Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/englishlandslett01mitc Project Gutenberg has the other three volumes of this work. II: From Elizabeth to Anne see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54142 III: Queen Anne and the Georges see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37226 IV: The Later Georges to Victoria see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54143 ENGLISH LANDS LETTERS AND KINGS From Celt to Tudor * * * * * * ENGLISH LANDS LETTERS AND KINGS _By Donald G. Mitchell_ I. From Celt to Tudor II. From Elizabeth to Anne III. Queen Anne and the Georges IV. The Later Georges to Victoria _Each 1 vol., 12mo, cloth, gilt top, $1.50_ AMERICAN LANDS AND LETTERS From the Mayflower to Rip Van Winkle _1 vol., square 12mo, Illustrated, $2.50_ * * * * * * ENGLISH LANDS LETTERS AND KINGS From Celt to Tudor by DONALD G. MITCHELL [Illustration] New York Charles Scribner’s Sons MDCCCXCVII Copyright, 1889, by Charles Scribner’S Sons Trow’S Printing and Bookbinding Company, New York. _PREFACE._ This little book is made up from the opening series of a considerable range of “talks,” with which--during the past few years--I have undertaken to entertain, and (if it might be) instruct a bevy of friends; and the interest of a few outsiders who have come to the hearings has induced me to put the matter in type. I feel somewhat awkwardly in obtruding upon the public any such panoramic view of British writers, in these days of specialists--when students devote half a lifetime to the analysis of the works of a single author, and to the proper study of a single period. I have tried, however, to avoid bad mistakes and misleading ones, and shall reckon my commentary only so far forth good--as it may familiarize the average reader with the salient characteristics of the writers brought under notice, and shall put these writers into such a swathing of historic and geographic enwrapments as shall keep them better in mind. When I consider the large number of books recently issued on similar topics, and the scholarly acuteness, and the great range belonging to so many of them, I am not a little discomforted at thought of my bold scurry over so wide reach of ground. Indeed, I have the figure before me now--as I hint an apology--of an old-time country doctor who has ventured with his saddle-bags and spicy nostrums into competition with a half score of special practitioners--with their microscopy and their _granules dosimetriques_; but I think, consolingly, that possibly the old-time mediciner--if not able to cure, can at the least induce a pleasurable slumber. EDGEWOOD, 1889. _CONTENTS._