Octosyllabic

“Octosyllabic verse, whether trochaic, as here, or iambic, as in Scott's "Lays of the Last Minstrel," is by far the easiest of all measures to write; and the fact that "Hiawatha" is unrhymed made the American's task greatly easier than that of the Scotchman.”

Hiawatha; a poem, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Illustrated by John Rea Neill.