> As to whether the Victorian collectors actually did a good job, that is a moot point, since we have no way of knowing anything about the songs they didn't preserve.

Moot only in an absolute sense, especially since they often described the sort of songs they didn't collect. (And they collected much that they didn't print.)

Obviously they did a great job of preserving what they thought merited preservation and would never have been preserved so well (if at all) if they'd stayed home. What those few collectors appreciated and preserved has delighted millions.

Many of the music-hall songs they rejected seem to have been preserved on broadsides and sheet music. Some have undoubtedly been lost, but those not printed were probably not very interesting even to the publishers.

It seems reasonable to imagine that what they didn't preserve would not, by and large, be very impressive even today. Bronson demonstrates how many versions of Child ballads are dull, fragmentary, and repetitive. But even these were collected by someone.

Criticizing the collectors for not having done enough is kind of like blaming Thomas Edison for not having invented the airplane. (He concluded in 1895 that heavier-than-air flight was impossible.)