Whether the Poet undertook to write and SING A SONG OF SIXPENCE for that popular price is not stated in his simple rhyme, but, at all events, we learn that he started with "a pocket full," and proceeded to draw on his imagination for all it was worth. What that famous blackbird-pie really cost—except in black-birds—is not disclosed, though the King seemed to show some anxiety about the state of his treasury, as he was discovered "in his counting house" imediately after the feast. But while the Queen, regardless of expense, regales herself on "bread and honey" in "the parlour", and her Maid-of-honour, or perhaps of-all-work, is engaged at the clothes-line, nothing is said about a princess.
No doubt there was a princess, and that Princess might have been PRINCESS BELLE-ETOILE? Anyway here she is in the same boat—I mean book—and certainly her adventures are romantic enough to prevent any surprise at the company in which Her Highness now finds herself.
Even princesses cannot do without Alphabets, and so in her train comes AN ALPHABET in which will be discovered many OLD and tried FRIENDS of the Nursery.
Thus we launch another volume of our series, like a fairy ship with a rather mixed cargo, in the hope that—to change the metaphor—like the blackbird-pie, it may prove, when opened, to be "a pretty dish to set before—" their Babyships.
Walter Crane
Kensington. Sept: 1909