Page:Poems of the Great War - Cunliffe.djvu/9



responsibility for the selection of the poems included in this volume rests entirely on my shoulders, though I am pleased to acknowledge the very kind help on this side of the Atlantic of Mr. Edward C. Marsh of the Macmillan Company, Miss Helen Rex Keller, Librarian of the School of Journalism, and Professor A. H. Thorndike of Columbia University; in England of Mr. F. Madan, Bodley's Librarian, Mr. G. W. Wheeler and Mr. J. W. Smallwood of the Radcliffe Camera, Oxford, Sir Walter Raleigh, Lady Scallon, Mr. A. R. Waller, Sir Adolphus Ward, and Sir Herbert Warren. While poetic merit has been, of course, the paramount consideration, I have endeavored to exercise a catholic judgment, and to give fair representation to various schools of thought and expression as well as to the various phases of the War. If undue prominence seems to be given to what may be called its more personal aspects — the spirit of sacrifice and devotion which inspired men and women to give themselves and those dearest to them to a great cause — I must plead in excuse