In compiling the present collection I have drawn on the store of 140
tales with which I originally started; some of the best of these I
reserved for this when making up the former one. That had necessarily to
contain the old favourites _Jack the Giant Killer, Dick Whittington_,
and the rest, which are often not so interesting or so well told as the
less familiar ones buried in periodicals or folk-lore collections. But
since the publication of _English Fairy Tales_, I have been specially
fortunate in obtaining access to tales entirely new and exceptionally
well told, which have been either published during the past three years
or have been kindly placed at my disposal by folk-lore friends. Among
these, the tales reported by Mrs. Balfour, with a thorough knowledge of
the peasants' mind and mode of speech, are a veritable acquisition. I
only regret that I have had to tone down so much of dialect in her
versions. She has added to my indebtedness to her by sending me several
tales which are entirely new and inedited.
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