Excerpt from Classical Metres: In English Verse

Of this book the first part, my own, has happily outlived its prefaces: it began as a simple tabulation of Milton's practice in Paradise Lost, to which an account of the prosody of Samson Agonistes was added, and in 1893 eight appendices or notes on various points. To this I now (1901) add an analysis of stress-prosody, and a chapter on the structure of the English accentual hexameter. My intention throughout has been to provide a sound foundation for a grammar of English prosody, on the basis of Milton's practice, which is chosen not as the final model, but as a convenient norma, a middle and fixed point, to which all other practice may be referred for comparison. I believe that little beyond what I have written is necessary for the purpose proposed: if I were tempted to add anything, it would be the examination of Chaucer's prosody, which in his part of the Romaunt of the Rose would, compared with the French original, show the origin and rationale of our traditional elisions.

The second part of this book, that by my friend Mr. Stone, must prove of great value to students.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.