Note 162 — Chapter XIX · GREAT BRITAIN.

The first step in the artistic life of Burne-Jones, she says, “was a series of pen-and-ink designs made at the suggestion of his friend Mr. Maclaren. These drawings were intended for illustrations to a volume of Ballads upon the Fairy Mythology of Europe, which Maclaren had written with the intention of publishing immediately.... The scheme included a frontispiece, title-page, illustrations and ornamental letters. They were begun early in 1854 and carried on for about two years and a half, and in the series may be traced his development from the time that he first went into the Wytham woods to draw leaves and branches until the day when he discovered that the human form was the alphabet of the language which he was henceforth to use.” The frontispiece, title-page, and a tail-piece on page 279 are all that appear in “The Fairy Family: a Series of Ballads and Metrical Tales Illustrating the Fairy Mythology of Europe,” which Maclaren published anonymously in 1857 (London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, and Roberts). A second edition, published in 1873, bears Maclaren’s name on the title-page and is dedicated “To my daughter Mabel” (London, Macmillan & Co.).