Andebsen. — Metre. 467 



the ten-syllabled line was adopted because the eight-syllabled 

 was too short and the twelve-syllabled too long ; but no reason 

 is given. In the last " Encyclopaedia Britannica " it is suggested 

 that, whilst usage may have made the line what it is, there may 

 be some deep underlying law which has unconsciously guided 

 the poet. Without doubt there is an underlying law : nor is 

 it of great intricacy, for it is clearly manifested every time a 

 stanza of verse is read aloud. Yet of the many writers on English 

 prosody, though all speak of the regularity of lengths, not one 

 gives the reason nor suggests the law for this regularity. 



4. It is this law that is to be traced ; and, as any law is best 

 seen in operation where simplicity offers no distraction, the 

 simplest and commonest forms of verse will serve as the best 

 illustrations. We will therefore turn to ballad-metres, taking 

 as simplest and most convenient Bitson's collection of the 

 Robin Hood ballads. The discovery of this law is as important 

 as the discovery of a primary law determining the form assumed 

 by any particular predominant type of animal — say, man. 



CHAPTER II. 



Ballad-metre. 



1. The commonest form in which ballad-metre is now printed 

 is in quatrains, or stanzas of four lines, the first and third usually 

 eight-syllabled, the second and fourth six- syllabled. 



The true and original form, however, is different, each pair 

 as printed being really one line of fourteen syllables. In Bitson's 

 prefatory note to the " Ballad of Bobin Hood and the Beggar " 

 he says, " It may be proper to mention that each line of the 

 printed copy is here thrown into two, a step which, though 

 absolutely necessary from the narrowness of the page, is suf- 

 ficiently justified by the frequent recurrence of the double 

 rime. The division of stanzas was conceived to be a still fur- 

 ther improvement." This " narrowness of the page " has been 

 given as one reason for the adoption of lines of certain uniform 

 length, and it has also been stated that thus printed the eye 

 more readily catches the substance of the words. Both state- 

 ments can at once be dismissed when it is remembered that the 

 length of line was fixed at a time when the ballads were trans- 

 mitted orally, before books were printed at all. The lines are 

 printed as fourteen-syllabled in Warner's " Albion's England." 



2. From Bitson's remark that " the division of stanzas was 

 conceived to be a still further improvement," it is evident (as 

 from their oral transmission, too, it must be) that the long lines 

 were run on without division into stanzas ; but the fact that 

 it was at all possible to divide them in this way is a significant 

 one. It means that in most cases two fourteen-syllabled lines 



