Limit number of elements from AJAX response

Question

The AJAX response returns a list of <a> elements:

<a href="/1/">One</a>
<a href="/2/">Two</a>
<a href="/3/">Three</a>

How do I select only the first n a elements from the response?

$.ajax({
    url: '/' + page,
    success: function (res) {
        btn.after($('a', $(res)).slice(0,20));
    }
});

That's what I'm currently trying but I'm getting a Uncaught Error: Syntax error, unrecognized expression followed by the whole response.

Answer 1

The response had two closing div elements at the end but no two openings, so I had to make one:

$.ajax({
    url: '/' + page,
    success: function (res) {
        btn.after($('a', $($.trim('<div><div>'+res))).slice(0,20));
    }
});