_Háppy is hé, that fróm all búsiness cléar, Ás the old ráce of mánkind wére, Wíth his own óxen tílls his síre's left lánds, And ís not ín the úsurer's bánds; Nor sóldier-líke, stárted with róugh alárms, Nor dréads the séa's enráged hárms_, &c. He used the reverse order in _Odes_ iv. 1. In Wordsworth's poem _The Gipsies_ (iv. 68) we have the couplets: _a a₅ b b₄ c c₅ d d₄_, &c., but not divided into stanzas. Five- and three-foot lines _a₅ a₃ b₅ b₃ c₅ c₃ d₅ d₃_, &c., occur in Ben Jonson, _The Forest, XI. Epode_ (_Poets_, vi, pp. 555-6); and with reverse order (_a₃ a₅ b₃ b₅ c₃ c₅_, &c.) in his _Epigrams_ (_Poets_, iv. 546). The combination of five- and two-foot lines seems to occur in modern poets only; e.g. in W. S. Landor, _Miscellanies_, clxxv (ii. 649): _Néver may stórm thy péaceful bósom véx, Thou lóvely Éxe! O'er whóse pure stréam that músic yésterníght Pour'd frésh delíght, And léft a vísion for the éye of Mórn To láugh to scórn_, &c. With crossed rhymes (feminine and masculine rhymes, alternately) this combination occurs in Mrs. Browning, _A Drama of Exile_ (i. 12), where the scheme is _a ~₅ b₂ a ~₅ b₂ c ~₅ d₂ c ~₅ d₂_, and in R. Browning, _A Grammarian's Funeral_ (iv. 270), the formula being _a₅ b ~₂ a₅ b ~₂ c₅ d ~₂ c₅ d ~₂_, &c. § =208.= Combinations of four- and two-foot lines (masculine and feminine endings) occur in Ben Jonson, _Epigrams_, cxx (_Poets_, iv. 545); iambic and anapaestic verses similarly combined in R. Browning, _Prospice_, vi. 152. In the same poet we have three- and two-foot iambic-anapaestic lines with the formula _a ~₃ b₂ c ~₃ b₂ d ~₃ e₂ f ~₃ e₂_; in _The Englishman in Italy_ (iv. 186): _Fortú, Fortú, my belóved one, Sit hére by my side, On my knées put up bóth little féet! I was súre, if I tried_, &c. In Mrs. Browning we find this metre, which might be taken also as five-foot iambic-anapaestic couplets, broken up by internal rhyme (according to the formula _a ~₃ b₂ a ~₃ b₂ c ~₃ d₂ c ~₃ d₂_, &c.) in _A Drama of Exile_ (i. 3). For other specimens see _Metrik_, ii, §§ 244-8. A number of other anisometrical combinations of verses will be mentioned in Book II, in the chapter on the non-strophic odes. NOTES: [178] _Book of Nonsense_, London, Routledge, 1843. CHAPTER XVI IMITATIONS OF CLASSICAL FORMS OF VERSE AND STANZA § =209. The English hexameter.= Of all imitations of classical metres in English the best known and most popular is the hexameter. In the history of its development we have to distinguish two epochs--that of the first and somewhat grotesque attempts to introduce it into English poetry in the second half of the sixteenth century, and that of its revival in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.