PREFACE. THE design of this book is stated in the early part of the introduction, and little excuse could therefore be found for making the preface more than a list of acknowledgments. Two points, however, which are not mentioned elsewhere, may properly be spoken of here. Firstly, care has been taken to keep both passages and comment within the compass of boys sixteen years old. They may meet with a certain number of unfamiliar allusions, but few which a glance at the Encyclopædia Britannica will not clear up. In the second place, and as a kind of corollary, the spelling and style of printing have been modernised wherever I feared that an archaic guise might prove a stumblingblock. Some will consider this a piece of vandalism, like the stupid "restoration" of an old building, but, rather unwillingly, I sacrifice the picturesqueness of a sixteenth or seventeenth century page for the sake of rendering its text more intelligible. The friends who have assisted me with advice, information and other aid are many, and on the completion of a pleasant task I thank them cordially for their varied suggestions and services. Among those who have helped me materially are Prof. C. E. Moyse, Dean Walton, Mr. P. T. Lafleur, Prof. Frank Carter and Mr. C. H. Gould, of McGill University; Prof. Charles Gross, Prof. A. B. Hart and Mr. T. J. Kiernan, of Harvard University; Prof. G. M. Wrong, of Toronto University; Dr. C. A. Herter and Mr. Alex. Falconer. In preparing the printer's manuscript the help of Miss Helen Fairbairn has been most grateful. I am also indebted to several translators and publishers for permission to reprint pieces of which they enjoy the copyright. Thus the Historical Department of the University of 219377 Pennsylvania placed at my disposal its excellent Translations and Reprints, from which Extracts 17, 40, 41 and 110 have been taken. It is by the liberality of the Rev. W. H. Hutton and Mr. D. Nutt that Extract 23 appears in its present place. Mr. G. E. Weare and Mr. John Macqueen have kindly given me warrant to use Extract 51; Messrs. Macmillan and Company, to use Extracts 2, 3, 4, 11 and 14 B.; Messrs. G. Bell and Sons, to use Extracts 8 and 22, which are taken from works published in Bohn's Antiquarian Library; Mr. Bernard Quaritch, to use Extract 12; Messrs. Constable and Co., to use Extract 47; Messrs. Warne and Co., to use Extract 111. And through the courtesy of Sir George Trevelyan, Lord Macaulay's sparkling letterExtract 116-becomes available for my purpose. Clarendon's character of Lord Falkland would have been included but for the stringency of a parliamentary statute which prevents the delegates of the Clarendon Press from sanctioning its publication. MONTREAL, 1st March, 1899. C. W. C. NOTE.-Throughout the book all bibliographical citations which follow the heading "Source" relate to the quarter whence the selection has been immediately derived. With their help the reader can in most cases go directly to the full text, of which the passage here printed is only a part. After each title comes the date of the event, while the author's date is given under the bibliographical reference. In a few cases the dates of a sovereign are attached to the instrument which was issued in his name. |