Her tent with sunny clouds was ceil'd aloft, And painted masts with silken sails embraves, -Right so Presumption did herself behave, &c. In this stave (and the remark applies also to the one preceding it) the final rhime runs continuously through the three last verses. This jingling was avoided, and another more convenient stave formed on the ballet-stave of seven, by substituting an alexandrine for the last verse of the stanza. Milton has used this Spenser-stave. Yet can I not persuade me thou art dead, Phineas Fletcher had preceded Milton in the use of this stanza some thirty years; and in his Letter to his 1 Ballast. 2 In his "Lamentacyon" for the death of Henry the Seventh's Queen, written in 1503, Sir Thomas More uses the ballet-stave of seven, and often Cousin W. R., the same poet has given us another kind of Spenser-stave, similarly formed in the ballet-stave of five verses. Prior, in his Poem on the Campaign of 1706, has used a Spenser-stave, consisting of two elegiac staves and a couplet. The ballet-stave, which answers to this arrangement, had been used by Churchyard. When bright Eliza rul'd Britannia's state, But greatest Anna! while thy arms pursue say What equal pen shall write thy wondrous reign? Prior professed to follow Spenser " in the manner of his expression and turn of his number, having only added gives six accents to the last verse of the stanza. This verse always ends with the words " and lo now here she lies." It must have been often convenient to wedge this section into a verse of six accents; and as the poet's rhythm is in other respects loose, I consider the resemblance to the Spenser-stave owing rather to the tumbling rhythm of the period, than to any design of introducing novelty into English versification one verse to his stanza," which he thought "made the number more harmonious." Had he stated facility to be his aim, he had shown more honesty. He has escaped the difficulties of Spenser's stanza, but at the same time has sacrificed all its science and not a little of its beauty. Prior's name gave to this stanza a certain degree of popularity. Among others, it was used by Lowth in his Choice of Hercules, and by Denton in his poem on the Immortality of the Soul. We have a few instances, in which the Spenser-stave was fashioned on combinations other than the ballet-stave, as in Rochester's poem on Nothing. Nothing, that dwell'st with fools in grave disguise, For whom they rev'rend shapes and forms devise, Lawn sleeves, and furs, and gowns, when they like thee look wise, Spaniards' dispatch, Danes' wit are mainly seen in thee! &c. Occasionally we have even the Psalm-staves ending with an alexandrine, as in Warton's verses on the Suicide's Grave. Beneath the beech, whose branches bare Smit with the lightnings vivid glare O'erhang the craggy road, And whistle hollow, as they wave, A wretched suicide holds his accurs'd abode. The broken stave was closed with an alexandrine at a very early period. The following intricate specimen was used by Spenser in his Epithalamion, written on the marriage of the two Ladies Somerset, daughters of Lord Worcester. It may be considered as compounded of a ballet-stave of 6, a peculiar ballet-stave of 5 with three terminations, another ballet-stave of 6, and a final couplet -the first and second staves receiving band from the rhime. Each of the three staves breaks its last verse. Open the Temple-gates unto my love! Open them wide, that she may enter in, With trembling steps and humble reverence To humble your proud faces. Bring her up to th' High Altar, that she may The Choristers the joyous anthem sing, That all the woods may answer, and their echo ring, &c. The stave which Cowley uses in his Ode to Light is of the same kind, but of greater simplicity. The original was doubtless Waller's stave, consisting of two rhiming couplets.* I quote the ode at some length, as it is one of the few cases, in which poetry has succeeded in throwing grace and beauty over the stern truths of science. -All the world's brav'ry that delights our eyes Is but thy sev'ral liveries, Thou the rich dye on them bestow'st, Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou go'st. A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st, The virgin lilies in their white Are clad but in the lawn of almost naked light. * See p. 302. The violet, Spring's little infant, stands Girt in thy purple swaddling bands ; On the fair tulip thou dost doat, Thou cloth'st them in a gay, and party-colour'd coat, &c. &c. Through the soft ways of heav'n and earth and sea, Like a clear river thou dost glide, And with thy living stream, through the close channels slide But the vast ocean of unbounded day In th' empyrean heav'n does stay; From thence took first their rise, thither at last must flow. ; It may be observed, before we close the chapter, that Chatterton has used the Spenser-staves, in the poems which he ascribed to Rowley. This anachronism would, of itself, be sufficient to prove the forgery, even though it had baffled every other test, which modern criticism has applied to it. |