borate review of it in the seventieth and
seventy-fourth numbers of the _Spectator_. He there demonstrates
that this old ballad has all the elements in it of the loftiest existing
epic. The moral is the same as that of the Iliad:

"God save the king and bless the land
In plenty, joy and peace
And grant henceforth that foul debate
Twixt noblemen may cease."

Addison, in Number 85 of the _Spectator_, also commends that
beautiful and touching ballad denominated "The Children in the Wood." He
observes, "This song is a plain, simple copy of nature, destitute of the
helps and ornaments of art. The tale of it is a pretty, tragical story
and pleases for no other reason than because it is a copy of nature." It
is known to every child as a nursery song or a pleasant story. A stanza
or two will reveal its pathos and rhythm. The children had been
committed by their dying parents to their uncle:

The parents being dead and gone
The children home he takes,
And brings them straite unto his house
Where much of them he makes.
He had kept these pretty babes
A twelve month and a daye
But for their wealth he did desire
To make them both away

An assassin is hired to kill them; he leaves them in a deep forest:

These pretty babes with hand in hand
Went wandering up and downe;
But never more could see the man
Approaching from the town:
Their pretty lippes with black-berries
Were all besmeared and dyed
And when they saw the darksome night
They sat them down and cried.
Thus wandered these poor innocents
Till death did end their grief,
In one another's armes they dyed
As wanting due relief;
No burial this pretty pair
Of any man receives
Till robin red-breast piously
Did cover them with leaves.

There is a famous story book written by Richard Johnson in the reign of
Elizabeth, entitled, "The Seven Champions of Christendom."[6]

The popular English ballad of "St. George and the Dragon," is founded on
one of the narratives of this book, and the story in the book on a still
older ballad, or legend, styled "Sir Bevis of Hampton." This, too,
resembles very much Ovid's account of the slaughter of the dragon by
Cadmus. In the legend of Sir Bevis the fight is thus described:

"Whan the dragon that foule is
Had a sight of Sir Bevis,
He cast yo a loud cry
As it had thondered in the sky,
He turned his belly toward the sun
It