PREFACE

I WAS led to the inception of this work by my recognition of the need-a need felt grievously in my own studies, but even more in the attempt to direct those of others-of a working hypothesis of the Science of Verse which should be at once rational, coherent, and simplesuch a working hypothesis as every music student has at his right hand.

The study of all the a priori text-books-founded as they are upon a complicated system which will not fit our modern verse-proved a weariness and vexation to the spirit; for, from Puttenham ("Arte of English Poesie," 1589) to our own day, although there is much delightful reading upon the essence of verse, there is little light upon the paths of metre, but endless ignes fatui. To follow the various disquisitions of the various metrists is like wandering through a vast Dædalian labyrinth, wherein, if at any time some true clew seems to offer itself, it will be presently snipped away and another diametrical one substituted; and, in the end, all lead no-whither. This, because in every case the supposed true way has been an artificial and arbitrary one, not the natural one founded upon primary law; the primary laws of verse, like those of music, being laid upon the bed-rock of acoustics.

The first clear note of truth we hear struck is from Coleridge, when, in his preface to "Christabel" (1816), he announced that he had discovered a "new principle of versification; to wit, that of accents." This declaration raised a storm of abusive criticism from the " Edin

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burgh Review," and from other quarters, and there the matter would seem to have ended; but he had, however elementarily, made as great a discovery as Sir Isaac Newton, when, from a falling apple, he deduced the law of gravitation.

In 1881 Sidney Lanier published his brilliant" Science of English Verse," this being the first deliberate attempt to analyse verse upon its true lines; viz., by musica! notation. Lanier's book did not have the revolutionising effect which the promulgation of so great and radical a principle should have had; partly, perhaps, because the book is somewhat abstruse for the general reader, but also partly, it seems to me, because it is not always wholly logical with itself. Many of the verse-notations, using as they do the foot-divisions and not the true bar-divisions measured from accent to accent, would seem to be an attempt to reconcile quantity with accent; whereas, belonging as they do to different periods, with their differing metrical standards, they have no correlation. Also, I do not comprehend the classing together of such diverse verse as "Hamlet's Soliloquy," Poe's " Raven,” and Tennyson's "Charge of the Light Brigade" as all in 3-beat measure; because, as I have pointed out (page 49), the 3-beat rhythm cannot exist without such a predominance of three notes (syllables) to a bar as shall give the whole verse its organic stamp.

Lanier's supreme glory is that he was a pioneer. Like Columbus, he plunged boldly into the unknown and discovered a new world; and the world is ours, to possess as we will.

In the present work, besides the exposition of primary verse-rhythm, as illustrated by the bar-measurements of music, I have endeavoured to elucidate a quality of verse which I have never seen noticed in any work on metre;

viz., motion, and the dynamic relation of verse-motion to its theme.

The purpose of this book being analytic, and not synthetic; dealing with the mechanism of verse rather than with its meaning-though the two are not wholly separable-I must be exonerated from any intention of trenching upon the realm of literary criticism, except as incidental to the exposition and development of the logical lines of my subject.

In all arts there is the art of the art and the science of the art. The former concerns itself chiefly with the subjective genius of the artist; the latter, with his concrete expression, or method; method being another name for universal law, and so reducible to an exact science.

Truth, wherever we find it, is superlatively simple. Through whatever channel we follow the developments of human thought, we shall find it to be a denuding process, a removing of the dead husks which ignorance or superstition or convention have folded about the precious kernel. All true art is at bottom unified and concrete; so also the best exposition, or science, of art will be unified and concrete.

In this treatise upon the" Musical Basis of Verse" I have endeavoured to state, rationally, coherently, and simply, what seem to me to be the principles of versetechnique, these principles being, finally, purely a matter of vibration.

I have to acknowledge the courtesy of the various copyright owners who have allowed me to use poems and extracts in illustration of my text: Mrs. Fields; Mrs. Lanier; Mr. John Lane (Mr. William Watson's "Hymn to the Sea" and " England, My Mother," and Mr. Watts Dunton's "The Sonnet's Voice"); Messrs.

Macmillan & Co.

(Tennyson, Arnold, and Kingsley); Messrs. A. & C. Black and The Macmillan Co. (Mr. Symonds's "Greek Poets "); Messrs. Small, Maynard & Co., and Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons. Permission has also been obtained from Messrs. Ellis & Elvey to quote D. G. Rossetti's "The Portrait" and "The Wine of Circe," and from Messrs. Smith, Elder & Co., to use extracts from copyright poems by Robert Browning.