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 there are other forms more elaborate and striking. 1) Most

common, perhaps, is the short iambic verse of two feet only—a dipody, that is—of four words arranged in two balanced pairs. The pairs are coupled together at the point of junction by a cæsural tie-rhyme, and the whole is expressive of a single generalized idea. Examples from the text are;—"phrăi fa kha thăi," Siamese subjects l. 23; "chĕp thawng khawng chăi," distressed in mind ll. 33—34; "phi nawng thawng diu," own brothers and sisters l. 2. Fourteen or fifteen of this species alone are to be found in the inscription. They abound everywhere in Siamese literature and speech. This seems indeed to be the fundamental pattern from which by variation are derived nearly all the other distinctly metrical forms which occur in Siamese prose.

2) One of these derived forms is simply an expansion of it by the insertion of identical words into the two members of the dipody, Thus in "khău phu lăk măk phu sawn," shares with stealer, consorts with hider ll. 26—27, the four accented words, khău—lăk—măk—sawn, represent the original framework of the dipocly, while the relative phu is the added element. In the much longer "hĕn khău thăn baw khrăi phin, hăn sin thăn baw khrăi düat. ll.27—28, the four accented words, khău—phin—sin—thăn, mark the simple pattern, with order and caesural tie-rhyme accurately kept; while the added material has expanded the simple iambic dipody to three times its original dimensions. It makes now two anapæstic verses; yet the tie-rhyme is not displaced. 3) A variation apparently simpler is produced by merely increasing

the number of units, and building up thus a continuous stanza. A fine example occurs in ll. 18—19:—

Năi năm mi pla,

Năi na mi khău;

Chău müang baw ău,

Chă kawp năi phrăi.

Here the first couplet answers exactly to an expansion of the pattern: năm—pla—na—khău, as described above, with pla and na for the tie-rhyme between the first two verses. But at this point come in the intricate rules of rhyme in stanzaic verse. Khău determines not only the tie-rhyme which is to link the two couplets together (in khău—chău), but the end-rhyme (ău) of verse 3 as well. There are thus