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viii the entire salvage from oldest narrative poetry of the West-Germanic peoples in mass. Finally, there are two lays or poems purporting to describe at first hand the life of these old minstrels, who either sang in permanent and well-rewarded office for their king, or else wandered from court to court and tasted the bounty of many chieftains. These two poems, moreover, contain many references to persons and stories of Germanic heroic legends that appear afterward in the second growth of epic, in the Scandinavian poems and sagas, in the cycle of the Nibelungen, Gudrun, and the rest. Such is the total rescue from oldest English epic that fate has allowed. It deserves to be read in its full extent by the modern English reader; and it is now presented to him for the first time in its bulk, and in a form which approximates as closely as possible to the original.

The translator is under great obligations to Professor Walter Morris Hart, of the University of California, not only for his generous aid in reading the proof-sheets of this book, but also for the substantial help afforded by his admirable study of Ballad and Epic.