NOTES BY THE WAY.
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��The eight volumes are dedicated to Queen Victoria :
To thee whom all the nations greet, Our Queen, of sixtieth year complete, We lay this offering at thy feet.
Purer and nobler thou hast stood In all thy stainless womanhood, Than the proud Queen of Tudor blood.
We hail the harvest thou hast sown : Obeyed and loved, wherever known, God bless our Queen ! and guard her Throne.
Ebsworth closes the Preface following the dedication to the Queen with this poem :
��Dedication to Queen Victoria.
��THE LAST WORD.
If it be said to those who loved me long,
" He left no trophy justifying praise
But gave the heedless world these idle lays ! " One voice may dare to vindicate my song : ' There was no blinding of his soul to wrong,
No weak repining at the toilsome days
On the still glowing Past he bent his gaze Searching for Truth his heart was ever strong.
Calm in success, in failure mute and proud, Nature consoled him for each loss in Art.
Not for reward he laboured ; where he vowed His energies, he first had given his heart :
He claimed no wreath, no dirge, from the mad crowd. Glad to have Lived ! not sorry to Depart."
As an instance of Ebs worth's unique knowledge of Ballads, it may be mentioned that Halliwell-Phillipps asked him for some information about a Ballad, and thanking Ebsworth, in a letter dated the 28th of March, 1887, now before me, Halliwell-Phillipps writes :
" I hardly know what sentiment predominates my great thankfulness to you for your kind information respecting the Ballad, or my astonishment that you could have written so elaborate a report on the instant and by return of post .... The establishment of the authenticity of that ballad is a point to me of special im- portance."
A volume containing a Ballad Index to the previous volumes completed the collection of the Roxburghe Ballads. A general Index of Historical Names to the entire volumes was projected, but lack of funds prevented the production of this. The number of subscriberc had dwindled to seventy-five ; and although a well- known publisher generously offered the loan of a hundred guineas, Ebsworth did not feel that he could take the burden of the expense
��Halliwell- Phillipps.
��The Ballad Index.
�� �
