Lord of his rights and of his children's love, Which in one moment, like the blast of doom, (Tennyson, Enoch Arden.) § 221. Trochaic Verse. In addition to verses with iambic rhythm, ie, which rise from unstressed syllables to stressed syllables (§ 204), there are also in NE. trochaic verses which begin with a stressed syllable. There is no fundamental difference between iambic and trochaic rhythms, for they both have in common, in contradistinction to anapaestic and dactylic verses (§ 222f.), a regular interchange of stressed and unstressed syllables. A passage in The True Tragedy of Herod and Antipater by Markham and Sampson shows how easily the iambic rhythm can pass into the trochaic. In this drama trochaic verses of five feet suddenly appear among the normal iambic verses: Ant. And judgment should pursue them. Yet, when Kings condémne themselves of ráshnesse, Her. Lórd to see how tíme is lóst with tálking. But the puzzle is easy to solve. Correct iambic blank verse is obtained by correcting the line divisions. Ant. And judgment should pursue them. Her. Good, no more. Goe stay the Execution. Ant. Not on earth How time is lost with talking. Ant. I am gone. -- (Dunstan, Examination of two English Dramas: The Tragedy of Mariam by E. Carew and The True Tragedy of Herod and Antipater by Markham and Sampson, Königsberg 1908, p. 61.) The close relationship between trochaic and iambic verses is seen from the fact that in the sixteenth century a trochaic verse of four feet arises, which by its masculine endings and its occasional anacrusis betrays its descent from the ME. verse of four feet (the short rimed couplet); cp. Midsummer-Night's Dream II, 2, 66 ff.; III, 2, 102 ff. 396 ff.; IV, 1, 77 ff. 99 ff.; V, 2, 1 ff., or Merchant of Venice III, 2, 131 ff.: You that choose not by the view. Be content and seek no new. If you be well pleas'd with this And hold your fortune for your bliss, Turn you where your lady is And | claim her with a loving kiss. Trochaic verse is much rarer than iambic verse and is used frequently only in the nineteenth century. The reasons for the scarcity of trochaic verse are: In trochaic rhythm the beginning of a foot falls together with the beginning of a word (which is felt to be unpleasant, § 209) more often than in iambic rhythm, further feminine endings are necessary in strict trochaic verse, and these are rare in NE. rimed verse (§ 203), so that trochaic verses are often catalectic, i.e. have masculine endings. Finally trochaic verse is not so capable of variation as iambic verse, which the construction of the English sentence favours. Compare Lewis, Principles, p. 101 ff. and Omond, Study of Metre, p. 62. The above-mentioned four-foot trochaic verse with masculine ending is much used later in lyrical poetry, e.g. Byron's Fare Thee Well: Fare thee well! and if for ever. Still for ever, fare thee well! Even though unforgiving, never Gainst thee shall my heart rebel. Longfellow's Hiawatha is in unrimed four-foot trochaics with feminine endings: Ye who love the haunts of Nature, And the rain-shower and the snow-storm, And the thunder in the mountains, Whose innumerable echoes Flap like eagles in their eyries; To this Song of Hiawatha! The metre of Hiawatha becomes monotonous to the reader, especially so owing to the many repetitions, but the metre suits the subject; cp. § 209 and Lewis, p. 105: "Even Hiawatha is, I think, delightful, just because its metre gives it the right touch of primitive outlandishness; but I confess I cannot enjoy very much of it at a time." Poe's Raven is written in trochaic verses of four and eight feet: Once upon a midnight dreary, While I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore Suddenly there came a tapping, "Tis some visitor', I muttered, 'tapping at my chamber door Only this and nothing more'. Tennyson (Locksley Hall), Swinburne (The Armada I, 1: England mother born of seamen, daughter fostered of the sea etc.) and others have used eightfoot trochaic verses. But these readily fall into two four-foot verses, just as seven-foot trochaic verses fall easily into verses of four and three feet, cp. iambic septenary (§ 211), Tennyson, The Captain: Brave the Captain was: the seamen Made a gallant crew, Gallant sons of English freemen, Sailors bold and true. Trochaic verses of six feet and of five feet are used by Swinburne and Browning. The latter uses unrimed trochaic verses of five feet in One Word More: There they are, my fifty men and women, Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also etc. T. Moore's Go where glory waits thee is in trochaic verses of three feet; Shelley's Skylark (§ 240) consists of four such verses followed by an alexandrine. Trochaic verses of one and of two feet occur in stanzas; cp. Schipper, EM II, 1, 396 ff. § 222. Anapaestic Verse. Just as in iambic rhythm, especially in verse of four beats (§ 214), two consecutive unstressed syllables sometimes occur (xxx for xx), so in anapaestic verse the opposite takes place. But the two types can be easily distinguished. In iambic verse the single unstressed syllable is the normal and two syllables must be uttered in the time of one by increasing the pace. In anapaestic verse two consecutive unstressed syllables are normal, where one occurs singly it must be uttered slowly. Anapaestic verse gives the impression of galloping, although an anapaestic verse occupies more time than an iambic verse with the same number of feet. In anapaestic verse the stresses are widely separated; they must, therefore, be made prominent, if the verse scheme is to remain clear. Thus the |