94
J. E. Wallace Wallin,
average for the pauses at the end of sentences is 1.21s. (The records
afford only seven instances.) The relation is as 1:2.16.
The difference between the two is, that the terminal pauses of poetry
are relatively equidistant. In prose the sentence may be of a great variety
of lengths ; hence the terminal pause in prose is not nearly so periodically
recurrent as in poetry. This constitutes the essential difference, which is
so easily heard, between the pauses of prose and poetry.
All the records are in complete agreement with the principle of pause
subordination, except two of the records of Table XXXI., prose without
punctuation marks, where the average of the sectional pauses is 0.45s. The
pauses of these records, according to the judgment of the ear, are placed
with hesitancy and diffidence.
Regularity.—The absolute regularity of the two series differs only by
0.01s. The relative inequality of the terminal pauses is 15%; of the
sectional 25%. The terminal pauses are one and two-thirds times as reg¬
ular as the sectional.
The regularity is higher in the prose reading of the test than in the
corresponding reading of the passages as poetry.
The lowest inequality for any set of records of sectional pauses is 12%,
Table XXX., prose read as poetry, the highest, 32%, Table XXIX.,
poetry read as poetry ; a range of 20%.
The lowest inequality for the terminal pauses is 10%, Table XXXVI.,
prose read as poetry ; the highest 29%, Table XXXVII., poetry read as
prose without punctuation marks; a range of 19%.
The lowest degree of irregularity for any record of sectional pauses is
12%, records of H. Ö. and S. I; the highest, 40%, J. M. T.; a range
of 28%.
For terminal pauses the lowest is 7%, C. O. ; the largest 47 %, G. F.
A., the record without the punctuation marks; a range of 40%.
The range for the individual records of sectional pauses is 8 % larger
than the range for the sets; and, of the terminal pauses, 21% larger.
Results—
The number of pauses of all kinds in recited poetry is generally greater
than the number of punctuation marks.
The number of punctuation-mark pauses is frequently if not generally
slightly less than the number of punctuation marks, in recited poetry.
The proportion of the number of pauses to punctuation marks varies
according as they are sectional or terminal. In respect to the sec¬
tional pauses, there were approximately 7 for every 4 punctuation marks ;
and for the terminal pauses, approximately 10 for every 9 punctuation
marks.