a-days in the form of ballads. There are certain indications that the
"common form" of the English Fairy Tale was the _cante-fable_, a
mixture of narrative and verse of which the most illustrious example
in literature is "Aucassin et Nicolette." In one case I have
endeavoured to retain this form, as the tale in which it occurs,
"Childe Rowland," is mentioned by Shakespeare in _King Lear_, and
is probably, as I have shown, the source of Milton's _Comus_.
Late as they have been collected, some dozen of the tales can be
traced back to the sixteenth century, two of them being quoted by
Shakespeare himself.

In the majority of instances I have had largely to rewrite these Fairy
Tales, especially those in dialect, including the Lowland Scotch.
[Footnote: It is perhaps worth remarking that the Brothers Grimm did
the same with their stories. "Dass der Ausdruck," say they in their
Preface, "und die Ausfuehrung des Einzelnen grossentheils von uns
herruehrt, versteht sich von selbst." I may add that many of their
stories were taken from printed sources. In the first volume of Mrs.
Hunt's translation, Nos. 12, 18, 19, 23, 32, 35, 42, 43, 44, 69, 77,
78, 83, 89, are thus derived.] Children, and sometimes those of larger
growth, will not read dialect. I have also had to reduce the flatulent
phraseology of the eighteenth-century chap-books, and to re-write in
simpler style the stories only extant in "Literary" English. I have,
however, left a few vulgarisms in the mouths of vulgar people.
Children appreciate the dramatic propriety of this as much as their
elders. Generally speaking, it has been my ambition to write as a good
old nurse will speak when she tells Fairy Tales. I am doubtful as to
my success in catching the colloquial-romantic tone appropriate for
such narratives, but the thing had to be done or else my main object,
to give a book of English Fairy Tales which English children will