But though we can not draw for our purpose upon other plays as his unassisted work, we may derive help from the consideration of two at least of Beaumont's poems,--poems that have something of a dramatic flavour. Though they are in rhyming couplets, they display many of the characteristics of the author's blank verse. In the _Letter to Ben Jonson_, which is conversational, I count of run-on lines, thirty-eight in eighty, almost fifty per cent, as compared with Fletcher's sometimes ten or twenty per cent, in spite of the superior elasticity of blank verse; and of stress-syllable openings in the same letter twenty-four per cent as compared with the thirty-five per cent of Fletcher's more highly cadenced rhythm in the _Shepheardesse_. In Beaumont's _Elegy on the Countess of Rutland_, the last forty-four lines afford a fine example of dramatic fervour--the indictment of the physicians. Here the run-on lines again abound, almost fifty per cent; while the stress-syllable openings are but sixteen per cent--much lower than one may find in many rhymed portions of the _Shepheardesse_. With regard to all other tests except that of double ending (which does not apply in this kind of heroic couplet), we find that these poems of Beaumont are of a metrical style distinguished by the same characteristics as his blank verse.[152] 2. In Certain Joint-Plays. If we turn now to a second class of material available,--the three plays indubitably produced in partnership,--and eliminate the portions written in the metrical style of Fletcher, as already ascertained, we may safely attribute the remainder to the junior member of the firm; and so arrive at a final determination of his manner in verse composition. The three plays, as I have said before, are _Philaster_, _The Maides Tragedy_ and _A King and No King_. A passage, which in the opinion of nearly all critics[153] is by all tests distinctively Fletcherian, may be cited from the first of these as an example of that which we eliminate when we look for Beaumont. It is from the beginning of Act V, 4, where the Captain enters: "Philaster, brave Philaster!" Let Philas|ter Be deeper in request, my ding [a] dongs, My paires of deere Indentures, | Kings of Clubs, [+!] Than | your cold wa|ter-cham|blets | or | your paint|ings [+!] Spit|ted with cop|per, | Let | not your has|ty Silkes, 10 [+!] Or | your branch'd cloth | of bod|kin, | or | your ti|shues,-- [+!] Deare|ly belov'd | of spi|ced cake | and cus|tards,-- Your Rob|in-hoods, |[+!] Scar|lets and Johns, |[+!] tye | your affec|tions In darknesse to your Shops. No, dainty duc|kers, [+!] Up | with your three|-piled spi|rits, | your | wrought va|lors. 15 And let | your un|cut col|lers | make | the King feele The measure of your mightinesse, Philas|ter![154]