Hei mihi quod nullis amor est medicabilis herbis:
Woe is me that love is curable by no herbs.
[Plate:
HEU! MISERANDE PUER!]
Ovid never would have said that, if he had smoked a cigar or chewed
tobacco. The ancients believed that love might be excited by certain
articles taken from the vegetable kingdom. Why then should it be
considered impossible to allay the same feeling in a similar manner?
Every bane has its corresponding antidote; if so, there may be physic
even for a philter. And for the pangs which a _virgin_ has inflicted,
what remedy could be prescribed more reasonable than the _Virginian_
weed;-- besides, love generally ends in smoke.
[Illustration: A CURE FOR THE HEARTACHE.]
Væ misero capiti, madefacto, sæpe fenestræ
Imbribus immundis, Lydia cara, tuæ:
Woe to my wretched head, often wetted, dear
Lydia, by the unclean showers of your window.
This would be a proper place for introducing a few remarks on the
ancient mode of serenading; which we are prevented from doing by the
very imperfect state of our present information on this interesting
point. It is, however, pretty generally admitted that the Romans always
took care to provide themselves with an umbrella on these occasions,
and this for a reason which the above distich will have rendered
sufficiently obvious. It appears to us that so salutary a precaution is
well worthy of being sometimes adopted in these modern days-- and with
this hint we conclude the Syntax.
+PROSODY.+
[Transcriber's Note:
As explained at the beginning of the e-text, vowels with macron ("long"
mark) are shown as CAPITALS, while vowels with breve ("short" mark) are
shown in {braces}. Long vowels that are already capitalized (very rare)
are shown in [brackets].]
All you that bards of note would be,
Must study well your Prosody.
As Comparative Anatomy teaches what the sound of a cod-fish is; so
Prosody teaches what is the sound of syllables.
Sound and quantity mean the same thing; though how that fact is to be
reconciled with the proverb, "great _cry_ and little _wool_," we do not
know.
Prosody is divided into three parts. Tone, Breathing, and Time. As to
tone-- boys are usually required to repeat it in a loud one, without
stammering or drawling; and with as little breathing and time, or
breathing-time, as possible.
We shall leave tone to the consideration of pianoforte and
fiddle-makers; and breathing to doctors and chemists, who can _analyze_
it a great deal better than we can. In this place we think proper to
treat only of Time.
Now of Time a very great deal may be said, taking the word in all the
senses in which it is capable of being used.
In the first place, Time flies-- but this we have had occasion to
observe before; as also that Time is a very great eater.
In the second, Time is a very ill-used personage; he is spent, wasted,
lost, kicked down, and killed-- the last as often as an Irishman is--
but for all that he never complains.
It is a question whether keeping Time, or losing Time, is the essential
characteristic of dancing.
Then we might expatiate largely about the value of Time, and of the
propriety of taking him by the forelock-- but for two reasons.
One of them is, that all this has been said long ago; the other, that it
is nothing at all to the purpose.
We might also quote extensively from Dr. Culpeper's Herbal, and from
Linnæus and Jussieu; but the _time_ we speak of, (although we hope it
will be _twigged_ by the reader,) is no _plant_; nevertheless it is a
necessary ingredient in grammatical _stuffing_.
Time in prosody is the measure of the pronouncing of a syllable.
Like whist, it is divided into Long and Short. A long time is marked
thus, as sUmEns, taking: a short time thus; as p{i}l{u}l{a}, a pill.
A foot is the placing together of two or more syllables, according to
the certain observation of their _time_, the organ of which should be
well developed for that purpose.
Ordinary feet are long feet, short feet, broad feet, splay feet, club
feet, and bumble feet, to which may be added cloven feet in the case of
certain animals, and an "old gentleman."
There are several kinds of Latin feet; here, however, we shall only
notice spondees and dactyls.
A spondee is a foot of two syllables, as InfAns, an infant.
A dactyl is a foot of three syllables, as Ang{e}l{u}s, an angel,
pOrc{u}l{u}s, a little pig.
Scanning is measuring a verse as you are measured by your tailor-- by
the _foot_, according to _rule_. To scanning there belong the figures
called Synal[oe]pha, Ecthlipsis, Synæresis, Diæresis, and Cæsura.
Synal[oe]pha is the cutting off a vowel at the end of a word, before
another at the beginning of the next; as
[O]cclUsIs EvAsi {o}c{u}lIs nAsOqu{e} cruEntO: