Note: Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/englishlands04mitc Project Gutenberg has the other three volumes of this work. I: Fom Celt to Tudor see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54168 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 ENGLISH LANDS LETTERS AND KINGS The Later Georges to Victoria * * * * * * 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 The Later Georges to Victoria by DONALD G. MITCHELL [Illustration] New York Charles Scribner’S Sons MDCCCXCVII Copyright, 1897, by Charles Scribner’S Sons Trow Directory Printing and Bookbinding Company New York _FORECAST._ The printers ask if there is to be prefatory matter. There shall be no excuses, nor any defensive explanations: and I shall only give here such forecast of this little book as may serve as a reminder, and appetizer, for the kindly acquaintances I meet once more; and further serve as an illustrative _menu_, for the benefit of those newer and more critical friends who browse tentatively at the tables of the booksellers. This volume--the fourth in its series of English Lands and Letters--opens upon that always delightful country of hills and waters, which is known as the Lake District of England;--where we found Wordsworth, stalking over the fells--and where we now find the maker of those heavy poems of _Thalaba_ and _Madoc_, and of the charming little biography of Nelson. There, too, we find that strange creature, De Quincey, full of a tumult of thoughts and language--out of which comes ever and anon some penetrating utterance, whose barb of words fixes it in the mind, and makes it rankle. Professor Wilson is his fellow, among the hills by Elleray--as strenuous, and weightier with his great bulk of Scottish manhood; the _Isle of Palms_ is forgotten; but not “Christopher in his Shooting Jacket”--stained, and bespattered with Highland libations.