Can we speak accurately, then, of long syllables and short syllables in modern English? It may be said that we have a large number of genuine diphthongs; and such double sounds, especially where they are so open as to require unusual effort on the part of the vocal organs (like _-ow_, for example), may be assumed to take a longer time in utterance than monophthongs. Even such a sound as is represented by _-au_ or _-aw_, though it has but slight diphthongal quality, seems to sound longer than most monophthongs. But in none of these cases does ordinary pronunciation make the sound-length at all conspicuous, except where it coincides with strong stress; and it requires a moment's reasoning to convince one's self that the vowel in _fine_ is any longer than that in _fan_. It is more than doubtful, then, whether our vowel sounds can be regarded as of significance for metrical time. A word like "saw" or "now," occurring in such a place in the verse as to be passed over with the briefest and lightest utterance, would be pronounced with rapidity by the ordinary reader, with no thought that the vowel-sound was too "long." But in the earlier languages a syllable might be long, not only from the presence of a long vowel, but also from the presence of two or more consonants following the vowel. May this be said to hold good for modern English? In general, prolonged consonantal sounds seem to be avoided, as in the case of vowels. We pass over them rapidly, and have, for instance, no such clearly stopped syllables due to double consonants as are heard in Italian words like _madonna_. Yet we cannot doubt that two or three consonants require more time than one, and in words like _strength_, _flushed_, _fists_, and the like, every one would find the consonantal length perceptible. More than this, two consonants often serve to "close" the preceding syllable, by making it impossible to run the consonant at the end of it over into the following syllable, and hence really lengthen it. This, of course, is the reason why the first syllable of the Latin _avis_ is said to be short, but that of _alvus_ to be long. The Elizabethan metrists tried to apply these Latin rules of "quantity by position" to all English words; and many modern English writers, who have been trained from childhood in the appreciation of Latin quantities, easily perceive the differing consonantal quantities of English words. These quantities may, then, certainly be said to exist; but in ordinary English pronunciation, and to the ordinary, untrained English ear, they must be strongly marked in order to attract attention. When thus strongly marked, they doubtless play some part in the structure of verse. In some lines attributed to Raleigh, "His desire is a dureless content, And a trustless joy," the syllable _trust_-occupies the time of two syllables; the typical metre would require something like "And a pitiless joy."