just that number of ictus, or strong accents, in it. In another verse of the same poet : Lassándo ógni sua imprésa; e piágne, e tréma.— Rime i. son. 90, 10, we may observe that there are seventeen syllables, and besides a peculiarity of Italian verse, which Milton did not venture to imitate, namely, that the first foot is an iamb, and the second a trochee. As almost every line of the five-foot poetry of Italy thus contains more than eleven syllables, it is needless for us to give any further examples. The following will serve to show how Milton followed the Italian poets :- That were an ignominy and shame beneath.-i. 115. Many of these, no doubt, can come under the head of the hypermetric syllable after the cæsura; but we may observe that they are all followed by vowels. 2. Commencing the line, after the manner of the Provençal poets, with two trochees, has been a favourite practice of the Italian poets from the earliest times to the present day. We may see it in the very first lines of the Gerusalemme Liberata :*— Cánto l'ármi pietose, e 'l capitano. S'ármò d'A'sia e di Líbia il popol misto. Nón circóndi la frónte in Elicona. *The first three feet of these lines, it will be seen, correspond with the two first feet of the classic choriambic. See above, page 317, note. Haí di stélle immortáli aurea corona. Súcchi amári ingannáto intanto ei beve, E dall' inganno suo vita riceve. In this last passage, every line but the last we may see commences with two trochees, and the fourth of them contains only two iambs, in which last practice Milton also imitates his Italian prototypes.* Héll born not to conténd with spirits of heaven.-ii. 687. Spírits ódorous bréathes, flowers and their fruits.—ib. 482. I'n the sweat of thy fáce shalt thou eat bread.-x. 205. B'y the waters of life, where'er they sat.—xi. 79. I'n the visions of Gód. It was a hill.-ib. 377. A'mong daughters of mén the fairest found.-Par. Reg. ii. 154. From that plácid aspéct and meek regard.―iii. 217. O' Jehóvah our Lórd, how wondrous great.-Ps. viii. 1. It will be observed that here, as in the Italian poetry, the cæsura falls at the end of the third foot, and that four of these verses (v. 482, 750; x. 205; xi. 377) contain only two iambic feet. *The only instances we have met with out of Milton, are— Nímphès, Faúnès and A'madriades.-Chauc. C. T. 2930. I'n these flattering streams, and makes our faces.—Macbeth, iii. 2. The following line in Comus (v. 336) must, we think, be read in this manner,O'r, if your influence be quite dammed up; for the context shows that the emphasis must be laid on your. As an example of an Italian verse commencing with an anapæst, we may give the following from Tasso, in which however the foot is rather a choriamb: : Fea i múti campi e quel silenzio amico.-Ger. Lib. vi. 103. Milton has the following: With impétuous recoil and jarring sound.―ii. 880. Par. Reg. i. 357. 3. In Dante and Petrarca, but very rarely in the later poets, we meet with two trochees after the cæsura.† Such however was Milton's esteem for those poets, that even in this he follows them. Per mé si vá néll' etérno dolóre.—Inf. iii. 2. A'nche di quà nuóva schiéra s' adúna.—ib. 120. E 'l mar senz' onda, é per l'A'lpe ogni pésce. Prima ch' io trovi ín ciò páce nè trégua. Petr. parte i. son. 37. Milton offers the following examples of this structure ‡ :— When will and reason-réason álso is choíce.-iii. 108. 6 * "He [Wordsworth] talked of Milton, and observed, how he sometimes indulged himself, in the Paradise Lost, in lines which, if not in time, you could hardly call verse, instancing And Tiresias,' etc.; and then noticed the sweet flowing lines which followed, and with regard to which he had no doubt the unmusical line before had been inserted."-Life of Wordsworth, ii. 311. Now that line ends a sentence, and Wordsworth's error arose from his ignorance of the poet's pronunciation. He sounded Tiresias in the ordinary English way, Tireshas; Milton, who abhorred sh, in the classic manner, Tiresiäs, in four syllables, and so the line is perfectly harmonious. They are frequent however in the comic blank verse: see the comedies of Ariosto and Maffei's Le Ceremonie. The same occurs in Chaucer, if we may trust the printed text. Created thee, in the image of Gód.—vii. 427. And dust shalt eat áll the days of thy life.-x. 178. With them from bliss to the bottomless pít.-Par. Reg. i. 361. The Pontic king, and in tríumph had róde.-iii. 36. 4. Like the dramatists, Milton frequently has a hypermetric syllable at the cæsura, or even at the semicæsura. On Lémnos, the Ægæ'an* isle. Thus they relate.-i. 746.† With their bright luminaries, that set and rose.-vii. 385. Seemed their petition, than when that ancient pair.—xi. 10. We have observed above, that the heroic measure does not admit monosyllabic feet. A good reader will however in such instances as the following-where there is a stop after the first monosyllable of the line-give that word the time of a foot, and read the next foot as an anapæst. Tears, such as angels weep, burst forth; at last.-i. 620. So also when the cæsura falls in the middle of a foot, the * It is thus that this word is spelt in the correct first edition, as if to obviate the wrong pronunciation usually given to it-Egaan; and this and x. 584 are the only places in the poem where the Greek al is expressed by a, its representative everywhere else being e accented; as Pygméan, Lethéan, Orphéan, Sabéan, etc. Hence then we would read,—— With wide Cerberéan mouths full loud, and rung.—ii. 655. The sun as from Thyestéan banquet turned.-x. 688. + Being suitors, || should the duchess | deny to match her.-Beaum, and Fletch.: Women Pleased, i. 1. 2 G first syllable goes to the preceding iamb, and forms a bacchius, while the second makes a monosyllabic foot. With loss of Eden, till one greater man.-i. 4. The same principle applies to four-foot and six-foot verse, and to that of all languages in which it is regulated by accent, with the single exception of the poetry of France. It thus appears that Milton had the authority of the great Italian poets for the irregularities which Johnson lays to his charge; and surely the ear of a Johnson was not as susceptible of the varied melody of verse as that of a Petrarca or a Tasso. In fact, we are persuaded that a great poet could not write an inharmonious line; and that where such occurs, as in Shakespeare, the author of Venus and Adonis writing such!-we may be certain that there is an error of the copyist or of the printer. But then much depends on the reader; and as no one to whom nature has not given a musical ear, can ever read poetry as it should be read, few things are more rare than an accomplished reader. Most persons, however great their taste may be, read poetry in what is termed a chanting or singsong manner; and, consequently, when the melody is various, as in Milton, much of it is lost, both to the reader himself and to the auditors. We are, in fine, thoroughly convinced that, if properly read, there is not a single inharmonious verse in the entire works of this noble poet. * We can never believe that Milton did not dictate On him who had stolen Jove's authentic fire.-iv. 719; but the printer substituted stole, and it escaped the reader. So also in Comus (v. 195), the edition of 1637 and the Cambridge MS. have stolne, which is changed to stole in the edition of 1645, without any reason, and of course by the printer. The participle stole was little used; we recollect but two instances of it in Shakespeare. See above, page 298. |