Nature, to whom we all come alike for our simplest as our highest thoughts, works in many ways, but all subject to inviolable laws. These may often be not evident at a cursory glance, and still more often beyond our keenest search; we can only infer the law from the result. In mere human work, what one man produces is more or less easily understood by his fellow-man, and a knowledge of the rules to which he conformed, adds interest to our pleasure in his work, and makes us able to be real critics, to some extent, while mere taste or feeling can lay claim to no more than a personal and often valueless opinion. The laws which govern music are probably better known than those which rule verse, as our English poets choose generally a freer and more flexible mode of expression than the old writers allowed. Again, in music the form is more easily seen, for two reasons: one, that constant habit of hearing pieces in strict form has given us knowledge, without our being able to formulate it; the other, that the subjects of music, being at most vague and abstract, are left out of the title of works by the great masters, save in a very few instances. Even the “Eroica Symphony” or the “Wedding March” merely suggests abstract feelings. To describe a rose or an umbrella, for example, is impossible in music. We can only suggest praise, or grief, and similar emotional feelings. Therefore the shape only is usually given in the title, such as a march, minuet, or sonata. But in poetry the shape is rarely described. Even in the most widely used of these fixed forms, the sonnet, the shape is not by any means invariably expressed in the title. In the verses written in imitation of the Old French Troubadours it is more often used. In the _rondeau_, the most widely chosen, it is not always given, but the _triolet_, _villanelle_, or _ballade_ is almost always so described in the title, the shape, as in music, ranking worthy of interest in itself. These old shapes are more akin to the fugue and canon in music, as the whole work has inner laws governing each detail, and making the choice of words or notes decided beforehand to a great extent by the form. It is intended in this paper to describe a few of the forms which have of late found favour with the younger school of living poets, for a twofold reason: first, that their readers may better appreciate their works; secondly, that the amateur verse-writer may gain a knowledge of these verse shapes, and thereby be able to produce trifles which are worthy of attention. Although it is not given to many to produce great thoughts, yet to acquire a polished mode of displaying lesser ones to advantage, is in itself worth the trying. The tendency to diffusiveness which weakens so much verse, until the pretty trifling becomes wearisome, would be lessened if a strict form were first chosen, and the subject necessarily compressed within its limits.