to the
original and follow the author's construction and trend of thought as
closely as possible. For instance, there is a sonnet on Milton--write a
companion sonnet on Shakespeare or Dante. Match stanzas to Washington
with similar stanzas to Lincoln or Cromwell or any other character who
can be treated in the same general manner. Gray's "Elegy in a Country
Churchyard" suggests other elegies in other churchyards.

One may even parody a poem--not broadly, line for line in the American
fashion--but in the more delicate Calverley way, which applies the
spirit and meter of the poem to a lighter subject. One must imitate
before one can originate, but haphazard imitation leads nowhere.

In conclusion it may be said that verse making is no mystic art hidden
from the many. It is to be acquired by any one who is willing to work at
it steadily and consistently. First, a start in the right direction, and
then practice--practice--practice.

Nothing "dashed off" or "turned out," but every composition saved from
the wastebasket made--

  Correct in construction,
  Clear in thought,
  Simple in diction.




II

METER



CHAPTER II

METER


A metrical composition is divided into lines, each line containing a
definite number of syllables. These syllables are grouped by twos and
threes into "feet" which, by their makeup, determine the meter or
movement of the line.

Meter in English verse is built up through accent alone, but, though
this principle differs entirely from that of the ancients, who depended
on the length of the syllable, we still cling to the names with which
they distinguished the different feet. It will be discovered that by
combining accented and unaccented syllables into groups of two, three
and four an immense variety of feet can be produced. In fact the Roman
poets made use of about thirty. In English verse we disregard the
four-syllabled foot altogether and make use only of the two and three
syllabled.

Those commonly accepted are:

  Iambus [u][-]      Dactyl [-][u][u]

  Trochee [-][u]     Anapest [u][u][-]

  Spondee [-][-]     Amphimacer [-][u][-]

           Amphibrach [u][-][u]

The dash stands for the accented syllable.

An idea of the use of these meters in verse may be gained from the
following examples:

  IAMBIC

     u   -- |  u ---- |  u   --  | u  - |  u   | -----
  "From low | to high | doth dis | solu | tion | climb

   u    -  |   u  ---- | u   -  |  u -  | u  --
  And sink | from high | to low | along | a scale."


  TROCHAIC

   ----  u  | --- u   | --  u  | --  u
  "Tell us, | Master, | of thy | wisdom

  --   u  |  ---   u  | ----  u  | ----   u
  Ere the | chains of | darkness | bind thee."


  DACTYLLIC

   ----  u  u  |  -- u  u
  "Take her up | tenderly

   --   u    u  |  --
  Lift her with | care."


  ANAPESTIC

    u  u ----  | u   u  --  |  u  u  ---- |  u
  "If he talks | of his bak | ing or brew | ing

   u  u ----- |  u  u  --- |  u  u ---
  If he comes | to you rid | ing a cob."

A line of spondees is rarely found in our English because a succession
of accented syllables is almost impossible with us and the amphimacer
and amphibrach are seldom more than secondary feet in a dactyllic or
anapestic line. Where more than one combination of syllables is used the
line takes its name from the foot predominating.

As to number, the feet in a single line are practically unlimited though
one rarely comes across a line containing more than eight. Lines of
three and four are more common. Indeed, in some lyrical poems we have
lines made up of a single syllable.

The classic names for lines of varying length are perhaps necessary. The