526 Ti-a?! sections. 



Thus, th,e word " rufE " is all spoken on the breath ; it is one sound, : but 

 " rut " has two distinct sounds ; there is a pause between the completion 

 of the vowel sound and the completion of the consonantal sound — that 

 is, there is a stoppage of breath in the midst of the syllable. In the open 

 consonants there is a free and uninterrupted passage of breath ; in the 

 closed consonants there is a momentary stoppage. Thus it is that two parts 

 of one word may be more widely separated than two distinct words. In 

 the word " obey," for instance, there is a greater pause between the " o " 

 and the " bey " than between the " I " and " am " of " I am " ; hence the 

 common colloquial corruption of the latter to " I'm." This easy gliding 

 from vowel to vowel was doubtless also the reason for the prosodic col- 

 loquiahsm of " clipping " referred to in paragraph 17 of Section III. In 

 scansion by stress-units, then, any closed consonant following a stress will 

 naturally fall into the following unit. It must be remembered, at the same 

 time, that a doubled consonant like the " bb " in " rubbing " does not in- 

 dicate a doubled consonantal sound, but a shortened vowel ; and the word 

 should not, therefore, be divided " rub/bing," but " ru/bbing." Doubled 

 open consonants may be thus divided if desired, as their sound is con- 

 tinuous, though it receives no stress. The better scansion of (20) would 

 therefore be, — 



(21.) Stop u/p the acce/ss and pa/ssage to/ rem6/{rse,) 1 



That no/ conipu/nctious vi/sitings/ of na/(tnre) 2 



Sha/ke my fell pu//rpose, nor/ keep pence jj betwee/(n) 3 



The efie/ct and i/t ! C6/me to my w6/man's brea/(sts,) 4 



And ta/ke my mi/Ik for ga/U, you mu/rdering mi/(nisters,) 5 



^ Where/ver in/ your sigh/tless su/bstances/ 6 



You wa/it on na/ture's mi/schief ! C6/me, thick nigh//(t,) 7 



And pa/11 thee in/ the du/nnest smo/ke of he/(ll,) 8 



That my/ keen kni//fe see/ not the wou/"<^l it ma/(kes,) 9 



Nor hea/ven p^ep through// the bla/nket of/ the da/(rk,) 10 

 To cry/ " Hold, h6//ld ! " 



Naturally, odd consonants may as readily fall beyond the last unit as out- 

 side the first or any other, and it appears to be only a matter of degree how 

 many consonants thus fall beyond the unit. There may even be one or 

 two vowels amongst those consonants, making one or two syllables. \\'T],en 

 such vowels occur, the feminine and double feminine endings result ; and 

 it was seen by Table I above that in 3,000 verses there were only 214 

 feminine and 2 double feminine endings. In the above quotation from 

 " Macbeth," .in verses 1, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10 there is only breathed or hissed sound 

 falUng beyond the last unit ; in verses 3 and 8 there is the sustained sound 

 of hquid consonants ; in verse 2 there is a vocal vowel, " u," making another 

 syllable, " ture," resulting in a feminine ending ; and in verse 5 there are 

 two vocal vowels, " i " and " e," making two syllables, resulting in a double 

 feminine ending. The difference between these various verse-endings is 

 largely one of degree only : as regards duration of sound, it will probably 

 be admitted readily that the word " nature," ending verse 2, occupies less 

 time in utterance than the word " breasts," ending verse 4 ; and of the 

 parts falhng beyond the unit it will as probably be admitted that " ture " 

 occupies less time than " sts," for in the former there is but one continuous 

 sound, whereas in the latter there are two. Whilst, therefore, " ture " is 

 syntactically a sylhible in itself, and " sts " is only part of a syllable, pro- 

 sodically each occupies part of a time-space lying beyond the last unit 

 of the verse. Again, were the word ending verse 5 " minsters " instead of 

 " ministers," the time-value of " sters " would be little more than that of 



