of metre_, even to the denial that
_any_ poetic metres, founded on other principles, can properly
exist."--_Ib._, p. 491

OBS. 21.--J. D. W. is not one of those who discard quantity and supply
accent in expounding the nature of metre; and yet he does not coincide very
nearly with any of those who have heretofore made quantity the basis of
poetic numbers. His views of the rhythmical elements being in several
respects _peculiar_, I purpose briefly to notice them here, though some of
the peculiarities of this new "_Art of Measuring Verses_," should rather be
quoted under the head of _Scanning_, to which they more properly belong.
"Of every species of beauty," says this author, "and more especially of the
beauty of sounds, _continuousness_ is the _first element_; a succession of
_pulses_ of sound becomes agreeable, only when the breaks or intervals
cease to be heard." Again: "Quantity, or the _division into measures of
time_, is a _second element_ of verse; each line must be _stuffed out with
sounds_, to a certain fullness and plumpness, that will sustain the voice,
and force it to dwell upon the sounds."--_Rev._, p. 485. The first of these
positions is subsequently contradicted, or very largely qualified, by the
following: "So, the line of significant sounds, in a verse, is also marked
by _accents_, or _pulses_, and divided into portions called _feet_. These
are necessary and natural for the very simple reason that _continuity by
itself is tedious_; and the greatest pleasure arises from the union of
continuity with _variety_. [That is, with "_interruption_," as he elsewhere
calls it!] In the line,

'Full many a tale their music tells,'

there are at least four accents or stresses of the voice, with faint
_pauses_ after them, just enough to separate the continuous stream of sound
into these four parts, to be read thus:

Fullman--yataleth--eirmus--ictells,[503]

by which, new combinations of sound are produced, of a singularly musical
character. It is evident from the inspection of the above line, that the
division of the feet by the accents is quite independent of the division of
words by the sense. The sounds are melted into continuity, and _re-divided
again_ in a manner agreeable to the musical ear."--_Ib._, p. 486.
Undoubtedly, the due formation of our poetic feet occasions both a blending
of some words and a dividing of others, in a manner unknown to prose; but
still we have the authority of this writer, as