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
Political verse as ivy-leaves around the ruin'd turret wreathe, All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray beneath. </poem> But in the English poetry the lines have mostly masculine rhyme whereas in Greek poetry the fifteen syllable feminine line is the norm of the Political verse. The Political verse characterizes traditional Greek poetry, especially between 1100 and 1850. It is the verse in which most Greek folk songs are written, including such temporally distant works as the medieval Cretan romance "Erotokritos" and the 3rd draft of Dionysios Solomos' ""The Free Besieged"", considered the masterpiece of modern Greek poetry. It is