ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Mythanks are due Messrs. Houghton Mifflin Company for the use of the following modern ballads, “The Ballad of the Oysterman,” by Oliver Wendell Holmes; “The Luck of Edenhall,” “The Three Kings,” and “The Skeleton in Armour,” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; “The Singing Leaves,” by James Russell Lowell; “Barclay of Ury,” by John Greenleaf Whittier.
Among the authoritative texts from which I have taken ancient and popular ballads, are Bell’sEarly Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England; Bishop Percy’sReliques of Ancient English Poetry, and hisFolio Manuscript, edited by Hales and Furnivall;A Collection of Old Ballads, London, 1723-25; Dixon’sAncient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England(Percy Society); Jamieson’sPopular Ballads and Songs; Monk Lewis’sTales of Wonder; Motherwell’sMinstrelsy, Ancient and Modern; Nicholson’sHistorical and Traditional Tales ... Connected with the South of Scotland; Ritson’sRobin Hood; Sir Walter Scott’sMinstrelsy of the Scottish Border; Sheldon’sMinstrelsy of the English Border; also the scholarly collection ofEnglish and Scottish Popular Ballads, compiled and edited by Professor FrancisJames Child, for the use of which my acknowledgments are due its publishers, Messrs. Houghton Mifflin Company.
The best texts available have been followed for the original ballads by Sir Walter Raleigh, George Herbert, Hogg, Scott, Lover, Kingsley, Tennyson, Campbell, and Keats.