The English reader is requested to bear in mind that the book has not been prepared in reference to an English but an American public, and to make due allowance for that fact. It would have placed the writer far more at ease had there been no prospect of publication in England. As this, however, was unavoidable, in some form, the writer has chosen to issue it there under her own sanction. There is one acknowledgment which the author feels happy to make, and that is, to those publishers in England, Scotland, France, and Germany who have shown a liberality beyond the requirements of legal obligation. The author hopes that the day is not far distant when America will reciprocate the liberality of other nations by granting to foreign authors those rights which her own receive from them. The _Journal_ which appears in the continental tour is from the pen of the Rev. C. Beecher. The _Letters_ were, for the most part, compiled from what was written at the time and on the spot. Some few were entirely written after the author's return. It is an affecting thought that several of the persons who appear in these letters as among the living, have now passed to the great future. The Earl of Warwick, Lord Cockburn, Judge Talfourd, and Dr. Wardlaw are no more among the ways of men. Thus, while we read, while we write, the shadowy procession is passing; the good are being gathered into life, and heaven enriched by the garnered treasures of earth. H.B.S. CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. INTRODUCTORY. LETTER I. The Voyage. LETTER II. Liverpool.--The Dingle.--A Ragged School.--Flowers.--Speke Hall.--Antislavery Meeting. LETTER III. Lancashire.--Carlisle.--Gretna Green.--Glasgow. LETTER IV. The Baillie.--The Cathedral.--Dr. Wardlaw.--A Tea Party--Bothwell Castle.--Chivalry.--Scott and Burns. LETTER V. Dumbarton Castle.--Duke of Argyle.--Linlithgow.--Edinburgh. LETTER VI. Public Soirée.--Dr. Guthrie.--Craigmiller Castle.--Bass Rock.--Bannockburn.--Stirling.--Glamis Castle.--Barclay of Ury.--The Dee.--Aberdeen.--The Cathedral.--Brig o'Balgounie. LETTER VII. Letter from a Scotch Bachelor.--Reformatory Schools of Aberdeen.--Dundee.--Dr. Dick.--The Queen in Scotland. LETTER VIII. Melrose.--Dry burgh.--Abbotsford. LETTER IX. Douglas of Caver.--Temperance Soirée.--Calls.--Lord Gainsborough.--Sir William Hamilton.--George Combe.--Visit to Hawthornden.--Roslin Castle.--The Quakers.--Hervey's Studio.--Grass Market.--Grayfriars' Churchyard. LETTER X. Birmingham.--Stratford on Avon. LETTER XI. Warwick.--Kenilworth. LETTER XII. Birmingham.--Sybil Jones.--J.A. James. LETTER XIII. London.--Lord Mayor's Dinner. LETTER XIV. London.--Dinner with Earl of Carlisle. LETTER XV. London.--Anniversary of Bible Society.--Dulwich Gallery.--Dinner with Mr. E. Cropper.--Soirée at Rev. Mr. Binney's. LETTER XVI. Reception at Stafford House. LETTER XVII. The Sutherland Estate.