i Leopold StaffWiktor Jarosław Darasz, Mały przewodnik po wierszu polskim, Kraków 2003.
Przykładem ballady może być The Epitaph in Form of a Ballad Villona w angielskim tłumaczeniu wspomnianego Algernona Charlesa Swinburne’a. Oto pierwsza strofa i przesłanie tego utworu.
Men, brother men, that after us yet live, Let not your hearts too hard against us be; For if some pity of us poor men ye give, The sooner God shall take of you pity. Here are we five or six strung up, you see, And here the flesh that all too well we fed Bit by bit eaten and rotten, rent and shred, And we the bones grow dust and ash withal; Let no man laugh at us discomforted, But pray to God that he forgive us all. [...] Prince Jesus, that of all art lord and head, Keep us, that hell be not our bitter bed;