Bagford Ballads:

ILLUSTRATING

The Last Years of the Stuarts.

EDITED,

WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES,

BY

JOSEPH WOODFALL EBSWORTH, M.A. CANTAB.

EDITOR OF THE REPRINTED "DROLLERIES' OF THE RESTORATION;"
AUTHOR OF "KARL'S LEGACY.'

WITH COPIES OF ALL THE ORIGINAL WOODCUTS.

"In good King Charles's Golden Days,

When Loyalty no harm meant.”—BERCHERIENSIS VICARIUS.

IN TWO DIVISIONS:

Second Division.

HERTFORD:

Printed for the Ballad Society,

BY STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS.

1878.

HERTFORD:

STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS, PRINTERS.

The Bagford Ballads.

"What hast here? Ballads?"-The Winter's Tale, iv. 3

C

I.

OME around me, ye bountiful Masters,
My ballads and songs, pray, now hear!
I've laid in a fresh stock of Disasters,
To make you all shudder with fear.
I could curdle your blood, with a many;
Or make your flesh creep, with a few ;
I might shock you to death, for one penny :
And warrant the whole of them true.

II.

But, I see, you need change from such diet;
(One remembers that toujours perdrix !)
You shall have, if you'll only be quiet,

Some rare Battles, on land or at sea;
With as much Love and Mirth, for your money,
As a Cavalier Hector e'er knew:

Till around you the world becomes sunny,

And you fancy 'twas all made for you.

III.

Far away, from your present small troubles,
To the past of these ballads return :
There are gay hues, methinks, on their bubbles,
Bright sparks 'mid their embers yet burn.
Let the cynic growl, "Soap-suds! all hollow;"

Or the saint mutter, "Brands, for the flame !"
Street-songs were not scorn'd by Apollo,-

Take some of them now, in his name.

J. W. E.

13 September, 1877.