Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of England | Page 2

my intention to form a collection of local songs, illustrative of popular festivals, customs, manners, and dialects. As the merit of having anticipated, and, in a great measure, accomplished this project belongs exclusively to Mr. Dixon, so to that gentleman I have now the pleasure of tendering my acknowledgments for the means of enriching the Annotated Edition of the English Poets with a volume which, in some respects, is the most curious and interesting of the series.
Subsequently to the publication of his collection by the Percy Society, Mr. Dixon had amassed additional materials of great value; and, conscious that the work admitted of considerable improvement, both in the way of omission and augmentation, he resolved upon the preparation of a new edition. His reasons for rejecting certain portions of the former volume are stated in the following extract from a communication with which he has obliged me, and which may be considered as his own introduction to the ensuing pages.
The editor had passed his earliest years in a romantic mountaindistrict in the North of England, where old customs and manners,?and old songs and ballads still linger. Under the influence of these associations, he imbibed a passionate love for peasant rhymes; having little notion at that time that the simple?minstrelsy which afforded him so much delight could yield hardly less pleasure to those who cultivated more artificial modes of poetry, and who knew little of the life of the peasantry. His collection was not issued without diffidence; but the result dissipated all apprehension as to the estimate in which these essentially popular productions are held. The reception of the book, indeed, far exceeded its merits; for he is bound in candour to say that it was neither so complete nor so judiciously selected as it might have been. Like almost all books issued by societies, it was got up in haste, and hurried through the press. It?contained some things which were out of place in such a work, but which were inserted upon solicitations that could not have been very easily refused; and even where the matter was unexceptionable, it sometimes happened that it was printed from comparatively modern broadsides, for want of time to consult earlier editions. In the interval which has since elapsed, all these defects and shortcomings have been remedied. Several pieces, which had no?legitimate claims to the places they occupied, have been removed; others have been collated with more ancient copies than the editor had had access to previously; and the whole work has been?considerably enlarged. In its present form it is strictly what its title-page implies--a collection of poems, ballads, and songs preserved by tradition, and in actual circulation, amongst the peasantry.
Bex, Canton de Vaud.?Switzerland.
The present volume differs in many important particulars from the former, of the deficiencies of which Mr. Dixon makes so frank an avowal. It has not only undergone a careful revision, but has received additions to an extent which renders it almost a new work. Many of there accessions are taken from extremely rare originals, and others are here printed for the first time, including amongst the latter the ballad of Earl Brand, a traditional lyric of great antiquity, long familiar to the dales of the North of England; and the Death of Queen Jane, a relic of more than ordinary intesest. Nearly forty songs, noted down from recitation, or gathered from sources not generally accessible, have been added to the former collection, illustrative, for the most part, of historical events, country pastimes, and local customs. Not the least suggestive feature in this department are the political songs it contains, which have long outlived the occasions that gave them birth, and which still retain their popularity, although their allusions are no longer understood. Amongst this class of songs may be specially indicated Jack and Tom, Joan's Ale was New, George Ridler's Oven, and The Carrion Crow. The songs of a strictly rural character, having reference to the occupations and intercourse of the people, possess an interest which cannot be adequately measured by their poetical pretensions. The very defects of art with which they are chargeable, constitute their highest claim to consideration as authentic specimens of country lore. The songs in praise of the dairy, or the plough; or in celebration of the harvest-home, or the churn-supper; or descriptive of the pleasures of the milk-maid, or the courtship in the farm-house; or those that give us glimpses of the ways of life of the waggoner, the poacher, the horse-dealer, and the boon companion of the road-side hostelrie, are no less curious for their idiomatic and primitive forms of expression, than for their pictures of rustic modes and manners. Of special interest, too, are the songs which relate to festival and customs; such as the Sword Dancer's Song and Interlude, the Swearing-in Song, or