* * * * *


NOTES.

TRADITIONAL ENGLISH BALLADS.

The task of gathering old traditionary song is surely a pleasant and a
lightsome one. Albeit the harvest has been plentiful and the gleaners many,
still a stray sheaf may occasionally be found worth the having. But we must
be careful not to "pick up a straw."

One of your corespondents recommends, as an addition to the value of your
pages, the careful getting together of those numerous traditional ballads
that are still sometimes to be met with, floating about various parts of
the country. This advice is by no means to be disregarded, but I wish to
point out the necessity of the contributors to the undertaking knowing
something about ballad literature. An acquaintance with the ordinary
_published_ collections, at least, cannot be dispensed with. Without this
knowledge we should be only multiplying copies of worthless trifles, or
reprinting ballads that had already appeared in print.

The traditional copies of old _black-letter_ ballads are, in almost all
cases (as may easily be seen by comparison), much the worse for wear. As a
proof of this I refer the curious in these matters to a volume of
_Traditional Versions of Old Ballads_, collected by Mr. Peter Buchan, and
edited by Mr. Dixon for the Percy Society. The Rev. Mr. Dyce pronounces
this "a volume of _forgeries_;" but, acquitting poor Buchan (of whom more
anon) of any intention to deceive, it is, to say the least of it, a volume