Page:Posthumous poems (IA posthumousswinb00swin).pdf/12

 restore. There passed into our hands also other pieces which we have reason to believe the poet wished to suppress, or on mature reflection would have so wished. These we have not printed. Our desire has been to be loyal to his memory, and we are here giving to the world nothing but what we believe that he would consent to give if he could direct our conduct.

The principal exception to the chronological arrangement adopted in this volume is the placing at the forefront of the book the eleven border ballads which Mr. Wise was so fortunate as to discover among the MSS. which he bought in 1909 from Watts-Dunton. The rough drafts of these ballads were found among MSS. of the years 1862 and 1863, and the character of the handwriting, as well as of the paper, leads us to believe that they belong to this period. With them were found several of the ballads published at last in the Third Series of Poems and Ballads (1889) but provisionally set up in type in 1877. There is no doubt that Swinburne hesitated long as to whether he should give to the public any of his more primitive border ballads. At an early age he had been attracted to this class of poetry by the study of Scott's Border