I would remark that our rhythm must be designed to suit our delivery. Is not our tone subdued as a rule in the exordium, except of course in cases of accusation where we have to rouse the judge or fill him with indignation, full and clear in the statement of fact, in argument impetuous and rapid not merely in our language, but in our motions as well, expansive and fluent in commonplaces and descriptions and, as a rule, submissive and downcast in the peroration?

But the motions of the body also have their own appropriate rhythms, while the musical theory of rhythm determines the value of metrical feet no less for dancing than for tunes. Again, do we not adapt our voice and gesture to the nature of the themes on which we are speaking? There is, therefore, all the less reason for wonder that the same is true of the feet employed in prose, since it is natural that what is sublime should have a stately stride, that what is gentle should seem to be led along, that what is violent should seem to run and what is tender to flow.

Consequently, where necessary, we must borrow the pompous effect produced by the spondees and iambi which compose the greater portion of the rhythms of tragedy, as in the line, En, impero Argis, sceptra mi liquit Pelops. From an unknown tragedian. Lo, I am lord at Argos, where to me I Pelops the sceptre left. But the comic senarius, styled trochaic, contains a number of pyrrhics and trochees, which others call tribrachs, but loses in dignity what it gains in speed,

as for example in the line, quid igiturfaciam? non earn, ne nunc quidem?Ter. Eun. I. i. 1. What shall I do then? Not go even now? The pyrrhic never forms a separate foot, but does form part of the anapaest, tribrach and dactyl and it is in this connexion that it is mentioned by Quintilian. Violent and abusive language, on the other hand, even in verse, as I have said, employs the iambic for its attack: e.g., Quis hoc potest videre, quis potest pati,nisi impudicus et vorax et aleo? Cat. xxix. 1. Who save a lecherous gambling glutton can endure to gaze on such a sight as this As a general rule, however,

if the choice were forced upon me, I should prefer my rhythm to be harsh and violent rather than nerveless and effeminate, as it is in so many writers, more especially in our own day, when it trips along in wanton measures that suggest the accompaniment of castanets. Nor will any rhythm ever be so admirable that it ought to be continued with the same recurrence of feet.