The issue of this second volume of _Popular Ballads of the Olden Time_
has been delayed chiefly by the care given to the texts, in most
instances the whole requiring to be copied by hand.
I consider myself fortunate to be enabled, by the kind service of
my friend Mr. A. Francis Steuart, to print for the first time in a
collection of ballads the version of the _Grey Selchie of Shool Skerry_
given in the Appendix. It is a feather in the cap of any ballad-editor
after Professor Child to discover a ballad that escaped his eye.
My thanks are also due to the Rev. Professor W. W. Skeat for assistance
generously given in connection with the ballad of _Judas_; and, as
before, to Mr. A. H. Bullen.