ABSTRACT

We had occasion, last year, to give an account of the cheap periodical press as it then existed in London; and have thought that, as pendant to the article then published, which treated of the popular prose of the day, a few words regarding the popular poetry might not be unwelcome to the reader. A file of penny newspapers, or a bundle of ballads, are not, to be sure, amongst the most dignified parts of the historical collection, but, nevertheless, they form some part in it; and as it may be pretty confidently predicted that many of the newspapers will cease to appear, and must of the songs will be forgotten, while Fraser’s Magazinc is still, under the guidance of our successors, the great instructor and entertainer of the descendants of the present public, we feel, as it were, that we shall confer a benefit on posterity, in giving some brief account of the fugitive poetry of the year 1839; not to mention the actual good which the present subscriber to regina must derive from the perusal of the ensuing article.