Page:A Selection of Original Songs, Scraps, Etc., by Ned Farmer (1st ed.).djvu/8

ii. Its contents have been written within the last year or two, at various times and seasons, and, as the subjects will fully testify, under the influence of very different feelings.

No person can, by any possibility, be more acutely alive to the glaring folly of parading my "exalted doggrel" before the public than myself, and I have yet to learn whether I am about most to astonish those who know me, by attempting at all, or those who do not, by the hardihood evinced in publishing it when written.

Whatever may be the errors and demerits of the, (and their name is "Legion,") I shall at least enjoy the very sincere satisfaction of knowing, that although no one may become either the wiser or better for having read it, yet can no person ever be a whit the for its perusal.

In conclusion, I am clearly of opinion that my wiser course is to plead "guilty" to the general folly of the transaction, and (in all due dread and humble hope,) throw myself upon the mercy of the court, and in doing which I beg most respectfully to subscribe myself

EDWARD FARMER.

Greet, November, 1846.