VERSIFICATION. 123 



ratian metres, a perfect terra incognita to the great mass of our Ameri- 

 can students. In regard to words derived from the Greek, loo, parlicu- 

 larly proper names, it would save a world of trouble to refer the student 

 at once to the Greek, where the long or short vowel will in so many 

 cases tell him what is the true quantity of the syllable. 



In the part upon Metres, Prof. Brooks appears to have added more 

 to the original of Ross than any where else, and I am inclined to re- 

 gard this as the most satisfactory part of the work. Here, however, we 

 have always thought there was one grand desideratum in our English 

 treatises upon versification — i/ic absence of the corresponding English 

 verse. I cannot but think that if the subject were properly illustrated, 

 versification would be about as simple and interesting as any otlier part 

 of Latin Grammar. That I may not appear singular in this opinion, I 

 will cite the authority of the illustrious Bextley, who in his Treatise 

 "-De Metris Terentianis^'''' pp. 12-13, Leipsic Ed. Ter., thus expresses 

 himself — " It is nothing more than just that we should give the same 

 license to the ancient Latins which we grant to the modern English 

 poets. Of these there is none whom Ave do not indulge in the occa- 

 sional use of long syllables in places where the verse requires short 

 ones. For as the Latins received all their forms of metre from the 

 Greeks, so have we received ours from the Latins. On which account 

 it is the more to be lamented, and is even deserving of our indignation, 

 that ever since the revival of letters ingenuous youth have been feruled 

 and flogged into the learning of Dactylic verse which is inconsistent 

 with the genius of their mother-tongue, but are, by the fault of their 

 teachers, kept entirely ignorant of the Terentian metres which they 

 themselves, though ignorant of the fact, are always singing at home 

 and iivthe streets. The Trochaic Tetrameter catalectic is just as com- 

 mon among us as it is to Terence : 



Ego ille agrestis, | saevus, tristis, ] parcus, tniculen | tus, tenax. 

 Happy is the | country life, blest | with content, goorl | health and ease. 



This Trochaic by the addition of one syllable will become a full Iambic : 

 Thrice happy is | the country life | blest with content | good health and ease." 



But although we agree with Bentley in deploring the little attention 

 which is paid in our classical schools to Iambic and Trochaic verse, 

 whicli, as being less mechanical in its structure, we think ouglit to 

 liave the preference over Hexameters in elementary instruction, as more 

 attention would then be paid to principles, yet we cannot agree with 

 him that "Dactylic vei-se" (I suppose he means Hexameter) "is alto- 

 gether inconsistent with the genius of our language." We have seen 



