Page:The Fleshly school of poetry - Buchanan - 1872.djvu/63

 lable in words which in ordinary speech are accented on the penultimate:—

Between the hands, between the brows, Between the lips of Love-Lilee!"

which may be said to give to the speaker's voice a sort of cooing tenderness just bordering on a loving whistle. Still better as an illustration are the lines:—

Saturday night is market night Everywhere, be it dry or wet, And market night in the Haymar-ket!"

which the reader may advantageously compare with Mr. Morris's

"Then said the king, Thanked be thou; neither for nothing Shalt thou this good deed do to me;"

or Mr. Swinburne's

In either of the twain Red roses full of rain; She hath for bondwomen All kinds of flowers."

It is unnecessary to multiply examples of an affectation which disfigures all these writers; who, in the same spirit which prompts the ambitious nobodies that rent London theatres in the "empty" season to make up for their dulness by fearfully original "new readings," distinguish their attempt at leading business by affecting the construction of their grandfathers and great-grandfathers, and the accentuation of the poets of the court of James I. It is in all respects a sign of remarkable genius, from this point of view, to rhyme "was" with "grass," "death" with "lieth," "gain" with "fountain," "love" with "of," "once" with "suns," and so on ad nauseam. I am far from disputing the value of