GET UP AND BAR THE DOOR
THE LAWLANDS O' HOLLAND
THE TWA CORBIES
HELEN OF KIRCONNELL
WALY WALY
LORD RONALD
EDWARD, EDWARD



INTRODUCTION


The development of poetry, the articulate life of man, is hidden in
that mist which overhangs the morning of history. Yet the indications
are that this art of arts had its origin, as far back as the days of
savagery, in the ideal element of life rather than the utilitarian.
There came a time, undoubtedly, when the mnemonic value of verse was
recognized in the transmission of laws and records and the hard-won
wealth of experience. Our own Anglo-Saxon ancestors, whose rhyme, it
will be remembered, was initial rhyme, or alliteration, have
bequeathed to our modern speech many such devices for "the knitting up
of the memory," largely legal or popular phrases, as _bed and board_,
_to have and to hold_, _to give and to grant_, _time and tide_, _wind
and wave_, _gold and gear_; or proverbs, as, for example: _When bale
is highest, boon is nighest_, better known to the present age under
the still alliterative form: _The darkest hour's before the dawn_.
But if we may trust the signs of poetic evolution in barbarous tribes
to-day, if we may draw inferences from the sacred character attached
to the Muses in the myths of all races, with the old Norsemen, for