Chapter I: Introductory — html/flashpaper   pdf

— The Title - Definition of subject

— Matters barred or subordinated

— The matter preferred, and the method to be applied to it

— The time concerned

— Illustrations from Professor Skeat on Guest and Chaucer

— Antecedent Prosodies

— Anglo Saxon

— Latin - Its divergent lessons

— The earlier or "classical" metre

— The later "accentual" rhythm

— The clash of Rhythm and Metre

— Rhyme

— Greek (?)

— French and Provençal

— Scandanavian

— Celtic

— Summary

Chapter II: From 1100(?) to 1210(?) — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Difficulty as to dates and documents

— Working solution and selection

— The Canute song

— The fragments of St. Godric

— The Paternoster

— The Moral Ode

— The Orison of Our Lady

— Layamon

— The Ormulum

— The lesson of their examination

— The "foot" or "measure unit"

— Its internal and ex ternal arrangement

— Resemblances and differences of the result as compared with the mother-prosodies

— The importance and influence of rhyme

— Illustrated from the Rhyming Poem and Layamon

— From the Ormulum and the other pieces

— From the Paternoster, Orison, and Poema Morale

— And generally

Chapter III: The Thirteenth Century — html/flashpaper   pdf

— The documents

— Layamon B

— The later Moral Ode

— The Bestiary

— Sinners Beware, etc.

— The Love-Rune

— The Owl and the Nightingale

— Tendency to syllabic rigidity

— The correctives of this

— Versicular Survival: Proverbs of Alfred

— Modified in Proverbs of Hendyng

— Genesis and Exodus

— The Northern Psalter

— Robert of Gloucester

— The earliest Romances: Havelok

— King Horn

— The earliest English fabliaux

Interchapter I — html/flashpaper   pdf

Chapter I: The Metrical Romances — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Scale and matter of the period

— The general prosodic phenomena of metrical Romance

— The Auchinleck MS.

— The octosyllabic couplet poems

— Those in "Romance stanza"

— Origin and character of this

— Other stanzas: Sir Tristrem

— Others

— Lybius Disconus, etc.

Chapter II: Alliterative Romance and the
Alliterative Revival Generally — html/flashpaper   pdf

— The reappearance of alliterative measure

— Its charactger: interim comparison of Layamon and Langland

— The wholly unrhymed poems: William of Palerne, etc.

— Character and influence of their versification

— The poems with rhyme and stanza

— Gawain and the Green Knight

— The Awntyrs of Arthur

— The Pistyl of Susan

— The Pearl

— Merits and dangers of the blend

— Character of the reaction generally

Chapter III: Miscellaneous Metrical Poetry before or Contemporary with Chaucer/Gower — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Robert of Brunne

— His metrical jumble

— Lyric: MS. Harl. 2253

— Analysis of its metres

— Alison

— The Cuckoo Song, note

— Lesson of these

— Especially as to Equivalence and Foot-division

— The Percy Society "Religious Poems"

— William of Shoreham

— Wright's "Political Songs"

— The Cursor Mundi

— Minor poems of the Vernon MS.

— "The Dispute between a Good Man and the Devil"

— "The Castle of Love"

— Hampole

— Minot

— Gower

— His octosyllabics

— His other verse

— His general quality

Chapter IV: Chaucer — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Plan of campaign

— What Chaucer had before him in prosody

— His work: The Romaunt of the Rose

— The early "Minor Poems"

— The A B C and its stanza

— Rhetorical prosody

— The Complaint unto Pity

— Rhyme-royal

— The Book of the Duchess

— The Complaint of Mars

— The Parliament of Foules

— The other Minors

— Their lessoon

— Troilus and Cresseide

— The House of Fame

— Cadence, note

— The decasyllable: retrospect of its origin; and study of its virtues

— The Legend of Good Women

— Digression on dificulties

— The crux of the text

— "Critical" editions of the classics and of Middle English

— Solid points for discussion: the stanza forms

— The lines

— Decapitation or initial monosyllabic foot

— Trisyllabic feet

— Elision and Slur

— Trisyllabics proper

— Alexandrines

— Syllable-values

— Rhyme

— Note on Chauceriana

Chapter V: Langland and Other Alliteratives — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Piers Plowman

— Its general character

— The verse compared with Anglo-Saxon

— With Layamon

— Its intrinsic values: Structure

— Alliteration

— Rhymelessness

— Quality of the lines

— Qualifications of the rhythm

— Other alliterative poems c. 1400

Interchapter II — html/flashpaper   pdf

Chapter I: The Drama — html/flashpaper   pdf

— The Harrowing of Hell

— The York Plays

— The Townley

— The Coventry

— The Chester

— The rest

Chapter II: The Successors of Chaucer — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Ungracious state of the subject

— Lydgate and his reputation

— His older panegyrists

— His recent defenders

— The Minor Poems

— London Lickpenny

— The Story of Thebes

— The Temple of Glass

— The Assembly of Gods

— The Secrets of the Philosoffres

— The Two Nightingale Poems

— The Pilgrimage and other octosyllabic poems

— Occleve

— An interim lesson from the pair

— The last group

— Hawes

— The Conversion of Swearers

— The Pastime of Pleasure

— Barclay

— Skelton

— His "doggerel"

— The "Skeltonic" verse

Chapter III: Ballads and other Folk Poetry — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Miscellaneous

— The "Ballad Question" not ours

— Ballad metre very much ours

— Its history and qualities

— The original fourteener

— Chevy Chase

— Gamelyn

— The Nut-brown Maid

— The great Carol

— The Suffolk Dirge

— Miscellenea: songs and carols

— Miscellenea: longer works

Chapter IV: The Prosody of the Scottish Poets — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Character and relative importance

— Correctness and its moral

— Points for attention

— Early octosyllabic couplet: Barbour

— The Saints' Lives

— Wyntoun

— Blind Harry

— James I.

— Henryson

— Dunbar

— His successors not equal

— Douglas

— The Æneid

— The original poems

— The Eighth Prologue

— Lyndsay

— The Reformation satires

— Minor poems generally

— Alexander Scott

— Old-fashioned beauty of his metres

— Montgomerie

— The Cherry and Slae metre

— Others

— Hume and Mure

Interchapter III/Note on the Three Preceeding Books — html/flashpaper   pdf

Chapter I: The Turn of the Tide: Italian Influence — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Outline of subject

— Specific quality, for the purpose, of Italian, and of the sonnet itself

— Wyatt's general effect

— The English sonnet

— In Wyatt

— In Surrey

— Other forms

— "Poulter's measure"

— Wyatt's intertwisted decasyllables

— Surrey's other metres

— His blank verse

Chapter II: The Turn of the Tide: Classical Influence — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Twofold direction of this

— Pseudo-classical "versing"

— Metrical study

Chapter III: The Poets between Surrey and Spenser — html/flashpaper   pdf

— Constituents

— Predominance of the fourteener

— Googe

— His snapped verses

— Turberville

— Tusser

— Gascoigne

— The later miscellanists

— The translators

— Sackville

— The Mirror for Magistrates

Chapter IV: Sixteenth-Century Drama to Marlowe — html/flashpaper   pdf

— The great transition

— Its chief plank: doggerel Alexandrines

— Bale's King Johan

— St. Mary Magdalene, etc.

— Heywood, etc.

— Progress of the doggerel

— Examples

— The Four Elements

— Calisto and Melibæa

— Every Man, etc

— Others

— And others again to Shakespeare

— The metrical aspect of the doggerel group

— The infancy of blank verse

— Gorboduc

— Contrast of potentiality and later achievement

— The Misfortunes of Arthur

— The Marlowe group

Chapter V: Spenser — html/flashpaper   pdf

— His position, looking before and after

— The Shepherd's Kalendar

— The "February" metre

— The others

— Other poems

— Mother Hubbard's Tale

— Spenser as a sonneteer

— The Prothalamion and Epithalamion

— The Faerie Queen, and its stanza

— A true prosodic entity

— The diction

— Capacities of the stanza, internal and co-operative

Interchapter IV — html/flashpaper   pdf

Chapter I: Shakespeare and Blank Verse — pdf

— Retrospect of Chaucer, Surrey, etc.

— The line of the University Wits

— Shakespeare

— The order to be taken with his work

— Titus Andronicus

— The Comedy of Errors

— Love's Labour's Lost

— The Two Gentlemen of Verona

— Romeo and Juliet

— A Midsummer Night's Dream

— All's Well that Ends Well

— The early Histories and their Doubles:

— King John

— The "Doubles" generally

— Henry VI.

— Richard III.

— Henry IV.

— Richard II.

— The Merchant of Venice

— The Later Plays

— The Tempest

— The later (?) comedies

— The Merry Wives

— Measure for Measure

— As You Like It

— Taming of the Shrew

— Twelfth Night

— Much Ado

— The Winter's Tale

— The other English Histories

— Henry V.

— Henry VIII.

— Troilus and Cressida

— Timon of Athens

— Coriolanus

— Julius Cæsar

— Antony and Cleopatra

— The Four Great Tragedies

— Macbeth

— Hamlet

— King Lear

— Othello

— Cymbeline

— Pericles

— General considerations

— The pause

— The trisyllabic foot and its revival

— The redundant syllable

— Enjambment

— The morphology and biology of blank verse

— The Poems

— Venus and Adonis

— Lucrece

— The Sonnets

— Miscellaneous metres: the octosyllable

— Decasyllabic couplets

— The Songs

— Note on The Passionate Pilgrim, etc.

Chapter II: The Other "Elizabethan" Dramatists — pdf

— The shortness of the blank-verse season

— And its causes

— The practitioners

— Jonson

— Chapman

— Marston

— Dekker

— Webster

— Rowley

— Middleton

— Heywood

— Tourneur

— Day

— The minors

— General remarks

— Note on Shakespearian "Doubtful" Plays

Chapter III: The Contemporaries and Followers of Spenser in Stanza and Couplet — pdf

— Retrospect on Spenser's comparative position

— Dyer

— Raleigh

— Greville

— Sydney

— The Arcadia verse

— Astrophel and Stella, etc.

— Marlowe

— Drayton

— The Polyolbion

— His narrative stanzas

— His couplet

— His lyrics

— Daniel

— Davies

— Chapman

— His minor metres

— His fourteener

— Its predecessors

— Phaer, Golding, etc.

— Southwell and Warner

— Chapman's comments on his own verse

— Jonson

— The Fletchers

— Giles

— Phineas

— Browne

— His dealings with Occleve

— His "sevens"

— His enjambed couplet

— Wither

— His longer couplet in "Alresford Pool"

— His shorter

— Sylvester and Basse

— The Scottish Jacobeans

— Ayton, Ker, and Hannay

— Drummond

— Stirling

— Note on the Satirists

Chapter IV: Elizabethan Lyric and Sonnet — Donne — pdf

— Contents of chapter

— The Phœnix Nest

— England's Helicon and Davison's Poetical Rhapsody

— Music and prosody

— The Songs from the Plays

— Those from the Romances

— And from the Song-books

— Campion

— His "versings"

— His rhymed poems

— The Sonnet-outburst

— Community of its phenomena

— Instance from Zepheria

— And of its goodness

— Method of operation

— Licences and variations

— In line-length

— In line-number

— Other freaks

— Canzons, madrigals, etc.

— Barnes

— The moral of sonnet and song

— Johnson's lyrics

— The Celia Song

— The epitaphs

— Others

— The In Memoriam metre

— The problem of Donne

— His double prosodic aspect

— The anarchy of the Satires

— The "middle poems"

— The Lyrics

Chapter V: Prosodists — pdf

— A new subject of study

— The attraction of classical metres

— Note on Hawes's Example of Virtue

— The "craze" for them in English

— Ascham

— The contempt of rhyme

— Freaks of the craze

— Drant

— Harvey and Spenser

— Stanyhurst

— "Quantity"

— Sidney's silence

— Webbe

— Nash

— Puttenham

— Campion's Observations

— Daniel's Defence

— The Mirror for Magistrates once more

— Lesson of its prosodic freaks

— Of the prose discussions

— Of its later editions

— Gascoigne's Notes of Instruction

— Note on King James's Rewlis and Cautelis

— Chapman, Johnson, Drayton

Interchapter V — pdf

Chapter I Milton — pdf

— Studies of Milton's prosody frequent

— Reasons for this

— The early minor pieces

— The Nativity hymn

— The Archades, etc.

— Note on Translations, note

— The octosyllabic group

— The Sonnetts

— Lycidas

— Originality of its form

— Compared with Spenser

— Analysis

— Rationale of the system

— The blank verse

— Comus

— Paradise Lost

— The abjuration of rhyme

— Examination of the verse

— Apostrophation

— Paradise Regained

— Samson Agonistes

— Attempts to systematise apparent anomaly

— Mr. Bridges' view

— Discussion of it

— Contrast of it with our system

— The printing argument

— Cacophonies

— The "scanned not pronounced" argument

— Classical parallels and comparisons

— The true prosodic position of Milton

— Conclusion on uncontentious points

Chapter II The Battle of the Couplets — pdf

— The main currents of mid-seventeenth-century prosody

— The use of the couplet

— The pioneers

— Fairfax

— Sir John Beaumont

— Sandys

— The first main practitioners

— Waller

— Characteristics of his smoothness

— His other metres

— Their moral as to the couplet

— Cowley

— His curious position

— His couplet generally

— The Davideis

— His own principles

— His lyrics

— Denham

— The opposite or enjambed form

— Chalkhill, Marmion, and Chamberlayne

— The constitutive diference of the two styles

— Dangers of enjambment

— Note on the two couplets

Chapter III The Decay of Dramatic Blank Verse — pdf

— Beaumont and Fletcher

— Their taste for redundance

— Their attitude to their licences

— Massinger

— Ford

— Shirley

— Randolph

— Brome

— Davenport

— Nabbes

— Glapthorne

— The actual débâcle

— Suckling

— Davenant

— The problem

— And its answer

— Further instances

— Goff and Cokain

— Nero and The Martyred Soldier

— Rebellion

— Andromana

— Divers Caroline plays compared with Lust's Dominion

Chapter IV Caroline Lyric, Pindaric, and Stanza — pdf

— Special characteristics of this lyric

— And special influence of Jonson and Donne

— Some general characteristics

— Special metres

— The Caroline comon measure

— The Caroline long measure and In Memoriam quatrains

— The pure or mixed trochaic measures

— Herrick

— Carew

— Crashaw

— George Herbert

— Vaughan

— Lord Herbert of Cherbury

— Marvell

— The general

— Digression on "Phillida flouts me" and foot-division

— "Pindaric"

— Its rise in Cowley and its nature

— The inducements ot it

— Furor poeticus, etc.

— Its intrinsic attractions

— Its history

— Cowley's own practice

— The decay of stanza

— The quatrain

Chapter V Prosodists — pdf

Chapter I Dryden — pdf

— Variety of Dryden's metres

— His general prosodic standpoint

— His practice

— The Hastings elegy

— The Heroic Stanzas

— Astæa Redux and its group

— Annus Mirabilis

— The couplet in the heroic plays

— Its changes

— And conversion to blank

— Dryden's blank verse

— His lyrics

— Other songs

— The Odes

— The Hymns, etc.

— The couplet in the Translations

— In the later poems generally

— The Prologues, etc.

— The Satires

— The didactic and narrative pieces

— Triplets and Alexandrines

— Note on Alexandrines in continuous verse

Chapter II Contemporaries of Dryden in Lyric, Pindaric, and Couplet — pdf

— Arrangement

— Relation in form to predecessors

— "Orinda"

— Aphra Behn

— Sedley

— Rochester

— Dorset

— Others

— Otway

— Halifax

— Mulgrave

— Congreve

— Walsh

— The later Pindarics

— Sprat, Watts, etc.

— Otway again

— Swift

— Yalden

— Congreve again

— Couplet verse

— The minor heroic dramatists and the satirists

— Roscommon

— Mulgrave again

— Others

— Pomfret

Chapter III The Octosyllable and the Anapæst: Butler, Swift, and Prior — pdf

— "Hudibrastics" and Hudibras

— Their congeniality

— The rhymes

— Improper use of the name

— Practice of the metre before and after 1700

— Swift: his octosyllables

— The anapæst

— Retrospect of it

— Examples up to "Mary Ambree"

— And "A Hundred Years Hence"

— Remarks on this

— Prior

— His relation to the couplet

— His prosodic remarks

— His Pindaric

— His "improved" Spenserian

— His Octosyllables

— His Anapæsts

— The charm of the metre

— Other points in him

— His double rhymes

Chapter IV Prosodists — pdf

— Continued poeverty of the subject

— Dryden

— Mulgrave, Roscommon, etc.

Interchapter VII — pdf

Chapter I Pope and the Later Couplet — pdf

— Pope's metrical unitarianism

— His couplet, and its form

— The "gradus epithet"

— The Pastorals

— The Messiah and Windsor Forest

— The Essay on Criticism and The Rape of the Lock

— The Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady

— Eloisa to Abelard

— Interim comparison with Dryden

— The Homer

— The Essays and Satires

— Their value as chasteners

— Pope in other measures

— After Pope

— Johnson

— The partial return to Dryden

— Savage

— Churchill

— Goldsmith

— Crabbe

— Sir Eustace Grey etc.

— The heroics

— Cowper

— His early poems

— Table Talk, etc.

— Tirocinium

Chapter II Blank Verse after Milton — pdf

— The meaning of "after"

— Roscommon

— John Philips

— Broome and Fenton

— Addison, Watts, and others

— Gay and Prior

— Thomson

— Somerville

— Armstrong

— Young

— Digression on dramatic blanks

— Southerne

— Congreve, Rowe, and Addison

— Exaltation of the soliloquy

— Return to Night Thoughts

— Akenside

— Blair

— Glover

— Cowper

— Early blank verse

— The Task

— Yardley Oak

Chapter III Eighteenth-Century Lyric, etc. — pdf

— Preliminaries

— The Transition

— Addison, Parnell, and Rowe

— Hughes

— Gay

— Granville, etc.

— Watts

— Byrom

— Shenstone

— Spenserian imitation

— Akenside

— Smart

— Collins

— The "Ode to Evening"

— The others

— Gray

— The "Elegy" and the minor Odes

— The two great Odes, etc.

— Note, Mason

— Goldsmith

— Cowper

— Chatterton

— The Ballad

— The 1723 Collection

— The Reliques

— Evans

— Some minor lyrics

— The hymn-writers

— Charles Wesley

— Toplady

— Cowper again

— Later eighteenth-century anapæst and octosyllable

— Dyer and Anstey

Chapter IV Prosodists — pdf

— Revival of prosodic study

— Bysshe

— The rigour of the syllabic game

— Importance of this

— Watts

— Gildon

— Brightland, etc.

— Pemberson, Mainwaring, Harris

— Say and Home

— Burnet, Tucker, Herries

— Sheridan

— Steele

— Tyrwhitt

— Walter Young

— Nares and Fogg

— The Upper House: Shenstone

— On "long" rhymes

— On "dactyls"

— Gray

— His Metrum notes

— Johnson

— "Decasyllabomania" in him and others

— His arguments on pause

— Note on Goldsmith, note

— John Mason

— Mitford

Interchapter VIII — pdf

Chapter I Burns, Blake, and the Close of the Eigheenth Century (with an Excursus on Ossian)

— A glance backwards at Crabbe and Cowper

— Burns

— His "alterative" power

— Of the highest importance, but comparatively simple

— Blake: his complexity

— The Poetical Sketches

— The "Mad Song"

— The Songs of Innocence and of Experience

— The MS. Poems

— The "Prophetic" Books

— Blake's note on their form

— Models?

— The Early Fragment

— Tiriel

— Thel

— The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

— The French Revolution

— Albion, America, and Europe

— Urizen, Los, and Ahania

— The Four Zoas (Vala)

— Milton and Jerusalem

— Summary on Blake

— The other side

— Darwin

— Hayley

— Gifford

— Helen Maria Williams

— The Della Cruscans

— Moral of this

— Attempts at rhymelessness

— The hexameter

— Rhymeless Pindarics

— Sayers

— Bowles

Excursus on Ossian

Chapter II The First Romantic Group (The Lake Poets, Scott, Moore,
Landor, etc.)

— Possible influences

— Southey

— His early perception of true doctrine

— His practice in Ballad

— Thalaba

— Kehania

— Coleridge

— The Christabel manifesto

— Its looseness of statement

— His prosodic opinions not clear

— Supreme importance of his prosodic practice

— Kubla Khan

— The Ancient Mariner

— Recent ballad metre

— Christabel

— Wonderful blunders about it

— His other prosodic titles

— Wordsworth: his theories on poetic diction

— On "harmony of numbers"

— His actual prosodic quality

— The prosody of the Immortality ode

— An interlude of skirmish

— Scott

— His relation to Christabel

— His other narrative metres

— His lyric

— His critics

— Special relation of Moore's prosody to music

— The lesson of "Eveleen's Bower"

— Landor: his ordinary prosody

— That of his "epigrams"

— Rogers

— Campbell

— Mat Lewis

Chapter III The Second Romantic Group (Leigh Hunt, Byron, Shelley, Keats, and Minors)

— Leigh Hunt

— Byron: his lyrics

— His blank verse, etc.

— His Spenserians

— His serio-comic ottava

— Digression on Frere

— Byron's adoption of it

— Don Juan

— Shelley

— Undeliberateness of his prosody

— the "Juvenilia"

— Queen Mab

— His blank verse from Alastor onwards

— His early Spenserians

— Prince Athanase and the tercet

— Rosalind and Helen: Shelley's octosyllables

— Julian and Maddalo: his heroics

— Blank verse and other metres in drama

— Prometheus Unbound

— The Masque of Anarchy, etc.

— The Witch of Atlas and the octave

— Epipsychidion and Adonais

— The Triumph of Life, etc.

— The smaller lyrics, etc.

— Keats

— The early poems

— The sonnetts

— Endymion and Keats's first couplet

— The prosodic criticism in the Quarterly

— Isabella and his octave

— Lamia and the improved couplet

— Hyperion and its blank verse

— The Eve of St. Agnes and the Spenserian

— The various ode stanzas

— La Belle Dame sans Merci and The Eve of St. Mark

— The "Intermediates"

— "L. E. L."

— Haynbes Bayly

— Macaulay

— "The Last Buccaneer"

— Praed

— The "Praed metre"

— Hood

— "The Haunted House"

— His minor poems

— Darley and Beddoes

Chapter IV Prosodists before Guest

— Subject of the chapter

— Return to Cowper; as prosodic critic

— Sayers again

— The grammaticasters; Walker and Murray

— Odell

— Thelwall

— Roe

— Warner

— Herbert

— Gregory

— Criticisms on Southey's hexameters; the Edinburgh Review

— Tillbrook

— Crowe

— Some others

— Payne Knight

— Carey

— Frere and Blundell

Interchapter IX

Chapter I Tennyson and Browning

— Tennyson: the Poems by Two Brothers and other earliest work

— Timbuctoo and The Lover's Tale

— The volumes of 1830 and 1832

— "Claribel"

— The "Hollyhock" song

— "The Poet" and the decasyllabic quatrain

— The "Palace" and "Dream" stanzas

— The "Dying Swan"

— "The Lady of Shalott"

— "Œnone"

— The "Lotos-Eaters"

— The "Vision of Sin"

— "St. Simeon Stylites"

— "Love and Duty"

— "Morte d'Arthur" and "Ulysses"

— The Princess

— In Memoriam

— The Wellington ode

— Maud

— "The Voyage," etc.

— The anapæstics of the Ballads

— The later blank verse

— The dramas

— Browning

— The common mistake about him and Sordello

— The later form: not incorrect, but admitting the highest excellence with difficulty

— His octosyllables

— His salvation by lyric

— Miscellaneous examples

— "Love among the Ruins"

— "The Last Ride Together"

— "In a Gondola"

— More miscellenies

— "Childe Roland"

— Dramatis Personae

— "James Lee['s Wife]"

— "Abt Vogler"

— "Rabbi Ben Ezra"

— The later books

— Fifine at the Fair

— The last varieties

Chapter II The Mid-Century Minors

— Classification

— Mrs. Browning

— Her defects in form, especially in rhyme and diction

— The superiority of her strictly metrical powers

— Examples, especially "The Rhyme of the Duchess May"

— Mathew Arnold: his peculiar position

— His rhymless attempts: "The Strayed Reveller"

— Early lyric and blank verse

— "The Forsaken Merman" and "A Question"

— "The Church of Brou" and "Tristram and Iseult"

— "Isolation"

— Merope

— Empedocles on Etna

— "The Scholar-Gypsy," etc.

— Kingsley

— Some general considerations

— The "Spasmodics"

— Some miscellaneous examples

— Light verse: Barham

— Thackeray

— Dramatic verse: retrospect

— Miss Baillie and Talfourd

— Tennyson and Browning again

— Edward FitzGerald and the Rubaiyat

Chapter III Guest and other Mid-Century Prosodists

— Guest's History of English Rhythms

— The author a "solifidian" of accent

— His learning

— Its accompanying drawbacks

— The three obsessions

— Their working

— The accentual prejudice

— The linguistic-historical delusions

— The "section"

— Its scheme

— Its freaks

— Southey's summary verdict

— Evans

— O'Brien, Latham, Dallas, Lord Redesdale, etc.

Interchapter X

Chapter I The Pre-Raphaelite School

— Distribution and nomenclature

— Differentia: general and particular

— D. G. Rossetti

— "The Blessed Damozel"

— Various poems

— His sonnets and the later sonnet generally

— William Morris: his prosodic importance

— The verse in the Oxford and Cambridge Magazine

— The Defense of Guenevere

— The Life and Death of Jason

— Morris's heroics

— The Earthly Paradise

— Its octosyllabics

— Mr. Swinburne: his blank verse postponed

— Atalanta in Calydon

— Considerations on it

— Chastelard

— Poems and Ballads

— Laus Veneris

— Various forms

— The "Dolores" metre

— Other books: A Song of Italy and Songs before Sunrise

— The second Poems and Ballads

— "At a Month's End"

— The later volumes

— The blank verse

— The couplets of Tristram

— The long metres

— Miss Rossetti: Goblin Market

— The title poem

— Her later books

— Sonnets and general quality

— Canon Dixon

— Mano and its metre

— O'Shaughnessy: The Epic of Women

— The "Bacarolle"

— Lays of France

— Songs of a Worker

— Music and Moonlight

— James Thomson II.

Chapter II Other Poets of 1850-1900

— Restrictions

— Mr. George Meredith

— Comparison of Emily Bronte's "Remembrance"; Faber's "Pilgrims of the Night"; and Lord Lytton's "Astarte"

— Miss Veley: "A Japanese Fan"

— Lord De Tabley

— Mr. Henley

— John Davidson

— Francis Thompson

— Coventry Patmore

— The revival of the ballade and similar forms

— Some more dead poets, and some live ones

Chapter III The Later English Hexameter and the Discussions on It

— Hexametrists between Daniel and the mid-eighteenth century

— Goldsmith

— Tucker and the Herries

— The German example and its followers

— The "accentual form

— Coleridge

— Southey: his discussion of the matter

— The Vision of Judgment

— Between Southey and Longfellow

— Evangeline

— Clough: The Bothie

— His elegiacs, lyrics, etc.

— Others

— Cayley

— Calverley

— Kingsley and his remarks on Andromeda

— Andromeda itself

— Its base really anapæstic

— Tennyson

— Arnold and others

— Mr. Swinburne

— The last stage

— Reversion to Spedding, etc.

— Mr. W. J. Stone

— Mr. Bridges' experiments

Chapter IV Later Prosodists

— Plan

— Mr. Omond's work

— Sidney Walker

— Masson

— Patmore

— Mr. Wadham

— Tom Hood the Younger

— Dr. Abbott

— Professor Sylvester

— Professor Earle

— Mr. Henry Sweet

— Mr. Symonds

— Mr. A. J. Ellis

— Conway

— Mr. Ruskin

— Mr. Edmund Gurney

— Mr. Shadworth Hodgson

— Professor Fleeming Jenkin

— Professor Mayor

— The "monopressure" theory

— Mr. William Larminie

— Mr. J. M. Robertson

— MM. Van Dam and Stoffel

— Other foreign students of English prosody: Dr. Schipper

— M. Verrier

— Mr. Hallard

— Mr. Bateson

— Mr. William Thomson

— Mr. C. F. Keary

— Mr. Hewlett

— Remarks on "Fancy" prosodies

Chapter V American Poets and Prosodists

— Necessary selection

— Bryant

— "Maria del Occidente"

— Holmes

— Lowell

— Leland

— Emerson

— Poe

— His verse

— His Rationale of Verse

— Longfellow

— Whitman

— Rush

— Lanier

— Dr. Price

— Professor Gummere

— Miss Julia Dabney

— Professor Liddell

— Professor Lewis

— Others

A. Feet

— Feet composed of long and short syllables

— Not all combinations actual

— Differences from "classical" feet

— The three usual kinds: iamb, trochee, anapæst

— The spondee

— The dactyl

— The pyrrhic

— The tribrach

— Others

B. Constitution of Feet

— Quality or "quantity" in feet

— Not necessarily "time"

— Nor vowel "quantity"

— Accumulated consonants

— Or rhetorical stress

— Or place in verse will quantify

— Commonness of monosyllables

C. Equivalence and Substitution

— Substitution of equivalent feet

— Its two laws

— Confusion of base must be avoided

— (Of which the ear must judge)

— Certain substitutions are not eligible D. Pause

— Variation of pause

— Practically at discretion

— Blank verse specially dependent on pause

E. Line-Combination

— Simple or complex

— Rhymes necessary to couplet

— Few instances of successsful unrhymed stanza

— Uneveness of line in length

— Stanzas to be judged by the ear

— Origin of commonest line-combinations

F. Rhyme

— Rhyme natural in English

— It must be "full"

— and not identical

— General rule as to it

— Alliteration

— Single, etc., rhyme

— Fullness of sound

— Internal rhyme permissible

— But sometimes dangerous

G. Miscellaneous

— Vowel-music

— "Fingering"

— Confusion of rhythms intolerable

A. Lines

— I. Alliterative

— II. "Short" lines

— III. Octosyllable

— IV. Decasyllable

— V. Alexandrine

— VI. Fourteener

— VII. Doggerel

— VIII. "Long" lines

B. Stanzas, etc.

— I. Ballad Verse

— II. Romanced-Six or Rime Couee

— III. Octosyllabic and Decasyllabic Couplet

— IV. Quatrain

— V. In Memoriam Metre

— VI. Rhyme-Royal

— VII. Octave

— VIII. Spenserian

— IX. Burns Metre

— X. Other Stanzas

Chapter IV Bibliography

— Abbot, E.A.

— Alden, R. M.

— Blake, J. W.

— Brewer, R. F.

— Bridges, R. S.

— Bysshe, Edward

— Calvery, C. S.

— Campion, Thomas

— Cayley, C. B.

— Coleridge, S. T.

— Conway, Gilbert

— Crowe, William

— Daniel, Samuel

— Dryden, John

— Gascoigne, George

— Goldsmith, Oliver

— Guest, Edwin

— Hodgson, Shadworth

— Hood, T. (the younger)

— Jenkin, Fleeming

— Johnson, Samuel

— Ker, W. P.

— King James the First (Sixth of Scotland)

— Lewis, C. M.

— Liddell, Mark H.

— Mason, John

— Masson, David

— Mayor, J. B.

— Mitford, William

— Ormond, T.S.

— Patmore, Coventry

— Poe, E. A.

— Puttenham, George?

— Ruskin, John

— Schipper, J.

— Shenstone, William

— Skeat, W. W.

— Southey, Robert

— Spedding, James

— Spenser, Edmund

— Steele, Joshua

— Stone, W. J.

— Symonds, J. A.

— Thelwall, John

— Verrier, M.

— Wadham, E.

— Webbe, William