THE POEMS in this book 1 are written some in Running Rhythm, the common rhythm
      in English use, some in Sprung Rhythm, and some in a mixture of the two. And those
      in the common rhythm are some counterpointed, some not.
        Common English rhythm, called Running Rhythm above, is measured by feet of
      either two or three syllables and (putting aside the imperfect feet at the beginning and
      end of lines and also some unusual measures, in which feet seem to be paired
      together and double or composite feet to arise) never more or less.
        Every foot has one principal stress or accent, and this or the syllable it falls on may
      be called the Stress of the foot and the other part, the one or two unaccented
      syllables, the Slack. Feet (and the rhythms made out of them) in which the stress
      comes first are called Falling Feet and Falling Rhythms, feet and rhythm in which the
      slack comes first are called Rising Feet and Rhythms, and if the stress is between
      two slacks there will be Rocking Feet and Rhythms. These distinctions are real and
      true to nature; but for purposes of scanning it is a great convenience to follow the
      example of music and take the stress always first, as the accent or the chief account
      always comes first in a musical bar. If this is done there will be in common English
      verse only two possible feet—the so-called accentual Trochee and Dactyl, and
      correspondingly only two possible uniform rhythms, the so-called Trochaic and
      Dactylic. But they may be mixed and then what the Greeks called a Logaoedic
      Rhythm arises. These are the facts and according to these the scanning of ordinary
      regularly-written English verse is very simple indeed and to bring in other principles is
      here unnecessary.
        But because verse written strictly in these feet and by these principles will become
      same and tame the poets have brought in licences and departures from rule to give
      variety, and especially when the natural rhythm is rising, as in the common
      ten-syllable or five-foot verse, rhymed or blank. These irregularities are chiefly
      Reversed Feet and Reversed or Counterpoint Rhythm, which two things are two
      steps or degrees of licence in the same kind. By a reversed foot I mean the putting
      the stress where, to judge by the rest of the measure, the slack should be and the
      slack where the stress, and this is done freely at the beginning of a line and, in the
      course of a line, after a pause; only scarcely ever in the second foot or place and
      never in the last, unless when the poet designs some extraordinary effect; for these
      places are characteristic and sensitive and cannot well be touched. But the reversal
      of the first foot and of some middle foot after a strong pause is a thing so natural that
      our poets have generally done it, from Chaucer down, without remark and it
      commonly passes unnoticed and cannot be said to amount to a formal change of
      rhythm, but rather is that irregularity which all natural growth and motion shews. If
      however the reversal is repeated in two feet running, especially so as to include the
      sensitive second foot, it must be due either to great want of ear or else is a calculated
      effect, the superinducing or mounting of a new rhythm upon the old; and since the
      new or mounted rhythm is actualy heard and at the same time the mind naturally
      supplies the natural or standard foregoing rhythm, for we do not forget what the
      rhythm is that by rights we should be hearing, two rhythms are in some manner
      running at once and we have something answerable to counterpoint in music, which
      is two or more strains of tune going on together, and this is Counterpoint Rhythm. Of
      this kind of verse Milton is the great master and the choruses of Samson Agonistes
      are written throughout in it—but with the disadvantage that he does not let the reader
      clearly know what the ground-rhythm is meant to be and so they have struck most
      readers as merely irregular. And in fact if you counterpoint throughout, since one
      only of the counter rhythms is actually heard, the other is really destroyed or cannot
      come to exist, and what is written is one rhythm only and probably Sprung Rhythm,
      of which I now speak.
        Sprung Rhythm, as used in this book, is measured by feet of from one to four
      syllables, regularly, and for particular effects any number of weak or slack syllables
      may be used. It has one stress, which falls on the only syllable, if there is only one, if
      there are more, then scanning as above, on the first, and so gives rise to four sorts of
      feet, a monosyllable and the so-called accentual Trochee, Dactyl, and the First
      Paeon. And there will be four corresponding natural rhythms; but nominally the feet
      are mixed and any one may follow any other. And hence Sprung Rhythm differs
      from Running Rhythm in having or being only one nominal rhythm, a mixed or
      ‘logaoedic’ one, instead of three, but on the other hand in having twice the flexibility
      of foot, so that any two stresses may either follow one another running or be divided
      by one, two, or three slack syllables. But strict Sprung Rhythm cannot be
      counterpointed. In Sprung Rhythm, as in logaoedic rhythm generally, the feet are
      assumed to be equally long or strong and their seeming inequality is made up by
      pause or stressing.
        Remark also that it is natural in Sprung Rhythm for the lines to be rove over, that is
      for the scanning of each line immediately to take up that of the one before, so that if
      the first has one or more syllables at its end the other must have so many the less at
      its beginning; and in fact the scanning runs on without break from the beginning, say,
      of a stanza to the end and all the stanza is one long strain, though written in lines
      asunder.
        Two licences are natural to Sprung Rhythm. The one is rests, as in music; but of
      this an example is scarcely to be found in this book, unless in the Echos, second line.
      The other is hangers or outrides, that is one, two, or three slack syllables added to
      a foot and not counting in the nominal scanning. They are so called because they
      seem to hang below the line or ride forward or backward from it in another
      dimension than the line itself, according to a principle needless to explain here. These
      outriding half feet or hangers are marked by a loop underneath them, and plenty of
      them will be found.
        The other marks are easily understood, namely accents, where the reader might be
      in doubt which syllable should have the stress; slurs, that is loops over syllables, to
      tie them together into the time of one; little loops at the end of a line to shew that the
      rhyme goes on to the first letter of the next line; what in music are called pauses
           , to shew that the syllable should be dwelt on; and twirls , to mark
      reversed or counterpointed rhythm.
        Note on the nature and history of Sprung Rhythm—Sprung Rhythm is the most
      natural of things. For (1) it is the rhythm of common speech and of written prose,
      when rhythm is perceived in them. (2) It is the rhythm of all but the most
      monotonously regular music, so that in the words of choruses and refrains and in
      songs written closely to music it arises. (3) It is found in nursery rhymes, weather
      saws, and so on; because, however these may have been once made in running
      rhythm, the terminations having dropped off by the change of language, the stresses
      come together and so the rhythm is sprung. (4) It arises in common verse when
      reversed or counterpointed, for the same reason.
        But nevertheless in spite of all this and though Greek and Latin lyric verse, which is
      well known, and the old English verse seen in Pierce Ploughman are in sprung
      rhythm, it has in fact ceased to be used since the Elizabethan age, Greene being the
      last writer who can be said to have recognised it. For perhaps there was not, down
      to our days, a single, even short, poem in English in which sprung rhythm is
      employed—not for single effects or in fixed places—but as the governing principle of
      the scansion. I say this because the contrary has been asserted: if it is otherwise the
      poem should be cited.
          Some of the sonnets in this book 1 are in five-foot, some in six-foot or Alexandrine
      lines.
        Nos. 13 and 22 are Curtal-Sonnets, that is they are constructed in proportions
      resembling those of the sonnet proper, namely 6+4 instead of 8+6, with however a
      halfline tailpiece (so that the equation is rather 12/8 + 9/2 = 21/2 = 10.5).