A Paradise of

Daintie Devices.

I love a ballad but even too well; if it be doleful matter, merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing indeed, and sung lamentably.

Shakespeare-Winter's Tale, Act IV., Sc. 3.

I have a passion for ballads.

* They are the gypsy-children of song, born under green hedgerows, in the leafy lanes and by-paths of literature, in the genial summer time.

Longfellow-Hyperion, Bk. II., Ch. II.

A careless song, with a little nonsense in it, now and then does not misbecome a monarch.

Horace Walpole-Letter to Sir Horace Mann. 1770.

Now, good Cesario, but that piece of song,

That old and antique song we heard last night;
Methought it did relieve my passion much,
More than light airs and recollected terms,
Of these most brisk and giddy-paced times:
Come; but one verse.

Shakespeare-Twelfth Night, Act II., Sc. 4.

A PARADISE of

DAINTIE

DEVICES.

A Collection of

Poems,

Songs,
Ballads.

By Various Hands.

Old-fashioned poetry, but choicely good.
Izaak Walton-Complete Angler.

TAT NEW YORK.

Imprinted for

Charles Pratt & Co.

At 46 Broadway, near Trinity Church-Yard.

CHRISTMAS, 1882.

It (poesy) was ever thought to have some participation of divineness, because it doth raise and erect the mind, by submitting the shews of things to the desires of the mind.

Lord Bacon-Advancement of Learning, Bk. II.

Verse sweetens toil, however rude the sound;
All at her work the village-maiden sings,
Nor while she turns the giddy wheel around,
Revolves the sad vicissitudes of things.

Gifford-Contemplation.

Poetry is older than prose. Of this we have what may be called paleontological proof in the structure of all languages. Our every-day speech is fossil poetry. Words which are now dead were once alive. The farther we

recede and the lower we descend, the more these wonderful petrifactions of old forms of poetic thought and feeling abound.

Abraham Coles-The Evangel—Introduction.

A verse may find him who a sermon flies,

And turn delight into a sacrifice.

George Herbert-The Temple-The Church Porch.