The alexandrine was introduced into English from French verse, as early
(according to Schipper) as the early part of the thirteenth century.
Early poems in this metre alone, however, are almost wholly wanting, if
they ever existed. The early alexandrines usually appear in conjunction
with the septenary (seven-stress verse). The French alexandrine has
almost always been characterized by a regular and strongly marked medial
cesura, and this very commonly appears in the English form, but by no
means universally.
The French alexandrine is of uncertain origin. Kawczynski would trace it
to the classical Asclepiadean verse, as in
"Mæcenas atavis edite regibus,"
which at least has the requisite number of syllables. It appeared in
France as early as the first part of the twelfth century, and in
four-line stanzas was the favorite for didactic poetry as late as the
beginning of the fifteenth century; otherwise, in the close of the
fourteenth century, it was supplanted by the decasyllabic. In the middle
of the sixteenth century it again won precedence over the
decasyllabic--in part through the influence of Ronsard--and is of course
the standard measure of modern French poetry. The name "alexandrine"
seems to have been applied in the fifteenth century, from the familiar
use of the measure in the Alexander romance. The earliest known mention
of the term is in Herenc's _Doctrinal de la secunde Retorique_. (See
Stengel's article in Gröber's _Grundriss der Romanischen Philologie_,
from which these statements are taken.)
The French alexandrine is in a sense a quite different measure from the
English form. Accent is an element of so comparatively slight importance
in the French language and French rhythm, that its place seems partly to
be filled by regularity of cesural pause and regularity in the counting
of syllables. The French alexandrine, therefore, may often be described
as a verse of twelve syllables, divided into two equal parts by a pause,
with marked accents on the sixth and twelfth syllables, but with the
other accents irregularly disposed. Often it seems to an English reader
to have an anapestic effect, and to be best described as anapestic
tetrameter. In English, however, while the regularity in the number of
syllables is followed, and very commonly the medial pause, there is also
observed the regularity of alternate accents which gives the verse the
characteristic form indicated by the term "six-stress."
'Ye nuten hwat ye biddeþ, þat of gode nabbeþ imone;
for al eure bileve is on stokke oþer on stone:
ac þeo, þat god iknoweþ, heo wyten myd iwisse,
þat hele is icume to monne of folke judaysse.'
'Loverd,' heo seyde, 'nu quiddeþ men, þat cumen is Messyas,
þe king, þat wurþ and nuþen is and ever yete was.
hwenne he cumeþ, he wyle us alle ryhtleche;
for he nule ne he ne con nenne mon bipeche.'
(_De Muliere Samaritana_, ll. 51-58. In Morris's _Old English
Miscellany_, p. 84; and Zupitza's _Alt- und Mittelenglisches
Übungsbuch_, p. 83. ab. 1250.)
This early poem illustrates the irregular use of alexandrines near the
time of their introduction into English. The poem opens with a
septenary--
"Tho Iesu Crist an eorthe was, mylde weren his dede;"
and septenaries and alexandrines are used interchangeably. Dr. Triggs
says, in his notes on the poem in McLean's edition of Zupitza's
_Übungsbuch_, that lines 5, 6, 9-18, 25-28, 39, 40, 43, 44, 49-54, 57,
58, 63, 64, 66, 67, 70-72, 74, 75 are alexandrines. (Introduction, p.
lxii.) The English tendency toward indifference to regularity in the
counting of syllables is also noticeable. In the same way the early poem
called "The Passion of our Lord" (ed. Morris, E.E.T.S. xlix. 37), which
is thought from the heading--"_Ici cumence la passyun ihesu crist en
engleys_"--to be a translation from the French, shows a preponderance of
alexandrines, although it opens in septenary. See also such poems as the
"Death," "Doomsday," etc., in the _Old English Miscellany_. The
alexandrine was easily confused by the Middle English writers, not only
with the septenary, but with the native "long line," and it is often
difficult to say just what rhythm was in the writer's mind. Thus a line
like
"Be stille, leve soster, thin herte the to-breke,"
from the _Judas_, may be regarded either as an alexandrine or a long
four-stress line.
In Westsex was þan a kyng, his [name] was Sir Ine.
Whan he wist of the Bretons, of werre ne wild he fine.
Messengers he sent thorghout Inglond
Unto þe Inglis kynges, þat had it in þer hond,
And teld how þe Bretons, men of mykelle myght,
Þe lond wild wynne ageyn þorh force and fyght.
Hastisly ilkone þe kynges com fulle suythe,
Bolde men and stoute, þer hardinesse to kiþe.
In a grete Daneis felde þer þei samned alle,
Þat ever siþen hiderward Kampedene men kalle.
(ROBERT MANNING of Brunne: _Chronicle of Peter de Langtoft_. Hearne ed.,
vol. i. p. 2. ab. 1325.)
This poem is one of the very few representatives of distinctly
alexandrine verse in Middle English. The original poem being in
alexandrines, Manning followed it closely. In the first part, however,
he put rimes only at the ends of the verses, whereas later he introduced
internal rime, thus resolving the verse into short lines of three
stresses. Schipper observes that the four following lines are each
representative of a familiar type of the French alexandrine:
"Messengers he sent þorghout Inglond
Unto the Inglis kynges, þat had it in þer hond."
"After Ethelbert com Elfrith his broþer,
Þat was Egbrihtes sonne and [gh]it þer was an oþer."
(_Englische Metrik_, vol. i. p. 252.)
The so-called _Legend-Cycle_ is also marked by a sort of alexandrine
couplet. (See ten Brink's _English Literature_, Kennedy trans., vol. i.
p. 274.)
O! think I, had I wings like to the simple dove,
This peril might I fly, and seek some place of rest
In wilder woods, where I might dwell far from these cares.
What speedy way of wing my plaints should they lay on,
To 'scape the stormy blast that threatened is to me?
Rein those unbridled tongues! break that conjured league!
For I decipher'd have amid our town the strife.
(EARL OF SURREY: _Psalm. LV_. ab. 1540.)
This is a not very successful experiment in unrimed alexandrines. Others
of Surrey's Psalms are in rimed "Poulter's Measure" (alexandrines
alternating with septenary).
O, let me breathe a while, and hold thy heavy hand,
My grievous faults with Shame enough I understand.
Take ruth and pity on my plaint, or else I am forlorn;
Let not the world continue thus in laughing me to scorn.
Madam, if I be he, to whom you once were bent,
With whom to spend your time sometime you were content:
If any hope be left, if any recompense
Be able to recover this forepassed negligence,
O, help me now, poor wretch, in this most heavy plight,
And furnish me yet once again with Tediousness to fight.
(_The Marriage of Wit and Science_, V. ii., in Dodsley's _Old English
Plays_, ed. Hazlitt, vol. ii. p. 386. ab. 1570.)
In this play the alexandrine is the dominant measure, though mingled
with occasional septenaries still. (See Schipper, vol. i. p. 256.)
While favor fed my hope, delight with hope was brought,
Thought waited on delight, and speech did follow thought;
Then grew my tongue and pen records unto thy glory,
I thought all words were lost that were not spent of thee,
I thought each place was dark but where thy lights would be,
And all ears worse than deaf that heard not out thy story.
(SIDNEY: _Astrophel and Stella_, Fifth Song. [In stanzas _aabccb_.] ab.
1580.)
See also Sidney's sonnet in alexandrines, p. 272, below.
Of Albion's glorious isle the wonders whilst I write,
The sundry varying soils, the pleasures infinite,
(Where heat kills not the cold, nor cold expels the heat,
The calms too mildly small, nor winds too roughly great,
Nor night doth hinder day, nor day the night doth wrong,
The summer not too short, the winter not too long)
What help shall I invoke to aid my Muse the while?
Thou Genius of the place (this most renowned isle)
Which livedst long before the all-earth-drowning flood,
Whilst yet the world did swarm with her gigantic brood,
Go thou before me still thy circling shores about,
And in this wand'ring maze help to conduct me out.
(DRAYTON: _Polyolbion_, ll. 1-12. 1613.)
This is by all odds the longest Modern English poem in alexandrines, and
while the verse is often agreeable, it illustrates the unfitness of the
measure--to English ears--for long, continuous poems.
The dew was falling fast, the stars began to blink;
I heard a voice; it said, "Drink, pretty creature, drink!"
And looking o'er the hedge, before me I espied
A snow-white mountain-lamb with a Maiden at its side.
(WORDSWORTH: _The Pet Lamb_. 1800.)
If hunger, proverbs say, allures the wolf from wood,
Much more the bird must dare a dash at something good:
Must snatch up, bear away in beak, the trifle-treasure
To wood and wild, and then--O how enjoy at leisure!
Was never tree-built nest, you climbed and took, of bird,
(Rare city-visitant, talked of, scarce seen or heard,)
But, when you would dissect the structure, piece by piece,
You found, enwreathed amid the country-product--fleece
And feather, thistle-fluffs and bearded windlestraws--
Some shred of foreign silk, unravelling of gauze,
Bit, maybe, of brocade, mid fur and blow-bell-down:
Filched plainly from mankind, dear tribute paid by town,
Which proved how oft the bird had plucked up heart of grace,
Swooped down at waif and stray, made furtively our place
Pay tax and toll, then borne the booty to enrich
Her paradise i' the waste; the how and why of which,
That is the secret, there the mystery that stings!
(BROWNING: _Fifine at the Fair_, ix. 1872.)
Browning has made of the alexandrine in this poem an almost new measure,
hardly more like the alexandrine couplet of earlier days than the
measure of _Sordello_ is like the "heroic couplet" proper. In general,
the modern use of the alexandrine is characterized by increased freedom
in the placing of the cesura. It is also distinguished from the early
French and Middle English forms by the fact that the cesura and the
ending are commonly masculine.
By far the most frequent use of the alexandrine in English poetry is as
a variant from the five-stress line. For instances of this, see the
section on the Spenserian stanza, pp. 102-108, above, and Corson's
chapters on the Spenserian stanza and its influence, in his _Primer of
English Verse_. In connection with Dryden's use of the alexandrine as a
variant from the heroic couplet, Mr. Saintsbury makes some interesting
observations on the measure: "The metre, though a well-known English
critic has maltreated it of late, is a very fine one; and some of
Dryden's own lines are unmatched examples of that 'energy divine' which
has been attributed to him. In an essay on the alexandrine in English
poetry, which yet remains to be written, and which would be not the
least valuable of contributions to poetical criticism, this use of the
verse would have to be considered, as well as its regular recurrent
employment at the close of the Spenserian stanza, and its continuous
use.... An examination of the _Polyolbion_ and of _Fifine at the Fair_,
side by side, would, I think, reveal capacities, somewhat unexpected
even in this form of arrangement. But so far as the occasional
alexandrine is concerned, it is not a hyperbole to say that a number,
out of all proportion, of the best lines in English poetry may be found
in the closing verses of the Spenserian stave as used by Spenser
himself, by Shelley, and by the present Laureate, and in the occasional
alexandrines of Dryden. The only thing to be said against this latter
use is, that it demands a very skilful ear and hand to adjust the
cadence." (_Life of Dryden_, in Men of Letters Series, pp. 172, 173.)