One word on Thackery's "The Loving Ballad of Lord Bateman," mentioned by Toadfrog. It was found later as "a joint adaptation by Thackery and Dickens," however boring it may be. The original edition is a 40-page booklet (chapbook?), published in 1839, illustrated by George Cruikshank (11 illust. in all); music and a 10-page notes attached. It is entered in Child's ballad book (#53L); the music is in Bronson (no. 37). Leslie C. Staples (Past President, The Dickens Fellowship) says in the new note to the facsimile edition (Dent, 1969):

The authorship of this 'little jeu d'espri', as The Dickensian called it, was the subject of argument for years, until in 1939, some letters of Dickens to George Cruikshank turned up. Published in 1839, it is now accepted as a joint adaptation by Thackery and Dickens of a traditional ballad, said to have been heard by the former outside a public house. Dickens wrote to Cruikshank: 'I have altered a word here and there,' and 'substituted a new last verse for the old one'. The Preface and Notes are entirely Dickens's work. Cruikshank, the illustrator, sought the music from Dickens, who told him to ask Mrs Burnett, Dickens's sister and a professional singer, to take down the tune as he hummed it. Dickens was delighted with Cruikshank's work; in a post-publication letter of July 1839, he said: 'You never did anything like those etchings--never'.