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anon [working people]
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anon [working people] : ["half-penny Ballads"]
William Wordsworth discusses reading habits of the local labouring classes in letter to Francis Wrangham, 5 June 1808: '... I find, among the people I am speaking of, half-penny Ballads, and penny and two-penny histories, in great abundance; these are often bought as charitable tributes to the poor Persons who hawk them about (and it is the best way of procuring them); they are frequently stitched together in tolerably thick volumes, and such I have read; some of the contents, though not often religious, very good; others objectionable, either for the superstition in them (such as prophecies, fortune-telling, etc.) or more frequently for indelicacy.'
