fore, were examined individually, they might be distributed, so far as we have yet seen, into four sorts :-I. The normal 5 xa, or pure Decasyllabics of five Iambi. Such lines do occur pretty numerously, and generally, I think, with a calming, soothing, or pathetic effect. II. The 5 xa, with more or less of dissyllabic variation. This is by far the prevailing sort, and is divisible into sub-varieties, according to the amount and method of the dissyllabic variation. III. Lines of the 5 xa formula converted into Hendecasyllabics by some single trisyllabic variation. These are numerous. IV. Lines of 5 xa widened into Duodecasyllabics by a double trisyllabic variation. These are exceedingly rare. Of one feature of Milton's Blank Verse we have hitherto taken no account. It is THE SUPERNUMERARY FINAL SYLLABLE. This is a distinct thing from the supernumerary syllable or syllables that may arise within any line from the trisyllabic variation. It is a relic of the old English habit of speech which made it natural, as we see in Chaucer, to end verses with a weak syllable after a strong, as the Italians and other nations do yet. In Shakespeare the ending of a line with a supernumerary weak syllable after the last strong one was perfectly optional: often there are five or six such lines consecutively in a single speech.-How far did Milton keep up the habit? With respect to this question, we must distinguish between Milton's Dramatic Blank Verse, in his Comus and Samson Agonistes, and his Narrative Blank Verse, the adoption of which for his Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained he claimed as almost an invention.—The eighth line of Comus is one with a supernumerary final syllable ("Strive to keep up a frail and feverish being"); the tenth is the same; and throughout the Masque such lines occur at intervals to the number of about 70 in all, or about 9 per cent of the whole. It appears, therefore, that Milton availed himself of the traditional liberty of 5 xa + for dramatic blank verse, though more sparingly than was usual with the stage-dramatists. Not even in his Narrative Blank did he quite reject the convenient liberty. In the first Book of Paradise Lost, consisting of 798 lines, I count nine lines with a supernumerary final syllable. This is at the rate of about one in every hundred; and I rather think that the proportion throughout most of the poem is not in excess of that, though it varies in different Books, and in Book X. in particular I have noted at least fifty-two extrasyllabled lines in a total of 1104, or at the rate nearly of one in every twenty. In Paradise Regained, containing altogether 2070 lines, the number of extra-syllabled lines, as roughly observed, is 70 or more; which is at the rate of one in every thirty. On the whole, therefore, the notion that Milton disapproved of lines of this kind in Epic Blank Verse has been exaggerated. That he did hold them less suitable, however, for Epic Blank Verse than for Dramatic Blank is suggested not only by his very moderate use of them in his epics, but also by the fact that such lines are most frequent there in the dramatic parts or speeches.-The idea is confirmed when we pass to Samson Agonistes. He rather revels in the liberty of extra-syllabled lines in that dramatic poem. The blank-verse dialogue parts of the drama make about 1300 lines, and I have counted over 230 extra-syllabled lines among them, or more than one in every six. They sometimes come very thickly. In one speech of Samson's there are twelve in thirty-two lines, and there are instances of three or four quite consecutively. This fact of the occasional Supernumerary Final Syllable imports an additional metrical peculiarity into Milton's Blank Verse, inasmuch as it may occur in any of the four sorts into which on other grounds his lines may be distributed. When it occurs in a line of the first sort, i.e, composed otherwise of five pure consecutive Iambi, it simply makes that line 5 xa+, or hendecasyllabic: e.g. "While thus I called, and strayed I knew not whither." When it occurs in a line of the second sort, i.e. which would otherwise be 5 xa with dissyllabic variation or variations, the result similarly is 5 xa+ of that sort, also hendecasyllabic: e.g. "Eternal King: thee author of all being." But when it occurs in a line of the third sort or of the fourth-i.e. in a line of the single or the double trisyllabic variation-more happens. Such lines are still properly of the 5 xa formula, inasmuch as the trisyllabic feet introduced are but substitutes for xa in the places where they come; but they are already hendecasyllabic or duodecasyllabic. Now, VOL. III. when such a line acquires a supernumerary final syllable, or becomes 5 xa+, we have the curious phenomenon of a line perfectly within the rule of Blank Verse, perfectly answering to the 5 xa+formula, and yet containing twelve or even thirteen syllables. Here are examples of a length of twelve syllables so occasioned in lines already hendecasyllabic by the action of a single internal trisyllabic variation : "The fellows of his crime, the followers rather." And here is one example of a length of thirteen syllables produced by the supernumerary final syllable in lines already duodecasyllabic in virtue of two internal trisyllabic variations : "By spiritual, to themselves appropriating." Instances of lines twelve or thirteen syllables long are among the extreme rarities of Milton's text; but there is yet another way in which such a rarity may occur. It is by the accident or inadvertence of an Alexandrine-i.e. of a line not at all of the proper 5 xa or 5 xa+rhythm merely widened by trisyllabic variation and the supernumerary final syllable, but distinctly of the 6 xa rhythm. An ordinary Alexandrine consists of twelve syllables (six pure Iambi or an equivalent of dissyllabic feet) thus : "From out his secret altar touched with hallowed fire."— Od. Nat. 28. "While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmèd wave." Od. Nat. 68. But then, as an Alexandrine itself is susceptible of internal trisyllabic variation as well as dissyllabic, and as it may also have a supernumerary final syllable or be 6 xa+, we may have Alexandrines of thirteen syllables (or even perhaps fourteen): thus : "And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day." Od. Nat. 140. "Bright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable."-Od. Nat. 244 Are there any Alexandrines in Milton's Blank Verse? There are some, both of twelve syllables and of thirteen, scattered through the choruses in Samson, where, as we have said, Milton ranges freely from 2 xa to 6 xa: e.g. :— "No strength of man or fiercest wild beast could withstand."-127. In these choruses, however, Milton holds himself released from all ordinary rule; and in his Blank Verse proper, narrative or dramatic, it is much more difficult to find a true Alexandrine. In Comus, 617, where the end of a speech of the Elder Brother runs into one line with the beginning of a speech of the Guardian Spirit, the two fragments form an Alexandrine, thus :— "As to make this relation? Care and utmost shifts." The following are also perhaps examples : "As if she would her children should be riotous."-Com. 763. It may be maintained that these last are not positive examples, inasmuch as they may be taken rather as lines of 5 xa with two supernumerary weak final syllables; and the same may be said more plausibly of such lines as the following : "Is now the labour of my thoughts: 'tis likeliest.”—Com. 192. Nevertheless, exactly such lines do pass for Alexandrines in poems where Alexandrines are due, the two final weak syllables passing (as often in xa verse) for a distinct foot: e.g. "In whose dead face he redd great magnanimity." Spens. F. Q., II. viii. 23. "This garden to adorn with all variety."-F. Q., II. xii. 59. Whether, after such precedents, we call the above examples from Milton Alexandrines, or whether we call them, as it is perhaps best to do in dramatic dialogue, only 5 xa lines with two supernumerary final syllables, in either case we see in them lines of twelve or thirteen syllables produced by a cause different from those already noted. THE CÆSURA.—This term is used in different senses by prosodians; but it seems best, for English verse, to understand by it the pause attending the conclusion of a period, or of some logical section of a period, when that pause occurs anywhere else than at the end of a line. That Milton attached some importance to the Casura, in this sense, as a factor in Blank Verse, may be inferred from his Prefatory Note to Paradise Lost, where, defending the all-sufficiency of Blank Verse for "true musical delight," he says that such true musical delight "consists only in apt numbers, fit quantity of syllables, and the sense variously drawn out from one verse into another." Now, in this sense, I think I can report with some certainty that the most frequent Cæsura in Milton's Blank Verse is at the end of the third foot (i.e. generally after the sixth syllable, though it may occasionally be after the seventh, or even after the eighth): e.g. "And took in strains that might create a soul Under the ribs of Death." || This, I think, is also Shakespeare's favourite Casura. Next in frequency in Milton is the Cesura after the second foot (generally the fourth syllable): e.g. "A thousand demigods on golden seats After these two, but a long way after them, the most common are the Casura in the middle of the third foot (generally after the fifth syllable), and that in the middle of the fourth foot (generally after the seventh syllable): e.g. |