Andkesen. — Natural Classification of English Poetry. 411 



the true classification : as in the system of Linnaeus, the true organs have 

 been taken, but classification has been by their number instead of by their 

 development. • 



Under the breath-law, the various poetic forms in use aroup themselves 

 into certain evident classes. This law indicated the first great characteristic 

 — the length of line ; and this gives two distinct classes — lines of five stresses 

 and lines of eight stresses, each of which two classes I have named after 

 their predominant types, Heroic and Ballad respectively. Setting aside 

 the internal syllabic variation of verse, the places of greatest variation are 

 at the beginning and end of lines. Variation at the end being the more 

 pronounced, this has been taken as the distinguishing feature of the various 

 ballad forms into which the Ballad class has been divided, and the varia- 

 tion at the beginning as the feature of the subvariations of the different 

 forms. Thus in Romance Metre, or Parent Ballad, the line-end may lose 

 a stress-unit, or foot, and become Popular Ballad, of seven instead of eight 

 stresses. In the Popular Ballad, again, there are two variations — in one 

 the stressed syllable at the end of every half-line is dropped, in the other 

 the whole unit at the end of every half-line. These two forms would have 

 been kept as subvariations of the Popular Ballad were it not for the fact 

 that the former constitutes the normal ballad-metre of Denmark and Ger- 

 many — and from the epic of the Nibelungen Noth being written in it I 

 have called it the Nibelungen Metre — and the latter constitutes the ballad- 

 metre of France, and has already been called the Alexandrine, from its 

 forming the metre of a French epic on the deeds of Alexander. 



The stress-unit at the beginning of the line can be varied only in two 

 ways. In its normal form it consists of two syllables, the first unstressed, 

 the second stressed. The unstressed syllable may be dropped, or it may 

 be preceded by an extra unstressed syllable : from these variations are 

 produced the subvariations in each of the Ballad forms. 



Minor variations are formed by adding or dropping syllables at the 

 line-ends. Thus, in Romance Metre an unstressed syllable may be added, 

 when what is called a feminine or weak ending is produced. If it drop a 

 syllable, it produces feminine Popular Ballad ; if it drop two syllables, it 

 produces ordinary Popular Ballad. If Populai' Ballad drop a syllable 

 at the half-line end. it produces Nibelungen. If Nibelungen drop a syllable 

 at the half -line end, it produces Alexandrine ; if it add a syllable at 

 the line - end, it produces either feminine Nibelungen or feminine Alex- 

 andrine. 



Though these comprise the whole of the variations, except the internal 

 syllabic variations which are rather to be considered as scent and colour, 

 it will be seen that they include all regular formations outside lines of five 

 stresses. These latter form the second great class, the Heroic. This does 

 not show nearly the amount of variation of line-end shown by the former ; 

 its lines contain within themselves other and more subtle means of variation, 

 such as pause, overflow, &c. — features practically denied to Ballad. Its 

 subdivisions will be more readily seen. Firstly, the Common Heroic includes 

 all poems in riming couplets, with a sub variation including riming stanzas, 

 such as Spenserian, Sonnet, Rime Royal, &c. Secondly, Blank Verse in- 

 cludes two divisions — Epic, Narrative, and Didactic poems ; and the Drama, 

 rimed or unrimed. A third class, which I have called Irregular, includes 

 the Ode, poems in which the length of line follows no one of the preceding 

 classes exclusively, Metrical Tales, and Songs ; a subdivision I have called 

 Prose Lyrics, to include much of Walt Whitman's poetry ; another division 



