Page:The Hundred Best Poems (lyrical) in the English language - second series.djvu/14

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
viii
PREFATORY NOTE.

In this volume, as in its predecessor, I have not included poems by living authors. With regard to texts, titles, etc. I have gone on the same principles as before.

I have again to acknowledge with deep gratitude the kindness of many publishers and editors. Messrs Macmillan & Co., Ltd., in particular, have allowed me to reprint Matthew Arnold's 'The Last Word' and Christina Rossetti's 'A Royal Princess,' while I am indebted to Messrs. Chatto & Windus for permission to include a famous stanza from Stevenson's 'Songs of Travel,' and to Messrs. Ellis & Elvey for the same privilege in respect to D. G. Rossetti's 'Sudden Light.' Everyone who knows these four poems, or makes his first acquaintance with them now, will realize their great importance to the volume. I must also thank the following gentlemen who have allowed me to use copyright texts of non-copyright poems from editions published by then:—Messrs. Chatto & Windus (Sidney), Mr. Buxton Forman (Keats and Shelley), Mr Henry Frowde (Wordsworth), Messrs. T. C. & E. C. Jack (Burns),