The following _Preface_ belongs to the last few months of Dryden's life (1700), and introduces the collection, mainly of translations and adaptations, to which he gave the title of _Fables_ Apart from _Alexander's Feast_ (written in 1697), the most notable pieces in this collection were the versions of Chaucer's _Knightes Tale_ and _Nonne Prestes Tale_, and of three stories to be found in Boccaccio _Sigismunda and Guiscardo_, _Cymon and Iphigenia_, _Theodore and Honoria_. The Preface is memorable for its critical judgments on Homer, Virgil, and Ovid, still more memorable for its glowing praise of Chaucer. It closes as it was fitting that the last work of Dryden should close, with an apology, full of manliness and dignity, for the licentiousness of his comedies. For his short-comings in this matter he had lately been attacked by Collier, and in his reply he more than wins back any esteem that he may have lost by his transgression. It is with a poet, as with a man who designs to build, and is very exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand; but, generally speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short in the expense he first intended. He alters his mind as the work proceeds, and will have this or that convenience more, of which he had not thought when he began. So has it happened to me. I have built a house, where I intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a certain nobleman, who, beginning with a dog-kennel, never lived to finish the palace he had contrived.