THIS book is the history of the beginnings of English Poetry.
It is the beginning also of a history of that poetry which, I
hope, with perhaps too bold an ambition, to finish in the years
to come. Life gives too short a time now for a long work, but
it is a pleasure to have at least brought to an end this tale of
the origins of English verse.

It begins in the older England over the sea. It ends with
the accession of Ælfred. When he came to the throne in 871,
literature, both Latin and English, had perished, after a career
of two hundred years. The final home of both had been Nor-
thumbria. A few years after his accession the last unplun-
dered seats of learning were destroyed. All the Muses were
now silent. But before after Ælfred a new English literature
had begun, and in a new land, and the King was himself its
origin. What had been was poetry; this was prose. The
country of English poetry had been Northumbria; the country
of English prose was Wessex. At this date, then, the curtain
naturally falls on the first act of this history. At this date,
in the intervals of Ælfred's wars, it will naturally rise on the
beginning of the second act.

The English literature of this period is entirely poetry, and
this book is mainly dedicated to that poetry. I have not put
aside the life of the people, the Latin literature, or the politi-
cal history of England; but I have only spoken of them so far
as they bore upon the poetry or illustrated it. That poetry is
certainly not of a very fine quality, but it is frequently re-
markable. It has its own special qualities, and with the ex-

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