The Editor and Publishers gratefully acknowledge their indebtedness to the many owners of copyright poems, for permission to include them in this volume: to Mr. George Barlow, Mr. Harold Begbie, the Executors of the late Professor Blackie, Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. (for Longfellow's "Discoverer of the North Cape"), Lady Lushington, Messrs. Macmillan & Co., Ltd. (for Mr. F. T. Palgrave's poems), Mr. Gerald Massey, Mr. Henry Newbolt, Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd. (for Archbishop Trench's "The Alma"), Mrs. Piatt, and the Rev. F. W. Orde Ward ("F. Harald Williams "), etc. IN VERSE EDITED BY ERNEST PERTWEE ייין WITH A PREFACE BY A. T. POLLARD, M.A: (Oxon.) PREFACE 17024-H A VOLUME of moderate compass which illustrates from English Poetry many of the principal events of the History of England should be of great service, especially to the young. Herein the student gets the facts which have built up England as it is to-day, dealt with in a picturesque manner. The story of a nation's life as seen by the Poet must always be fascinating, and serve to make the men and actions of the past live again with a reality that prose cannot equally impart. Such inaccuracies as are to be found in some of the poems and ballads given in this volume are more than balanced by the manner in which the writers portray the spirit animating the times, with which they are concerned, and the passions which called forth the character and heroism which they vividly describe. 0 I believe that to the young this book will prove attractive; that by means of it Teachers will find it a far easier task to awaken an intelligent interest in those wider fields of History upon which this volume makes no attempt to touch. Mere collections of dates and an arid recital of events have too frequently been the predominating characteristics of History as taught in our schools, and I therefore welcome a volume, such as this, which apOproaches the Glories of our National Inheritance from the human, imaginative and sympathetic point of view of Poetry. ance: Pictures and novels have been effective in imprinting on many minds scenes and epochs of historical importa volume of verse should be equally effective. This volume, compiled by my former colleague, Mr Ernest Pertwee, may help, I trust, to dissipate the notion that history is a dry study. It is not the first of its kind, but it is more complete and systematic than any of its predecessors. |