I asked of my harp, 'Who hath injured thy chords?'

And she replied, 'The crooked finger, which I mocked in my time.' A blade of silver may be bended, a blade of steel abideth.

Kindness fadeth away, but vengeance endureth.

The sweet taste of mead passeth from the lips,

But they are long corroded by the juice of the wormwood;

The lamb is brought to the shambles, but the wolf rangeth the mountain;

Kindness fadeth away, but vengeance endureth.

I asked the red-hot iron when it glimmered on the anvil,

'Wherefore glowest thou longer than the firebrand ?'

'I was born in the dark mine, and the brand in the pleasant greenwood.' Kindness fadeth away, but vengeance endureth.

If free verse imply the poetical note struck without any formal regulation whatever, then have we got it in the following, Scott's 'Song of the Tempest,' in the 'Pirate;' but some restraint, much or little, appears necessary for metre, and that not to be verse without any. It may be a question whether the climaxing form of invocation in the piece count for anything:

Stern eagle of the far north-west,

I.

Thou that bearest in thy glance the thunderbolt,

Thou whose rushing pinions stir ocean to madness,

Thou the destroyer of herds, thou the scatterer of navies,

Amidst the scream of thy rage,

Amidst the rushing of thy onward wings,

Though thy scream be loud as the cry of a perishing nation,

Though the rushing of thy wings be like the roar of a thousand waves,

Yet hear, in thine ire and thy haste,

Hear thou the voice of the Reimkennar.

II.

Thou hast met the pine trees of Drontheim,

Their dark-green heads lie prostrate beside their uprooted stems;
Thou hast met the rider of the ocean,

The tall, the strong bark of the fearless rover,

And she has struck to thee the topsail

That she had not veiled to a royal armada,

Thou hast met the tower that bears its crest among the clouds,

The battled massive tower of the Jarl of former days,

And the copestone of the turret

Is lying upon its hospitable hearth;

But thou too shalt stoop, proud compeller of clouds,
When thou hearest the voice of the Reimkennar.

XXI.

HOVER.-FEET VERSUS MAIN.

THE nature of the hover has been already explained as affecting blank verse, in which its influence hardly ever ceases, while in quick metre every foot, unless exceptionally having a corresponding accent, no distinctive notice of it was called for. Here, however, is an example :—

Farewell, farewell, I'll dream no more,

"Tis misery to be dreaming; Farewell, farewell, and I will be

At least like thee in seeming.

This is but by the way, our real concern being more with forms into which the hover enters systematically.

In the following, part of a piece given in the last section, it is merely the natural result of triple rhyme :

One more unfortunate
Weary of breath,
Rashly importunǎte,
Gone to her death!

Take her up tenderly

Lift her with care;

Fashioned so slenderly,

Young, and so fair.-T. HOOD.

In the following its application is rather peculiar, and we begin to touch the true ground:

When woman's eye grows dim,

And her cheek paleth;
When fades the beautiful,

Then man's love faileth.

He sits not beside her chair,
Clasps not her fingers,
Entwines not the damp hair
That o'er her brow lingers.

He comes but a moment in,
Though her eye brightens.
Though the hectic flush
Feverishly heightens,
He stays but a moment near,
While that flush fadeth;
Though disappointment's tear
Her dim eye shadeth.

This is a piece about which, simple as it looks, there would be likely to be great disagreement as to the manner of scanning. The apparent construction, and doubtless the real one, is three feet of tolerably free choice in the longer line, and two in the shorter. There is, however, a disorganising metric power within. The middle foot of the three in the longer line being frequently quick, and the third foot, which is also the closing one, slow, there is a tendency to increase the force of the middle accent at the expense of the last, as in the analogous case of revert,' with which, indeed, it is in close connection-only a matter of the strong beginning different. The line

Though disappointment's tear

is of that description exactly.

When the middle foot is not quick, compensation is as if made by a real hover, as in the line

When fades the beautiful.

The first line of the poem, be it understood, is an exception here as in many other metres, the verse not assuming a distinct character till fairly under weigh.

The sum of the matter is this, that when recited in ordinary no verse, short or long, but this one, receives more than two main accents. We are drawing nigh to other principles of proportioning in which feet get unsettled.

In the next the hover is confined to the last foot but one, regularly every alternate line :

Thou wilt come no more, gentle Annie,
Like a flower thy spirit did depart:
Thou art gone, alas! like the many
That have bloomed in the summer of
Shall we never more behold thee,

Never hear thy winning voice again,

my

heart.

When the spring time comes, gentle Annie,

When the wild-flowers are scattered o'er the plain?

Here the prior alternate line is of three feet, a short foot between two long ones. The other is of four feet, beginning, in like manner with the first, quick, the second slow or quick at choice, and the two final slow. Thus roughly the second line bears to the first the appearance of having the final quick foot lengthened out into four syllables.

The consequence of this is that, read in a natural way, the example of the prior line, together with the similar opening of the other as if the same measure was about to be repeated, tends to the production of the hover on the third foot of the longer line, whether the syllable in place be accentually capable or not. Thus either line receives three main accents, save only the short line beginning with 'shall,' which receives but two.

A measure previously given in the section styled Junctions, beginning Rests my cheek,' and there remarked on as peculiar, is also noticeable in this way. In this case, however, the main beats are four :

All the prízes that allúred me in the eager days of pássion
Seem to reason (when it pauses not to scorn them, but survey),
As baubles which for childhood kindly sages stoop to fashion:
If sages make the plaything, 'tis to smile upon the play.

Or take another instance, the feet random arranged

When the sheep are in the fold, and the kye at hame,

And a' the world to rest are gane,

The waes o' my heart fa' in showers frae my ee',
While my gudeman lies sound by me.

:

Young Jamie lo'ed me weel, and sought me for his bride;
But saving a crown he had nae thing else beside;

To make the crown a pund, young Jamie ga'ed to sea;
And the crown and the pund were baith for me.

He hadna' been awa' a week but only twa,

When my father brak his arm, and the cow was stoun awa';
Ma mother she fell sick, and my Jamie at the sea-

And auld Robin Gray came a-courtin' me.

It is seen how unequal are the lines in the number of their feet, varying from four to six, with quick occasional; but, strange to tell, the main accents in every line will be found the same number, namely, four.

Also another old verse unexpectedly manifests the same substructure:

An old song made by an áged old páte

Of an old worshipful géntleman who hád a great estáte,

That képt a brave old house at a bountiful ráte,

And an old porter to relieve the poór at his gáte;

Like an old courtier of the queen's, and the quéen's old courtier.

In this case the movement by feet alone is not sufficient to explain all phenomena.

A peculiarity above others is the vastly different length of line that can be assimilated under four main ordering, and the extraordinary aptitude that the most varied verses show in adapting themselves to its regimen.

The secret of the matter is, that when measurement by feet is the least undecided by the action of the hover, another force comes into play, which is no other than timing, proportionate timing. All these examples, however, except perhaps the last, are on debatable ground, rather showing how verse into which the hover enters may be ruled, than that such is their arrangement incontestible.