One strong beat, then two trailing light syllables: the dactyl is poetry's waltz step. In English it is rare enough to feel exotic - Longfellow borrowed it for Evangeline specifically to echo classical epic, Tennyson used it for 'The Charge of the Light Brigade' at half-strength, and nursery-rhyme tradition uses it constantly.
Six dactyls per line make dactylic hexameter, the meter of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid. In the classical languages the pattern is quantitative - based on syllable duration (long/short) rather than stress - so our Dactylic Hexameter Scanner evaluates macrons, elisions, and spondee substitutions the way Roman grammarians did.
English imitations of hexameter usually end the line early, dropping the final two light syllables (catalexis), exactly as in the Evangeline example above.
For English dactylic experiments use the Poetry Meter Checker; for genuine classical hexameter coursework, the Dactylic Hexameter Scanner and Latin Scansion Tool apply the quantitative rules.