Page:A Selection of Original Songs, Scraps, Etc., by Ned Farmer (3rd ed.).djvu/13

 which they in their abundance have boaicored broadcast o'er the land, beyond the high, and I trust duly appreciated privilege of being permitted to peruse those bright undying records of their genius—the works they left us?

Again, is it by any means an unusual circumstance, that a dwarf and a giant are exhibited in the same town, nay, sometimes in the selfsame caravan? Is my simple fife to be unheard because other and better performers play upon ophicleides and trombones? Am I not to vend my sprats, because, forsooth, there happens to be salmon in the market? Because I possess not the fleetness of a Deerfoot, am I therefore to sit ingloriously still 1 Nonsense! in mild and subdued tones, but with a decided amount of firmness, I repeat. Nonsense!

Do me, courteous Reader, I conjure ye, the justice to believe me, when I most solemnly assert that, in bringing out the Third Edition of my Scrap Book, I was perfectly free from any wild and ambitious expectancies as to what was likely to accrue therefrom. I anticipated no proud niche in Westminster Abbey; and, as "I am a tall man and a gentleman," I never for a single moment had it in my mind to thrust from his well-filled throne the Poet Laureate, or snatch from his magic hand the well-earned sceptre he so worthily grasps. I had no futile hope of thereby immortalizing the humble name I bear; I entertained no insane idea of amassing a colossal fortune.

Beyond this I feel bound to state, that no person breathing, can by any possibility be more thoroughly alive to the numberless shortcomings and defects of my Scrap Book than myself; but what was I to do? People would keep asking