For the time I study Virtue, and that | part: of | philosophy | Tam. of the Shrew, 1. 1. Night with her will bring Silence, and sleep list ning to thee will watch. His heart P. L. 7. Distends with pride, and hardening in his strength Met such embodied force. P. L. 1. This stop, however, like the last, can never close a period. When the first accent falls on the second syllable, it is very commonly followed by a stop. It were, quod he, to thee no gret honour For to be false, ne for to be traytour To me, that am: thy cousin and thy brother. For it of honour and all virtue is Chau. The Knightes Tale. The root, and brings | forth: glorious flow'rs of fame]. With such an easy and unforc'd ascent, F. Q. 6. 2. That no stupendous precipice denies Access, no horror: turns | away | our eyes]. Denham. Cooper's Hill. Are there, among the females of our isle, Such faults at which: | it is a fault | to smile | ? There are. Vice once by mod est nature chain'd Pope's Sat. 7. And legal ties, expatiates unrestrained. This stop was by no means rare in the verse of four accents. Bot for pite I trow greting Be na thing bot ane opynnyng Off hart, that schaw is the tendernyss | Off rewth that in it closyt is. The Bruce, 2. 926. When he gives her many a rose Sweeter than the breath, that blows The leaves, grapes, berries of the best. : Fletcher. Faithful Shepherdess. Nor let the water riding high, As thou wad'st in, make thee cry, And sob, but ever live | with me, : And not a wave shall trouble thee. Fletcher. Fa. Sh. 2. 1. Our poets sometimes place a stop after the third syllable, but I think never happily. The clotered blood for any leche craft Corrumpeth, and | is in his bouk|e ylaft]. : Chau. The Knightes Tale. Of the blod real Of The bes, and of sus tren two | yborne. Chau. The Knightes Tale. What in me is dark Illumine, what is low raise | and support. How he can Is doubtful, that | he never will, is sure. If I can be to thee A polet, thou: Parnassus art | to me. P. L. 1. P. L. 2. Denham. Cooper's Hill. Why then should I, encouraging the bad, Dryden. Abs. & Arch. This stop is also found in verse of four accents. The lord off Lorne wounyt tharby, When we see how nearly the freedom of our elder poets approached to license, we may appreciate, in some measure, the obligations we are under to the school of Pope and Dryden. The attempts to revive the abuses, which they reformed, have happily, as yet, met with only partial success. OUR Anglo-Saxon poems consist of certain versicles, or, as we have hitherto termed them, sections, bound together in pairs by the laws of alliteration. In some few instances, of comparatively modern date, the bond of union is the final rhime; but generally speaking, this rhime is an addition to the alliteration, and not a substitute for it. In Icelandic poems we sometimes find a section occurring without its fellow; but I have never met with such a case in Anglo-Saxon verse, unless where there has evidently been a section missing. For the most part these sections contain two or three accents, but some are found containing four or even five. The greater number of these longer sections may be divided into two parts, which generally fulfil all the conditions of an alliterative couplet; and in some manuscripts are actually found so divided. Whether every section of more than three accents be compound, may perhaps be matter of doubt. There are certainly many sections of four accents, which can have no middle pause, unless it fall in the midst of a word; for example, Tha spræc❘se of ermod a cyning: the ær was engla scynost. Then spake the haughty king, that erewhile was of angels shenest. Cadmon. and in the Icelandic verse of four accents, the middle pause is of rare occurrence. But this is not decisive as to their origin; for if a compound section were once admitted, we cannot expect it would still retain all the peculiarities of an alliterative couplet. As many of these sections are obviously compound, it would perhaps be safer to refer them all to an origin, which is sufficient for the purpose, than to multiply the sources of our rhythms, without satisfactory authority. Such verses and alliterative couplets, as contain a compound section, may well furnish matter for a distinct chapter. We shall, at present, consider those only, which are composed of simple sections. We have seen, that two accented syllables may come together, if they have a pause between them. This pause, which has been termed the sectional pause, was admitted into the elementary versicle. The verses, however, or alliterative couplets, which contain the sectional pause, are of a character so peculiar, that they may be considered apart from the others, not only without injury to the general arrangement, but with much advantage to the clear understanding of the subject. We shall, at present, then consider only such verses, as are formed of two simple sections, and do not contain any sectional pause. Thus restricted, the elementary versicle or section is formed according to the following rules. 1. Each couple of adjacent accents must be separated by one or two syllables which are unaccented, but not by more than two. 2. No section can have more than three, or less than two accents. These rules are directly at variance with those which Rask has given. According to him, all the syllables before that, which contains the alliteration, form merely a |