succession of feet or
syllables to form a rhythm; the need of framing each line to correspond
with some other line or lines in length; the propriety of always making
each line susceptible of scansion by itself: all these points, so essential
to a true explanation of the nature of English verse, though, for the most
part, well maintained by some prosodists, are nevertheless denied by some,
so that opposite opinions may be cited concerning them all. I would not
suggest that all or any of these points are thereby made _doubtful_; for
there may be opposite judgements in a dozen cases, and yet concurrence
enough (if concurrence _can_ do it) to establish them every one.

OBS. 3.--An ingenious poet and prosodist now living,[484] Edgar Allan Poe,
(to whom I owe a word or two of reply,) in his "Notes upon English Verse,"
with great self-complacency, represents, that, "While much has been written
upon the structure of the Greek and Latin rhythms, comparatively _nothing_
has been done as regards the English;" that, "It may be said, indeed, we
are _without a treatise_ upon our own versification;" that "The very best"
_definition_ of versification[485] to be found in any of "_our ordinary
treatises_ on the topic," has "_not a single point_ which does not involve
an error;" that, "A _leading deft_ in each of these treatises is the
confining of the subject to mere _versification_, while metre, or rhythm,
in general, is the real question at issue;" that, "Versification is _not_
the art, but the _act_'--of making verses;" that, "A correspondence in the
_length_ of lines is by no means essential;" that "_Harmony_" produced "by
the regular alternation of syllables differing in quantity," does not
include "_melody_;" that "A _regular alternation_, as described, forms _no
part_ of the principle of metre:" that "There is no necessity of _any
regularity_ in the succession of _feet_;" that, "By consequence," he
ventures to "dispute the _essentiality_ of any alternation, regular or
irregular, of _syllables_ long and short:" that, "For _anything more
intelligible_ or _more satisfactory_ than this definition [i. e., G.
Brown's former definition of versification,] we shall look in vain in _any
published_ treatise upon the subject;" that, "So general and _so total a
failure_ can be referred only to some _radical misconception_;" that, "The
word _verse_ is derived (through _versus_ from the Latin _verto, I turn_,)
and * * * * it can be nothing but _th