THE FOREWORD
Here are 77 story-telling ballads and narrative poems, that will make the heart beat faster and the pulse bound, of any boy or girl from twelve to fifteen years of age.
They offer a feast of good things—romances, hero-tales, Faërie legends, and adventures of Knights and lovely Damsels. They sing of proud and wicked folk, of gentle and loyal ones, of Laidley Worms, Witches, Mermaids with golden combs, sad maidens, glad ones and fearless lovers, moss-troopers, border-rievers, and Kings in disguise. All their doings are related in the stirring, leaping, joyous—or at times martial and mournful-ballad measure.
The ancient ballads are here presented exactly as when in days of old they were sung by minstrels and recited by gaffers and gammers. No alterations are made in the texts of the ballad-collectors and collators, except the changing of a few objectionable words. Two or three of the less well-known ballads are done into modern spelling. A number, not hitherto found in children’s collections, will be delightfully new to young people. Some popular ballads, like “King John and the Abbot of Canterbury,” and “The King and the Miller of Mansfield,” are omitted because they are in Story-Telling Poems.
A goodly number of famous modern ballads are included; and at the end of the volume are 10 short narrative poems of “Pilgrimage and Souls so Strong.”
At the end of the book are a Glossary and Indexes of subjects, authors, titles, and first lines.