The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

Ixviii
METRES OP HORACE.
taking place only between the third Sapphic and the concluding
Adonic,' has induced an eminent prosodian (Di-. Carey) to en-
tertain the opinion that neither Sappho, nor Catullus, nor Hor-
ace ever intended the stanza to consist of four separate verses,
but wrote it as three, viz., two five-foot Sapphics and one of
seven feet, (including the Adonic) ; the fifth foot of the long
verse being indiscriminately either a spondee or a trochee.
The ordinary mode of reading the Sapphic verse has at length
begun to be abandoned, and the more correct one substituted,
which is as follows :
There is still, however, as has been remarked, some doubt
which of the accented syllables ought to have the stronger ac-
cent and which the weaker. (Consult Journal of Education,
vol. iv., p. 356 ; Penny Cyclopiedia, art. Arsis.)
11. CHORIAMBIC PENTAMETER.
The choriambic pentameter consists of a spondee, three chor-
iambi, and an iambus ;
as,
Ta ne queeslerls, I
| s(yire nefds, quSm mXhl, quem | till.
|
12. ALTERED CHORIAMBIC TETRAMETER.
The proper choriambic tetrameter consists of three choriam
bi and a bacchius (i. e., an iambus and a long syllable) ; as,
Jane pdtlr, | Jdni tuens, | dlvS hiceps, | Mformls.
(Sept. Serenas.)
Horace, however, made an alteration, though not an improve-
ment, by substituting a spondee instead of an iambus in the first
measure, thus changing the choriambus into a second epitrite,
viz.,
Te dios 0\r5 Sybdrin | ciir prSpSres | dmando.
The choriambic tetrameter, in its original state, was called
1. The divisiona wWch take place between the other lines of the Sapphic stanza,
when they are not common cases of synapheia (as in Horace, Cflnn. ii., 2, 18), will
be found to regard cmipcmtid words only, and not s^pU ones. The nde of Hor-
ace (iv., S) which begins
Findarum quisguis atudet amulari
Xule—
furnishes no exception to this remark. A synteresis operates in 7u2e, which must
be read as if written Tide.