The Ballad of the White Horse

In this literary ballad the length of the stanzas ranges from four to six lines. Each type of stanza has its own distinct form. The four-line stanza, also known as a quatrain, alternates four- and three-beat stresses. For example, from Book I:

They bred like birds in English woods, (4)

They rooted like the rose, (3)

When Alfred came to Athelney, (4)

To hide him from their bows (3) (Lines 108-11). 

The meter here is iambic, an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, although overall the meter of the ballad is flexible, with many variations on the basic iambic beat. 

The five-line stanzas have their own distinctive structure. The first line, a tetrameter, contains four stressed syllables; the second line, a trimeter, contains three; lines 3 and 4 contain four stresses, and line 5 contains three stresses. It can be represented thus: 4,3,4,4,3:  

Our towns were shaken of tall kings (4)

With scarlet beards like blood: (3)

The world turned empty where they trod, (4)

They took the kindly cross of God (4)

And cut it up for wood (3) (Book 1, Lines 91-95). 

In terms of the number of stresses, or beats, the six-line stanzas usually follow a pattern of 4,3,4,4,4,3: