Andersen. — Tin; Verxc-unit , 611) 



17. The apparently absolute subversion of the pause, exemplified in 

 the first verse of No. (33), is yet more strikingly illustrated in Browning's 

 metrically remarkable poem " Pheidippides " : — 



(35.) First I salute this soil of the blessed, river and rock ! 



< )ods of my birthplace, daemons and heroes, honour to all ! 



Then I name thee, claim thee for our patron, coequal in praise — 



A}% with Zeus the Defender, with Her of the aegis and spear ! 



Also, ye of the bow and the buskin, praised be your peer, 



Xow, henceforth and forever, — O latest to whom I upraise 



Hand and heart and voice ! For Athens, leave pasture and tiock ! 



Present to help, potent to save. Pan — patron I call ! 



Archons of Athens, topped by the tettix, see, I return ! 



See, 'tis myself here standing alive, no spectre that speaks ! 



Crowned with the myrtle, did you command me, Athens and you, 



" Run, Pheidippides, run and race, reach Sparta for aid ! 



Persia has come, we are here, where is She ? " Your command I obeyed, 



Ran and raced : like stubble, some field which a fire runs through. 



Was the space between city and city : two days, two nights did I burn 



Over the hills, under the dales, down jjits and up peaks. 



Into their midst I broke : breath served but for " Persia has come ! 



Persia bids Athens proffer slaves' tribute, water and earth ; 



Razed to the ground is Eretria — but Athens, shall Athens sink. 



Drop into dust and die — the flower of Hellas utterly die, 



Die, with the wide world spitting at Sparta, the stupid, the stander-by ? 



Answer me quick, what help, what hand do you stretch o'er destruction's brink ? 



How, — when ? No care for my limbs ! — there's lightning in all and some — 



Rough-hewn as. this verse appears, beneath its ruggedness Hows the per- 

 fect smoothness of the lyrical ballad ! Though the measure is not, as 

 Mr. Symons says in his " Introduction," an " invention of Mr. Browning's," 

 no other British poet has used it with Browning's magnificent effect. As 

 will be noted on reading the quotation, the verses are greatly varied, and 

 great variation is a characteristic of a new as well as of an old type. In 

 the new, however, the variations are new, unfamiliar, and in many cases 

 isolated ; whereas in the old the variations have become fixed, and are as 

 familiar almost as the type itself. The latter is the case with the variations 

 of the ballad : the strangeness of many of Browning's verses in " Phei- 

 dippides " is of itself an indication of the newness of the metre. The mo,«t 

 obtrusive characteristic of the poem is the breakmg-up of the verses, which 

 are triple Alexandrines, into three parts ; instead of the usual middle pause 

 of the Alexandrine, these verses have two pauses, thus breaking into three 

 approximately equal parts : — 



(35«.) 1. Archons of Athens, topped by the tettix, see, I return ! 



2. Gods of my birthplace, daemons and heroes, honour to all ! 



3. Over the hills, under the dales, down pits and up peaks. 



4. Present to help, potent to save, Pan — patron I call ! 



The characteristic unit of the poem is evidently the " choriamb," a Greek 

 unit of four syllables, of which the first and last bore the stress. This is 

 a unit which Browning himself has previously used : — 



Kentish Sir Byng stood for his King, bidding the crop-headed Parliament 

 swing ; 



The verse of " Pheidippides " breaks off at the " crop " of this example, 

 with what loss to the sweep of metre the ear will at once detect. The 

 choriamb of (35) is still further varied by receiving a feminine ending, 

 reducing the length of the pause between every two units, as may be seen 



