of the Olden Time_
has been delayed chiefly by the care given to the texts, in most
instances the whole requiring to be copied by hand.

I consider myself fortunate to be enabled, by the kind service of
my friend Mr. A. Francis Steuart, to print for the first time in a
collection of ballads the version of the _Grey Selchie of Shool Skerry_
given in the Appendix. It is a feather in the cap of any ballad-editor
after Professor Child to discover a ballad that escaped his eye.

My thanks are also due to the Rev. Professor W. W. Skeat for assistance
generously given in connection with the ballad of _Judas_; and, as
before, to Mr. A. H. Bullen.

F. S.

BALLADS IN THE SECOND SERIES

The ballads in the present volume have been classified roughly so
as to fall under the heads (i) Ballads of Superstition and of the
Supernatural, including Dirges (pp. 1-122); (ii) Ballads of Sacred
Origin (pp. 123-154); (iii) Ballads of Riddle and Repartee (pp.
155-181); and (iv) a few ballads, otherwise almost unclassifiable,
collected under the title of 'Fyttes of Mirth,' or Merry Ballads
(pp. 182 to end).

I

That the majority of the ballads in the first section are Scottish can
hardly cause surprise. Superstition lurks amongst the mountains and in
the corners of the earth. And, with one remarkable exception, all the
best lyrical work in these ballads of the supernatural is to be found in
the Scots. _Thomas Rymer_, _Tam Lin_, _The Wife of Usher's Well_, _Clerk
Sanders_, and _The Daemon Lover_, are perhaps the most notable examples
amongst the ballads proper, and _Fair Helen of Kirconnell_, _The Twa
Corbies_, and _Bonnie George Campbell_ amongst the dirges. All these
are known wherever poetry is read.

'For dulness, the creeping Saxons;
For beauty and amorousness, the Gaedhills.'

But the exception referred to above, _The Unquiet Grave_, is true
English, and yet lyrical, singing itself, like a genuine ballad, to a
tune as one reads.

The complete superstition hinted at in this ballad should perhaps be
stated more fully. It is obvious that excessive mourning is fatal to
the peace of the dead; but it is also to be noticed that it is almost
equally fatal to the mourner. The mourner in _The Unquiet Grave_ is
refused the kiss demanded, as it will be fatal. _Clerk Sanders_, on the
other hand, has lost--if ever it possessed--any trace of this doctrine.
For Margret does not die; though she would have died had she kissed him