PREFACE TO NEW EDITION

A new édition of tliîs little volume being called for, the text has been carefully revised throughout, while the biographical sketches hâve been amplified or completed wherever necessary, and a considérable number of notes, chiefly explanatory of the historical and other allusions in the text, has been added.

For the extract from Fontanes ('La Bible') vvhich found a place in the previous édition, we hâve substituted two short lyric poems, written in a lighter and more élégant vein, which appear to us fully worthy of the praise bestowed upon them by the prince of modem French critics, M. Sainte-Beuve.

GUSTAVE MASSON

G. W. PROTHERO.