strains of b ton all or nearly all the poets who have followed these have attempted to follow in the same course until the flowers � and they were which grew beside their path have been trodden preface down by the pressure of numerous feet and from the very and familiarity with which such subjects have been presented to our view chivalry has lost its romance love and beauty have almost ceased to charm and passion has itself to death does it then follow that poetry must die also let us not admit the thought of such a falling upon our country or our age one thing however b necessary and it has been overlooked by almost all who have lately attempted to write poetry � after the over excitement which created so false and unnatural a taste has entirely subsided we must return to nature and simplicity it is more than probable that many will return in vain because the ear long accustomed to the higher of genius will scarcely condescend for some time at least to listen to the melody of simple � ut nature must prevail at last and whatever the event of the experiment i have made may be its or success will in no way affect my conviction that by returning to simplicity � by making simplicity without weakness or the constant companion of his studies the poet who is true to nature may viii preface yet find acceptance with intelligent and feeling minds in the poetry of life i have endeavoured to prove that four are necessary for an able and successful poet � power imagination impression and taste to only one of these � a for receiving lively and lasting impressions do i make any yet such is my confidence in the power of simplicity and truth that i commit my poem to the public not doubting but there will be found amongst that public some whose experience will testify to its and more whose hearts will respond to its truth it contains no exaggerated statements i know that such things are as i have here described it has suited my purpose amongst other illustrations to have actual representations made of the home of my childhood as well as of my s present residence but in making this confession i should wish to have it clearly understood that the representation of real scenes extends no farther the description of the habits of the farmer s family as well as the conduct of his landlord has arisen entirely out of the imagination of the writer and in the latter case preface ix especially would be very regarded as a specimen of the conduct of landed in general i cannot in the usual manner explain my reasons for selecting the subject which the following pages because instead of saying that i have chosen it i must say that it is almost ever present to my mind � the story is and has arisen out of the popular evils of the day but some of the scenes i have attempted to describe are such as are well calculated to force themselves into verse and if they fail to present to others the same vivid colouring which them amongst my early associations the fault is in the writer as a poet � not in the rural scenes of england as a subject for v indeed it has been chiefly when contemplating such scenes and the habits and feelings of those who are with them that i have renewed my confidence in the conviction that poetry never can become extinct it b the fashion of the day to overlook as unworthy of attention much that is connected with the happiness and misery of social life and to bring every effort of industry and mental application to a x preface bear upon the machinery of mere animal existence in with the same mode of thinking we hear perpetually of our national prosperity being calculated in exact proportion with our commerce and with the competition england is enabled to maintain with the abroad thus we are too much disposed to forget that the real prosperity of a nation ought to be calculated by its elevation in the scale of moral feeling rather than by its facility in supplying the bodily wants of the community at large that much of this true elevation of feeling belongs to the agricultural classes no one can deny who has become with their social and domestic habits and it ought to be esteemed as highest amongst the many privileges of rural life that the circumstances in which the farmer is placed have a natural tendency to induce a tone of feeling the value of which can never be by the greatest physical advantages this world is able to supply in his association with the more laborious classes the is placed on a footing very different from that of the the simple fact that in one case the working people are called men and in the other hands of itself a wide preface xi to the they are for the most part but instruments of labour � mere hands and they are taken into his employment when trade is said to be brisk and dismissed when he needs them no more just as so many tools are taken up or laid aside to suit the service of the day but the farmer dwells as it were amongst his own people he has most probably grown up from infancy beside them his children may have been with theirs he knows all the internal economy of the cottages around him his people come to him for advice in their domestic and social transactions and he feels too sensibly for his peace of mind that when his own altered circumstances render it necessary for him to dismiss any of them from his er ice that distress which be is well able to picture will cast a gloom over the 