That class is a large one in our country villages, and these books reflect its thoughts and manners as half-penny ballads do the life of the streets of London.
Two or three chairs, a table, and a large sea-chest formed the principal movables. About the wall were stuck up naval ballads, such as "Admiral Hosier's Ghost,"
The collection of ballads will in future be reserved for private study, with the object of making poetry tributary'--Wegg was so proud of having found this word, that he said it again, with a capital letter--'Tributary, to friendship.
The ballads are not more true to the facts; but they give us, in a coarser form, far more of the spirit than we get from the same facts reflected in the intellect of a Dickens, for instance, or of any writer far enough above the scene to be properly its artist.