Gay’s Stanza consists of alternating iambic trimeters and iambic trimeters with an additional syllable. Iambic trimeters with the additional syllable are used for odd lines, and iambic trimeters are used for even lines.

The rhyme scheme is abab, and the odd rhymes (the a’s) are double, i.e. the last two syllables of the lines rhyme.¹

Examples of Gay’s Stanza

‘Twas when the seas were roaring
With hollow blasts of wind,
A damsel lay deploring,
All on a rock reclined;
Wide o’er the foaming rillows
She cast a wistfu look;
Her head was crown’d with willows,
That trembled o’er the brook.”

- John Gay

History

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References