The Ballad of the White Horse is also considered a Roman Catholic allegory. Chesterton incorporates a significant amount of philosophy into the basic structure of the story. The poem consists of 2,684 lines of English verse. They are divided into stanzas, typically consisting of 4 to 6 lines each. The poem is based on the ballad stanza form, although the poem often departs significantly from it. Types of metrical feet are used more or less freely, although there is often basic repetition in a line. The rhyme scheme varies, often being ABCB or ABCCCB. Prefatory Note Chesterton begins his work with a note (in prose) declaring
Regulated verse are rhymed on the even lines, with one rhyme being used throughout the poem. Also, and definitionally, the tonal profile of the poem is controlled (that is, "regulated"). Furthermore, semantic and tonal parallelism is generally required of certain interior couplets. During the Tang Dynasty, the "Shen-Song" team of Shen Quanqi and Song Zhiwen greatly contributed to the development of this Classical Chinese verse form. Regulated verse consisting of the three "jintishi" or "new style poetry" forms of "lushi", "jueju", and "pailu" while retaining the basic characteristics that are distinguished from the "gushi" or "old style poetry" by the addition of