Chapter I: Front Matter

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THE TRUE STORY BOOK

* * * * *

WORKS BY ANDREW LANG.

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THE TRUE STORY BOOK. Edited by ANDREW LANG. With
Plates and Illustrations in the Text by H. J.
Ford, Lucien Davis, Lancelot Speed, and L. Bogle.
Crown 8vo. 6_s._

London: LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO.
New York: 15 East 16th Street.

* * * * *

THE TRUE STORY BOOK

Edited by

ANDREW LANG

With Numerous Illustrations by L. Bogle, Lucien Davis, H. J. Ford, C. H. M. Kerr, and Lancelot Speed

London Longmans, Green, and Co and New York: 15 East 16th Street 1893

All rights reserved

_DEDICATION_

_TO FRANCIS McCUNN_

_You like the things I used to like,
The things I'm fond of still,
The sound of fairy wands that strike
Men into beasts at will;_

_The cruel stepmother, the fair
Stepdaughter, kind and leal,
The bull and bear so debonair,
The trenchant fairy steel._

_You love the world where brute and fish
Converse with man and bird,
Where dungeons open at a wish,
And seas dry at a word._

_That merry world to-day we leave,
We list an ower-true tale,
Of hearts that sore for Charlie grieve,
When handsome princes fail,_

_Of gallant races overthrown,
Of dungeons ill to climb,
There's no such tale of trouble known,
In all the fairy time._

_There Montezuma still were king,
There Charles would wear the crown,
And there the Highlanders would ding
The Hanoverian down:_

_In Fairyland the Rightful Cause
Is never long a-winning,
In Fairyland the fairy laws
Are prompt to punish sinning:_

_For Fairyland's the land of joy,
And this the world of pain,
So back to Fairyland, my boy,
We'll journey once again!_