The collection of popular songs, _Narodne __srpske pjesme_, from which most of those which occupy this volume are taken, was made by Vuk, and committed to paper either from early recollections, or from the repetition of Servian minstrels. These, he informs us, and his statement is corroborated by every intelligent traveller, form a very small portion of the treasure of song which exists unrecorded among the peasantry. How so much of beautiful anonymous poetry should have been created in so perfect a form, is a subject well worthy of inquiry. Among a people who look to music and song as a source of enjoyment, the habit of improvisation grows up imperceptibly, and engages all the fertilities of imagination in its exercise. The thought which first finds vent in a poetical form, if worth preservation, is polished and perfected as it passes from lip to lip, till it receives the stamp of popular approval, and becomes as it were a national possession. There is no text-book, no authentic record, to which it can be referred, whose authority should interfere with its improvement. The poetry of a people is a common inheritance, which one generation transfers sanctioned and amended to another. Political adversity, too, strengthens the attachment of a nation to the records of its ancient prosperous days. The harps may be hung on the willows for a while, during the storm and the struggle, but when the tumult is over, they will be strung again to repeat the old songs, and recall the time gone by. * * * * * The historical ballads, which are in lines composed of five trochaics, are always sung with the accompaniment of the _Gusle_. At the end of every verse, the singer drops his voice, and mutters a short cadence. The emphatic passages are chanted in a louder tone. “I cannot describe,” says Wessely, “the pathos with which these songs are sometimes sung. I have witnessed crowds surrounding a blind old singer, and every cheek was wet with tears—it was not the music, it was the words which affected them.” As this simple instrument, the Gusle, is never used but to accompany the poetry of the Servians, and as it is difficult to find a Servian who does not play upon it, the universality of their popular ballads may be well imagined. * * * * * Independently of the measure of ten syllables, universally used in the ballads of the Servians, they have verses of seven syllables, consisting of two trochaics and one dactyl: Wĭlt thoŭ lōve thy̆ Mīlĭtză? Of eight syllables, consisting of four trochaics: as, Hāstăn ōnwărd tō thě wēddĭng. And of one trochaic between two dactyls: Mērrĭly̆, dāncĭng, mērrĭly̆. Of ten syllables, two trochaics and two dactyls: Mōrăvă’s bānks ăre trōd by̆ thě māidĕn. Of twelve syllables, composed of two trochaics and one iambic: Gō thěn, Kūm, thŏu lōv’d ŏne, wāits shě fŏr thēe.