Prologue - Poem by William Bell Scott

LITTLE dear! we often say
To bright young eyes and dainty ears:
The two words oft together go,
Would I could know
Together they might go to-day,
And designate in coming years,
These my verses—rather small,
I hope, to weary or appal—
Small as drops of blood or tears.

‘Pretty if good!’ grand-dame replied
To the vain youngster by her side:
‘Good if true,’ it seems to me,
Our verses should be judged to be:
If nature prompts, not merely art:
Only emotion's potent spell
Can clothe life with the lovely shell,
And send the rhyme like love's own dart
Flying direct from heart to heart.
Ah me! then, reader, can you say
‘Little dears’ to these to-day?