disputed; but in many minute circumstances, as well as in the way by which the same catastrophe is brought out, sensible differences exist. By selecting the most beautiful and striking passages which present themselves in the one copy, and making these cohere as they best may with similar extracts detached from the other copy, the editor of oral poetry succeeds in producing from the conflicting texts of his various authorities a third version, more perfect and ornate than any individual one as it originally stood. This improved version may contain the quintessencethe poetic elements of each copy consulted, but in this general resemblance to all it loses its particular affinity to any one. Its individuality entirely disappears, and those features by which each separate copy proved its authenticity, in the collated version become faint and dubious, confused and undistinguishable. Such copies, however, are those which find their way readiest into our every-day compilations of such things, as well on account of their superior poetical merit, as of the comparative distinctness and fulness of their narrative; and to readers not accustomed to inquire into the nature of traditionary poetry, they thus convey very inaccurate impressions of the state in which these compositions are actually extant among us.

This mode, then, of editing ancient ballads, by subjecting them to the process of refinement now described, though it be more conscientious and less liable to censure than another method also resorted to, is nevertheless highly objectionable, as effectually marring the venerable simplicity of early song, destroying in a great measure its

characteristic peculiarities, and as being the means of introducing erroneous conceptions regarding our vernacular poetry which has been recovered from tradition.

All versions of a ballad so preserved by oral transmission from one age to another, are entitled to be considered as of equal authenticity, and coeval production, one with the other, although among them wide and irreconcilable discrepancies exist. Indeed, the differences between some copies of the same ballad are so important, that their existence can be accounted for in no other way than by supposing these different versions the productions of so many distinct minstrels, each of whom obtained the story, which he versified from a channel foreign to that accessible by his fellow-poets. Some of these diversities, it is true, may be attributable to the interpolations and corruptions acquired in the course of time, through the ignorance of reciters. Some are inaccurately committed to memory at first, and are thus in an incomplete form delivered. Others are in part forgotten, and the defects of the memory may be supplied by the invention of the reciter, or the limb of some other similar composition substituted for that which is lost. But allowing the utmost latitude for the many mutations incident to this species of literature, still it cannot account for all the variations we find in these copies, several of which ought to be elevated to the rank of distinct ballads, in place of being regarded as mere variations from one original text.

Under the pressure of such circumstances, then, it surely is the duty of the collector and

し

editor of traditionary ballads to avoid the perilous and frequently abortive task of uniting discordant and essentially incohesive texts, and to content himself with merely selecting that one of his copies which appears the most complete and least vitiated, and to give it purely and simply as he obtained it, without hazarding any emendation whatsoever.

If this comparatively innocent mode of restoring our ancient ballads be obnoxious to censure, they are still more culpable as editors who, under no authority of written or recited copy, but merely to gratify their own insatiate rage for innovation and improvement, recklessly and injudiciously cut and carve as they list on these productions, and, in some cases, entirely re-write them. Where the narrative is poor in incident, where it is wholly barren of imagery, there they most thickly plant their own bastard inventions, and strew the delicate blossoms of their own precious conceit; where the ancient song breaks forth in the earnest, simple, and downright language of passion and of nature, there our ballad renovator must dilute it to the slip-slop sentiment of his own day, and garnish it with the artificial brilliancies of his own style of writing; introducing throughout a current of feeling, and a tissue of allusions, (poetical, very poetical, we shall be charitable enough to suppose they are,) wholly at issue with the cast of thought, the manners, and the modes of expression peculiar to the age which produced the original poem. And, where the ancient minstrel, true in his delineations of society and of manners to the times in which he flourished, faithfully and

vigorously sketches, ad vivam, nor hesitates, in the rush and tide of his song, to call a spade a spade, the modern affects to shudder at the grossness and vulgarity of antiquity, and diligently weaves his own gossamer web of sensuality' around the nakedness of ancient simplicity, and then gloats over his seductive handiwork with the complacency of the merest voluptuary. They who choose to stigmatise the muse of antiquity as being rather "high-kilted," do no service either to letters or to morality by apparelling her in a "trailing gown," or giving her a “side tail" of their own fashioning. In truth, it is by such impertinent and pernicious labours that the obscenities of early writers become disgustingly obtruded on the public eye. Had they been allowed to pass uncommented on, they would never have called a blush to the innocent cheek, or in the unaffectedly pure mind have wakened one unhallowed thought. For the curious and important knowledge, then, which enables us to detect and understand the gross witticisms and licentious allusions of our ancestors, we stand indebted to the tasteful emendations, the delicate and minute criticism of these singularly sensitive and moral editors. But in their bitter wrath, and in their lachrymose exclamations against the licentiousness of ancient song, and the times which produced and could relish such foul dainties, and in the pains they take to detect the presence of indelicate inuendo, though never so cunningly wrapped up in some dark allegory, and in the skill they shew for its purification by kindly paraphrasing every objectionable passage, these well-meaning individuals not unfrequently

manifest a lurking affection for their task, and a perfect acquaintance with its subject, seldom to be found in conjunction with that unspotted purity and extraordinary refinement and maidenlike delicacy which they profess.

There is yet another description of old-song editors, whose mischievous and dishonest propensities cannot be too severely reprobated. It consists of those gentlemen who deem themselves fully better poets than ever earlier times produced, but who cannot persuade the public to think so, or even prevail on it to read their compositions till they have given them a slight sprinkling of olden phraseology, and stoutly maintained that they were genuine specimens of ancient song. Some trash accounted as ancient, they have by sheer impudence thus succeeded in forcing down the throat of a credulous and gaping public; but sooner or later these paltry forgeries are laid bare, to the shame and confusion of the utterer. The attempt to poison the sources of history, and to confound truth by such fabrications, is despicable and unprincipled. It is much to be regretted, however, that some men of undeniable talents have occasionally lent themselves to such ignoble ends, and bartered an honest fame for a worthless and shadowy triumph. But with all their ingenuity in the manufacture of these antique gens, they can at best only gull the rabble, a poor and mean gratification,-while on every hand they encounter the risk of being roughly handled by those who know the studies in which they traffic much better than themselves, and who by a solitary scratch of their pen can dissipate the idle fabrications thus painfully