Yorkshire Dialect Poems (1673-1915) and traditional poems

Preface (To the Second Edition)

The demand for a second edition of this anthology of Yorkshire dialect verse gives me an opportunity of correcting two rather serious error's which crept into the first edition. The poem entitled "Hunting Song" on page 86, which I attributed to Mr. Richard Blakeborough, is the work of Mr. Malham-Dembleby", whose poem, "A Kuss," immediately precedes it in the volume.

The poem on page 75, which in the first edition was marked Anonymous and entitled "Parson Drew thro' Pudsey," is the work of the late John Hartley; its proper' title is "T' First o' t' Sooar't," and it includes eight introductory stanzas which are now added as Appendix II.

Through the kindness of: Fr W. A. Craigie, Dr. M. Denby, and Mr. E. G. Bayford, I have also been able to make a few changes in the glossarial footnotes, The most important of these is the change from "Ember's" to "Floor" as the meaning of the word, "Fleet" in the second line of "A Lyke-wake Dirge." The note which Dr. Craigie sen't me on this word is so interesting that I reproduce it here verbatim:

"The word fleet in the 'Lyke-wake Dirge' has been much misunderstood, but
it is certain1y the same thing as flet-floor; see the O.E.D. and E.D.D.
under.  FLET.  The form is not necessarily 'erroneous,' as is said in the
O.E.D., for it might represent ,the O.N. dative fleti, which must have
been common in the phrase a fleti (cf. the first verse of 'Havamal').
The collocation with 'fire' occurs in 'Sir Gawayne' (l. 1653): 'Aboute
the fyre upon flet.' 'Fire and fleet and candle-light' are a summary of
the comforts of the house, which the dead person still enjoys for 'this
ae night,' and then goes out into the dark and cold."

F. W. Moorman