Since the publication of PALICIO, unexpected light has been thrown on the married history of _Palicio_ and _Margaret_. It would seem that they had a son, who was probably named after his maternal uncle, the chief Justiciary: for in March 1891 a half-witted Sicilian, named _Manuel Palizzi_, or _Palicio_, was among the Italians who were executed by the mob in _New Orleans_, for being concerned in the murder of the head of the police. Though the mental condition of this unfortunate fellow was such as to make his responsibility questionable, yet his connection with the _Mafia_ society, and with their motives and crimes, points, as unmistakably as his name, to his ancestor in my play, terribly degraded though he was in body as in mind. It is possible that some of our fanatical anarchists may be similarly the prey of a depraved atavism, and be impelled by a fermentation of the sour dregs of an old puritanic heroism. I hope that the family is now extinct. The late _Professor Freeman_ in the introduction to his _History of Sicily_, contributed to the literature of my play, by giving a careful and full account of what I assumed to be the origin of the family name. 1894. THE RETURN OF ULYSSES This play, being a dramatising of the chief scenes in Homer’s _Odyssey_, and not a recast of the story in dramatic form, is as a stage-play open to evident objections; to which, if it be not successful, there can be no answer. How closely Homer has been followed need not be pointed out, as translations of the _Odyssey_ are common, and the recent accurate version by _Mr. Lang_ is in every one’s reach. Reference to that will measure the author’s fidelity, and show where he has altered, where added; and it may also excuse him from any acknowledgment of obligation to his friend, beyond the general confession that he has borrowed from his book whenever it suited him to do so.