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free and even irregular, which comes of their being passed from mouth to mouth among plain people who were not particular about literary refinements. They all have certain mannerisms. Some are mere expressions, like "up and spake," "a rose but barely three." One is frequent repetition of adjectives and epithets, the lady is always fair and the Douglas is always doughty; and also of lines and even whole stanzas. The constant repetition of a line is called a refrain, as in "Edward, Edward," and in "Binnorie," where it has not been printed with each verse. They all have dialogue, often brought in abruptly and without any explanation of who are the speakers. Sometimes the whole ballad is in dialogue; sometimes even it is the utterance of a single speaker. They do not have the beauties of diction and the elegancies of style that we often find in our poets, but they certainly have a charm of their own.

Such a charm have these old ballads, written long since by nobody knows who, that modern poets in later years have been tempted to try to gain the same effects. The modern literary ballad, however, is not generally meant to be sung. Scott's "Lochinvar can be sung and often is, but "The Eve of Saint John" would be far too long, and so would most modern ballads. Walter Scott, who was one of the first to feel the desire to rival the old balladists, usually took the same kind of subject that they would have taken.

But

poets after him have exercised a free choice. Hood, in "The Dream of Eugene Aram," took the tale of a modern murder, while Rudyard Kipling saw that the border between India and Afghanistan had as much romance in its way as that between England and Scotland. Still, with all differences, the subject and even the treatment are much the same; we may compare that finest of the old ballads, "Sir Patrick Spens," with Longfellow's "Wreck of the Hesperus," and we shall find a number of resemblances, some of which are in real imitation by the later poet of matters of form and some in appreciation of the old ballad spirit.

But if we look at these poems closely, we shall see points which make them different from the old ballads. They are generally much more careful as to rhyme and rhythm and sometimes much more elaborate; thus, "Eugene Aram" has a six-line stanza with two rhymes, which is only found here and there among the old poems, while Rossetti's stanza in "Sister Helen" is more complicated than the usual ballad-stanza, and his variation of the refrain is something we never find in the old ballads carried to such an extent. Tennyson, while preserving the spirit and character of the old poem in "The Revenge," has entirely given up the stanzaic structure and the regularity of rhythm. And in any ballad by a modern poet we shall be likely to find a greater fullness of

figure and description than is to be found in the older poetry.

Such poems, however, may rightly be called ballads, even though they differ in some respects. from the older ballads. But there are other poems which are also inspired by the older poetry, and which yet would hardly be called ballads themselves. Thus Macaulay's "Battle of Lake Regillus," though otherwise full of ballad spirit, is too long for a ballad and much too full and figured in expression. Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" was certainly inspired by the ballads, but it is too elaborate in structure and expression to be called a ballad itself. Scott, who collected many a ballad and also wrote some in imitation of his old favorites, wrote afterward much longer poems which have plenty of ballad character, though we should not think of calling them ballads. "Marmion" is far too detailed in structure and expression to be thought of as a ballad. Yet the ballad spirit is observable in all these poems, the ballad way of putting things.

That is, on the whole, the thing we want to get, -the ballad spirit. Let us feel that strongly and we shall appreciate these old poems and the new alike. Let us feel the sentiment and the emotion of the ballad, its simplicity and its strength, - let us really know it and feel it so that we shall get its true virtue. It may be found in greater or less degree in all the poems in this

book, however different they may be. Indeed, this very difference will be the thing that allows this fine common quality to be the more easily perceived and enjoyed. Let us put some of them together, and see if we can detect it.

We must not choose those that are too much alike, for then we may be led away by some minor resemblance which is not the main thing. Thus we might read "True Thomas" and "The Young Tamlane," and we should say that the ballad spirit was wild and fanciful and superstitious, that it was the spirit of magic and enchantment and faerie, that the ballad was a fairy tale in verse. Or we might compare "Edom o' Gor

don" and "Kinmont Willie," and if so, we should be led to say something very different; for these poems are wild enough, but there is no fancy nor superstition in them, no magic nor enchantment. These are not fairy tales at all: they are realistic, almost matters of fact. We should say, if we read only these and others of the same kind, that the ballad spirit was the fresh and free spirit of lawless daring and reckless adventure, that it was the spirit of border chivalry and of the mosstrooping knighthood. Or we might compare "The Gay Gosshawk" and "The Douglas Tragedy," and we should say that the ballad spirit was the spirit of high-pitched romance, the spirit of ideal passion. The maiden who lay living in her coffin, unmoved while they dropped hot lead upon her

breast; the bride who saw her brothers all cut down on her wedding-day, and died in the arms of her dead husband before the next morning, - these are examples of a strained, exaggerated, fantastic passion that is unlike the enchantment of fairy lovers or the adventure of the marchman. Yet all these are true ballads, we must feel surely, and not ballads only because they can be sung. They are ballads for that reason, because they have the ballad character, but also for another, that they have the ballad spirit and quality.

What, then, can we say of this spirit as we see it in the enchanting mystery of the fairy ballads, in the intense passion of the romances, in the daring vigor of the border songs? We may feel it, and know it when we feel it, and yet not be able to describe it; and even if so, we do the main thing. Still we want, if possible, to be able to say what it is. Shall we say that it is the tone of a free and heightened expression of the simpler and the nobler human passions, touched always with a spirit of strangeness and adventure? Will such a formula as that help us to feel the especial charm of the old ballads, and of the new, and of the longer poems like ballads? If it does so, well and good; if not, we must try for something better. Read one and another poem, some that are alike and some that are different, and try to feel each strongly. Then, if we like, let us try to state exactly just what is the impression we have,