This book is in series with The Idiom of the People (English Traditional Verse from the Mss. of Cecil Sharp) and presents the results of further researches into folk-song manuscripts — those of S. Baring-Gould, H. E. D. Hammond and G. B.
Gardiner.
James Reeves has made discoveries here which are in many respects even more exciting than those revealed in The Idiom of the People.
This new collection of traditional poetry consists of 142 songs and fragments, and provides both a complement to the previous volume and an extension of it.
Some of the verses are fresh variants of those noted by Cecil Sharp, and others have not hitherto appeared in print or are to be found only in obscure and in-accessible sources.
In his abundant and interesting notes Mr Reeves sheds light on some obscurities of language and folk-lore; he explains the meaning of symbols and allusions for those who are unfamiliar with the lingua franca of folk song — a subject which receives detailed treatment in his Introduction.
He also makes a special study of the theme of fertility, showing that the sexuality of folk song must be understood in the wider context of the cycle of life in man and nature, which singers in an agricultural society saw as an 'Everlasting Circle'.
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