Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/92

 Ixxxviii INTRODUCTION ���of W, that I have not found elsewhere. Another �unsigned poem, The Sigh, is by her, and between these two poems are four unsigned poems that cannot be certainly ascribed to Lady Winchilsea, but that resemble her work and may be by her. Her Lines to Prior appear only in Prior's Miscellaneous Works. To Mr. Pope is found in the early collected editions of his works. Four poems are to be found only in Birch's General Dictionary. The endeavor has been to make this edi- tion of the poems complete, but there may be fugitive poems that have not been discovered. There is a possibility that Birch did not quote all the new poems in the manu- script belonging to Lady Hertford, but of that manuscript, if it is still in existence, I can get no trace. A more valu- able possible discovery would be the letters of Ardelia. She was highly esteemed as a correspondent and she wrote much to various members of the Thynne family at Longleat, to Lady Tufton and her daughters, to her cousin, Lady Hatton, to her sister Dorothy, and to many others. The publication of such letters, if there are any extant, would almost certainly be a valuable contribution to our knowledge of the period of William and Mary and of Anne. ���Ill �LADY WI-NCHILSEA'S POEMS �What has called attention to Lady Winchilsea's work is not so much its intrinsic worth as its place in literary evolution. The chief attempt of the following brief study will therefore be to show the relation of her poems to those of other writers both before and after her day. . A minute study of Lady Winchilsea's versification is not imperative, but some points are of considerable interest in ��� �