Foreign proper names especially in many cases are subject, as in earlier times, to variable accentuation, as e.g.: _Ajáx_ Sur. 129, _Cæsár_ Wyatt 191, _Cató_ ib. 191, the more usual accentuation also occurring in the writings of the same poets; similarly _Átridés_ Sur. 129 and _Atríde_ ib. 116, _Cárthages_ ib. 149 and _Cartháge_ 175. Shakespeare has always the unclassical _Andrónicus_, _Hypérion_, _Cleopátra_, but for rhythmical reasons _N+ó+rth+a_mpt+ó+n_ Rich. III, II. iv. 1 instead of _Northámpton_, and so in several other cases (cf. _Metrik_, ii. § 67). § =124.= Amongst the =Germanic vocables= the parathetic compounds chiefly call for notice, as their accentuation in common speech also approaches level stress, and for this reason they may be used with either accentuation. This group includes compounds like _moonlight_, _welfare_, _farewell_, and some conjunctions, prepositions, and pronouns, as _therefore_, _wherefore_, _something_, _nothing_, _sometimes_, _into_, _unto_, _towards_, _without_, as e.g.: _thérefore_ Wyatt 24, &c., _therefóre_ ib. 42, _nóthing_ Rich. II, II. ii. 12, _nothíng_ Rich. III, I. i. 236, _únto_ Sur. 125, _untó_ Sur. 117 (cf. _Metrik_, ii. § 58). Greater arbitrariness in the treatment of word-accent, explained best by the influence of Middle English usage, is shown in the rhythmical accentuation of the final syllable _-ing_ in words like _endíng_: _thing_ Wyatt 27; and of the suffixes _-ness_, _-ly_, _-y_, _-ow_, e.g. _goodnéss_: _excéss_ Wyatt 206, _free_: _trulý_ 147; _borrów_: _sorrów_: _overthrów_ ib. 227. Less admissible still are such accentuations with the endings _-er_, _-est_, used on the whole only by the earlier Modern English poets, e.g. _earnést_ Wyatt 11, _aftér_ ib. 207, and least of all with inflexional endings, e.g. _scornéd_ Sur. 170, _causéth_ Wyatt 33 (cf. _Metrik_, ii. §§ 59-61). As a rule, however, such unnatural accentuations can be avoided by assuming the omission of a thesis at the beginning or in the interior of a line. With regard to trisyllabic and polysyllabic words the remarks on pp. 176-7 are to be compared. DIVISION II VERSE-FORMS COMMON TO THE MIDDLE AND MODERN ENGLISH PERIODS CHAPTER IX LINES OF EIGHT FEET, FOUR FEET, TWO FEET, AND ONE FOOT § =125.=. Among the metres introduced into Middle English poetry in imitation of foreign models, perhaps the oldest is the four-foot verse, rhyming in couplets. This metre may be regarded as having originally arisen by halving the eight-foot line, although only an isolated example of this, dating from about the middle of the thirteenth century, quoted above (p. 127), is known in Middle English poetry. This, however, serves with special clearness to illustrate the resolution, by means of inserted rhyme, of the eight-foot long-line couplet into four-foot lines rhyming alternately (cf. § 78).