s. 107. But a very superficial examination of Chaucer's verse soon shews that he continually sets aside the rigid rule of the Old French prosody that regulated the position of the medial pause. His study of Italian soon shewed him a better way; for there is a great tendency to monotony in the French mode. Dante frequently includes _three_ accents in the former part of his line, which gives much greater freedom to the verse. Thus l. 14 of the Divina Commedia is as follows:-- L[`a]-ove terminava | quella valle. |¯| ¯| ¯| . ¯| ¯| Consequently, we must allow the bar denoting the caesura to shift its position to a later place in the line, as in A 3; though we may still use Dr. Schipper's number, as above, to denote the general type of the line. That is, A 3 becomes:-- Cf. 2. And-b['a]thed ['e]v'ry v['e]yn[:e] | in-sw['i]ch lic['o]ur. |¯| ¯| ¯| . |¯ |¯ But this is not the only variety; for the mark denoting the caesura is actually inserted in the Ellesmere MS. with much care, and is seldom misplaced. This shews that some lines are divided much more unequally; so that, in fact, the former portion of the line may contain _one_ accent only, or it may contain _four_; in addition to the above instances in which it contains _two_ or _three_. I give examples from the Cant. Tales, Group A:-- 12. And-sh['o]rtly | wh['a]n the-s['o]nne w['a]s to-r['e]ste (30). |¯ . ¯¯ |¯| ¯¯ |¯| 10. And-['a]fter | ['a]mor u['i]ncit ['o]mni.['a] (162). |¯| . ¯| ¯| ¯| ¯¯ 3. And th['u]s | with-f['e]yned fl['a]te.r['y]' and-j['a]pes (705). |¯ . |¯| ¯| ¯¯ |¯| 3. Arc['i]t' is-h['u]rt as-m['u]ch' as-h['e] | or-m['o]re (1116). |¯ |¯ |¯ |¯ . |¯| In some places the Ellesmere MS. marks _two_ pauses in a line, but we need only consider one of them as constituting the true caesura. Thus, in A 923, there is a mark after _been_ and another after _duchesse_; the latter may be considered as subsidiary. The occurrence of initial portions of a line containing _one_ accent or _four_ is comparatively rare; but the inclusion of _three_ accents is very common. s. 108. The addition of a weak syllable at the end of a line is easily explained. It is because, at this point, the poet is FREE; that is, the pause that naturally occurs there enables him to insert an additional syllable with ease. Shakespeare did not hesitate even to add _two_ syllables there, if he was so minded; as in Rich. III. iii. 6. 9:--'Untainted, unexamin'd, free, at liberty.'