4. A biographical index of the authors represented in the series. This consists of brief sketches of the many writers whose work has been drawn upon for the narratives of Great Events. It is intended for ready reference, and gives only the essential facts. This index serves a double purpose. Suppose, for instance, that a reader is familiar with the name of John Lothrop Motley, but happens not to know whether he is still living, whether he had other occupation than writing, or what offices he held. This index will answer these questions. On the other hand, an admirer of Thomas Jefferson or Theodore Roosevelt may wish to know whether we have taken anything--and, if so, what--from their writings. This index will answer at once. 5. A general index covering every reference in the series to dates, events, persons, and places of historic importance. These are made easily accessible by a careful and elaborate system of cross-references. 6. A separate and complete chronology of each nation of ancient, mediaeval, and modern times, with references to the volume and page where each item is treated, either as an entire article or as part of one; so that the history of any one nation may be read in its logical order and in the language of its best historians. Such, as the National Alumni regard it, are the general character, wide scope, and earnest purpose of THE GREAT EVENTS BY FAMOUS HISTORIANS. Let us end by saying, in the friendly fashion of the old days when bookmakers and their readers were more intimate than now: "Kind reader, if this our performance doth in aught fall short of promise, blame not our good intent, but our unperfect wit." THE NATIONAL ALUMNI. AN OUTLINE NARRATIVE TRACING BRIEFLY THE CAUSES, CONNECTIONS, AND CONSEQUENCES OF THE GREAT EVENTS A GENERAL SURVEY OF THE PROGRESS OF THE HUMAN RACE, ITS ADVANCE IN KNOWLEDGE AND CIVILIZATION, AND THE BROAD WORLD MOVEMENTS WHICH HAVE SHAPED ITS DESTINY CHARLES F. HORNE, Ph.D. CONTINUED THROUGH THE SUCCESSIVE VOLUMES AND COVERING THE SUCCESSIVE PERIODS OF THE GREAT EVENTS BY FAMOUS HISTORIANS AN OUTLINE NARRATIVE TRACING BRIEFLY THE CAUSES, CONNECTIONS, AND CONSEQUENCES OF THE GREAT EVENTS (FROM THE BEGINNING TO THE OVERTHROW OF THE PERSIANS) CHARLES F. HORNE History, if we define it as the mere transcription of the written records of former generations, can go no farther back than the time such records were first made, no farther than the art of writing. But now that we have come to recognize the great earth itself as a story-book, as a keeper of records buried one beneath the other, confused and half obliterated, yet not wholly beyond our comprehension, now the historian may fairly be allowed to speak of a far earlier day.