literary turn of mind, resident in the north of England, being on a
visit to his "worthy friend, Humphrey Pitt, Esq., then living at
Shiffnal in Shropshire," had the glorious good luck to hit upon an old
folio manuscript of ballads and romances. "I saw it," writes Percy,
"lying dirty on the floor under a Bureau in ye Parlour; being used by
the Maids to light the fire."

"A scrubby, shabby paper book" it may have been, with some leaves torn
half away and others lacking altogether, but it was a genuine ballad
manuscript, in handwriting of about the year 1650, and Percy,
realizing that the worthy Mr. Pitt was feeding his parlor fire with
very precious fuel, begged the tattered volume of his host and bore it
proudly home, where with presumptuous pen he revised and embellished
and otherwise, all innocently, maltreated the noble old ballads until
he deemed, although with grave misgivings, that they would not too
violently shock the polite taste of the eighteenth century. The
eighteenth century, wearied to death of its own politeness, worn out
by the heartless elegance of Pope and the insipid sentimentality of
Prior, gave these fresh, simple melodies an unexpected welcome, even
in the face of the reigning king of letters, Dr. Johnson, who forbade
them to come to court. But good poems are not slain by bad critics,
and the old ballads, despite the burly doctor's displeasure, took
henceforth a recognized place in English literature. Herd's delightful
collection of Scottish songs and ballads, wherein are gathered so many
of those magical refrains, the rough ore of Burns' fine gold,--"Green
grow the rashes O," "Should auld acquaintance be forgot," "For the
sake o' somebody,"--soon followed, and Ritson, while ever slashing
away at poor Percy, often for his minstrel theories, more often for
his ballad emendations, and most often for his holding back the
original folio manuscript from publication, appeared himself as a