IBEX

This variety is Tery rarely admitted in serious composition, and is ill suited to tiie character of the language. Poets have, however, sometimes sportively attempted whole series of vers i cadent i; as in the set of sonnets of Casti, called / tre Giuli. 2. The verso eroico, or hendecasyllabic, which is the ordinary one, ending in a short syllable: " Canto I'arm i pietose, e '1 capitano." 3. The verso sdrucciolo, which ends with two short' syllables after the fifth iamb: " Pa i oziosa, e di tua gloria iramembre." This also is rarely used in serious writing; but its occasional employment adds a peculiar grace to lighter poetry. In English, according to the genius of the language, the decasyllabic line is most common; the hendecasyllabic occasional, and more frequent in blank verse than in rhymes, in consequence of the comparative rarity of trochaic rhymes; the sdrucciolo, also occasionally used by dramalie poets: e. g. " What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba? " The licence is sometimes carried so far as to add three short syllables to the last iamb: e. g. " The senator shall bear contempt hereditary." The German language is rich both in iambic and trochaic terminations: consequently the decasyllabic and hendecasyllabic are more indiscriminately employed than in either English or Italian; and it is not uncommon to use the elegant variety of alternate iambic and trochaic rhymes, like the French masculine and'feminine. [s. 595]