The versification of the Felibres follows in the main the rules observed by the French poets.  As in all the Romance languages the verse consists of a given number of syllables, and the number of stressed syllables in the line is not constant.  The few differences to be noted between French verse and Provencal verse arise from three differences in the languages.  The Provencal has no e mute, and therefore all the syllables theoretically counted are distinctly heard, and the masculine and the feminine rhymes are fully distinguished in pronunciation.  The new language possesses a number of diphthongs, and the unaccented part of the diphthong, a u or an i, constitutes a consonant either before or after a vowel in another word, being really a w or a y.  This prevents hiatus, which is banished from Provencal verse as it is from French, and here again theory and practice are in accord, for the elision of the e mute where this e follows a vowel readmits hiatus into the French line, and no such phenomenon is known to the Provencal.  Thirdly, the stressed syllable of each word is strongly marked, and verse exists as strongly and regularly accentual as in English or German.  This is seen in the numerous poems written to be sung to an air already existing.  The accents in these pieces fall with the rhythmic beat the English ear is accustomed to and which it so misses on first acquaintance with French verse.  A second consequence of this stronger stress is that verse is written without rhyme; the entire Poem of the Rhone is written in ten-syllable feminine verses unrhymed.

    “O tems di viei d’antico bounoumio,
    Que lis oustau avien ges de sarraio
    E que li gent, a Coundrieu coume au nostre,
    Se gatihavon, au caleu per rire!”

(Canto I.)

Mistral has made use of all the varieties of verse known to the French poets.  One of the poems in the Isclo d’Or offers an example of fourteen-syllable verse; it is called L’Amiradou (The Belvedere).  Here are the first two stanzas:—­

    “Au casteu de Tarascoun, i’a ’no reino, i’a ’no fado
                Au casteu de Tarascoun
                I’a ’no fado que s’escound.

    “Aqueu que ie durbira la presoun ounte es clavado
                Aqueu que ie durbira
                Beleu elo l’amara."[6]

We may note here instances of the special features of Provencal versification mentioned above.  The i in i’a, the equivalent of the French il y a, is really a consonant.  This i occurs again in the fourth of the lines quoted, so that there is no hiatus between que and ie.  In like manner the u of beleu, in the last line, stands with the sound of the English w between this and elo.  The e of ounte is elided.  It will be observed that there is a caesura between the seventh and eighth syllables of the long line, and that the verse has a marked rhythmic beat, with decided trochaic movement,—­