scription

{i:S. Wilkin 1826 title page: tp1.jpg}

The London (John Taylor) Title Page.
300 copies including those bearing the imprint of
Wightman & Cramp.

{i:John Taylor 1826 title page: tp2.jpg}

PREFACE

The ballads in this volume are translated from the Works of OEHLENSLAEGER,
(a poet who is yet living, and who stands high in the estimation of his
countrymen,) and from the KIAEMPE VISER, a collection of old songs,
celebrating the actions of the ancient heroes of Scandinavia.

The old Danish poets were, for the most part, extremely rude in their
versification. Their stanzas of four or two lines have not the full
rhyme of vowel and consonant, but merely what the Spaniards call the
"assonante," or vowel rhyme, and attention seldom seems to have been paid
to the number of _feet_ on which the lines moved along. But, however
defective their poetry may be in point of harmony of numbers, it
describes, in vivid and barbaric language, scenes of barbaric grandeur,
which in these days are never witnessed; and, which, though the modern
muse may imagine, she generally fails in attempting to pourtray, from the
violent desire to be smooth and tuneful, forgetting that smoothness and
tunefulness are nearly synonymous with tameness and unmeaningness.

I expect shortly to lay before the public a complete translation of the
KIAEMPE VISER, made by me some years ago; and of which, I hope, the
specimens here produced will not give an unfavourable idea.

It was originally my intention to publish, among the "Miscellaneous
Pieces," several translations from the Gaelic, formerly the language of
the western world; the noble tongue

"A labhair Padric' nninse Fail na Riogh.
'San faighe caomhsin Colum naomhta' n I."

Which Patrick spoke in Innisfail, to heathen chiefs of old
Which Columb, the mild prophet-saint, spoke in his island-hold--

but I have retained them, with one exception, till I possess a sufficient
quantity to form an entire volume.

FROM ALLAN CUNNINGHAM,
TO GEORGE BORROW,

_On his proposing to translate the_ '_Kiaepe Viser_.'

Sing, sing, my friend; breathe life again
Through Norway's song and Denmark's strain:
On flowing Thames and Forth, in flood,
Pour Haco's war-song, fierce and rude.
O'er England's strength, through Scotland's cold,
His warrior minstrels marched of old--
Called on the wolf and bird of prey
To feast on Ireland's shore and bay;
And France, thy forward