popular songs, so dear to the hearts of the generations on whose
lips they were fashioned, and to all who care for the fresh note,
the direct word, the unrestrained emotion, rarely touch the highest
points of poetic achievement. Their charm lies, not in their
perfection of form, but in their spontaneity, sincerity, and graphic
power. They are not rivers of song, wide, deep, and swift; they are
rather cool, clear springs among the hills. In the reactions
against sophisticated poetry which set in from lime to time, the
popular ballad--the true folk-song--has often been exalted at the
expense of other forms of verse. It is idle to attempt to arrange
the various forms of poetry in an order of absolute values; it is
enough that each has its own quality, and, therefore, its own value.
The drama, the epic, the ballad, the lyric, each strikes its note in
the complete expression of human emotion and experience. Each
belongs to a particular stage of development, and each has the
authority and the enduring charm which attach to every authentic
utterance of the spirit of man under the conditions of life.

In this wide range of human expression the ballad follows the epic
as a kind of aftermath; a second and scattered harvest, springing
without regularity or nurture out of a rich and unexhausted soil. The
epic fastens upon some event of such commanding importance that it
marks a main current of history; some story, historic, or mythologic;
some incident susceptible of extended narrative treatment. It is
always, in its popular form, a matter of growth it is direct, simple,
free from didacticism; representing, as Aristotle says, "a single
action, entire and complete." It subordinates character to action; it
delights in episode and dialogue; it is content to tell the story as
a story, and leave the moralization to hearers or readers. The
popular ballad is so closely related to the popular epic that it may