In these six lectures I have endeavored to profit by his suggestion. In them there is little original: most of it _is_ out of the books. Books, however, like Nature, are a storehouse from which we draw whatever is best suited to our immediate needs; and if in choosing that which might interest an audience, to the majority of whom engravings and etchings were an unexplored country, I have preferred the obvious to the profound, I trust that the true-blue Print Expert will forgive me. These simple lectures make no pretense of being a History of Engraving, or a manual of How to Appreciate Prints. My sole aim has been to share with my audience the stimulation and pleasure which certain prints by the great engravers and etchers have given me. If I have succeeded, even a little, I shall be happy. I would add that the lectures are printed in substantially the same form as they were delivered. Consequently they must be read in connection with the illustrations which accompany them. The Bibliographies which follow each chapter have been prepared by Mr. Adam E. M. Paff, Assistant in the Department of Prints at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. FITZROY CARRINGTON _Museum of Fine Arts, Boston June 26, 1916_ ENGRAVERS AND ETCHERS GERMAN ENGRAVING: FROM THE BEGINNINGS TO MARTIN SCHONGAUER Where were the beginnings? When were the beginnings? Germany, the Netherlands, and Italy have each claimed priority. Max Lehrs has settled these rival claims, so far as they can be settled at the present time, by locating the cradle of engraving neither in Germany, in the Netherlands, nor in Italy, but in a neutral country--Switzerland, in the vicinity of Basle--naming the MASTER OF THE PLAYING CARDS as probably the earliest engraver whose works have come down to us. Undoubtedly this artist was not the first to engrave upon metal plates, but of his predecessors nothing is known, nor has any example of their work survived.