In Elizabeth’s reign we first meet with the ballad-mongers and professional authors of ballads. Simultaneously, or nearly so, comes the degradation of the word ‘ballad,’ until it signifies either the genuine popular ballad, or a satirical song, or a broadside, or almost any ditty of the day. Of the ballad-mongers, we have mentioned Elderton, Deloney, and Johnson. We might add a hundred others, from Anthony Munday to Martin Parker, and even Tom Durfey, each of whom contributed largely to the vast mushroom-literature that sprang up and flourished vigorously for the next century. Chappell mentions that seven hundred and ninety-six ballads remained at the end of 1560 in the cupboards of the council-chamber of the Stationers’ Company for transference to the new wardens of the succeeding year. These, of course, would consist chiefly of broadsides: the narrations of strange events, monstrosities, or ‘true tales’ of the day. It is true that many of the genuine popular ballads were rewritten to suit contemporary taste. But the style of the seventeenth century ballads cannot be compared to the noble straightforwardness and simplicity of the ancient ballad. Let us place side by side the first stanza of the _Hunting of the Cheviot_ and the first few verses of _Fair Rosamond_, a very fair specimen of Deloney’s work. The popular ancient ballad wastes no time on preliminaries[7]:-- [Footnote 7: A good notion of the way in which the old ballads plunge _in medias res_ may be obtained by reading the Index of First Lines.] ‘The Persé owt off Northombarlonde And avowe to God mayd he, That he wold hunte in the mowntayns Off Chyviat within days thre, In the magger of doughté Dogles; And all that ever with him be.’ Now for the milk-and-water:-- ‘Whenas King Henry rulde this land, The second of that name, Besides the queene, he dearly lovde A faire and comely dame. Most peerlesse was her beautye founde, Her favour and her face; A sweeter creature in this worlde Could never prince embrace. Her crisped lockes like threads of golde Appeard to each man’s sight; Her sparkling eyes, like Orient pearles, Did cast a heavenly light.’ Ritson’s taste actually led him, in comparing the above two first verses, to prefer the latter. Or again we might contrast _Sir Patrick Spence_-- ‘The King sits in Dumferling towne Drinking the blude reid wine: “O whar will I get a guid sailor, To sail this ship of mine?”’ with the _Children in the Wood_:-- ‘Now ponder well, you parents deare, These wordes, which I shall write; A doleful story you shall heare, In time brought forth to light.’ Artificial, tedious, didactic. The author of the ancient ballad seldom points, and never draws, a moral, and has unbounded faith in the credulity of the audience. The seventeenth century balladists pitchforked Nature into the midden.