The tale of _Oroonoko, the Royal Slave_ is indisputedly Mrs. Behn’s masterpiece in prose. Its originality and power have singled it out for a permanence and popularity none of her other works attained. It is vivid, realistic, pregnant with pathos, beauty, and truth, and not only has it so impressed itself upon the readers of more than two centuries, but further, it surely struck a new note in English literature and one which was re-echoed far and wide. It has been said that ‘_Oroonoko_ is the first emancipation novel’, and there is no little acumen in this remark. Certainly we may absolve Mrs. Behn from having directly written with a purpose such as animated Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_; but none the less her sympathy with the oppressed blacks, her deep emotions of pity for outraged humanity, her anger at the cruelties of the slave-driver aye ready with knout or knife, are manifest in every line. Beyond the intense interest of the pure narrative we have passages of a rhythm that is lyric, exquisitely descriptive of the picturesque tropical scenery and exotic vegetations, fragrant and luxuriant; there are intimate accounts of adventuring and primitive life; there are personal touches which lend a colour only personal touches can, as Aphara tells her prose-epic of her Superman, Cæsar the slave, Oroonoko the prince. It is not difficult to trace the influence of _Oroonoko_. We can see it in many an English author; in Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, in Chateaubriand. Her idyllic romance has inspired writers who perhaps but dimly remember even her name and her genius. It was often reprinted separately from the rest. There is a little 12mo _Oroonoko_, ‘the ninth edition corrected’, published at Doncaster, 1759, ‘for C. Plummer’, which is rarely seen save in a torn and well-thumbed state.[1] In 1777 the sentimental and highly proper Mrs. Elizabeth Griffith included _Oroonoko_ in her three volume _Collection of Novels selected and revised._ _Oroonoko_, ‘written originally by Mrs. Behn and revised by Mrs. Griffith’[2], was also issued separately, ‘price sixpence’[3], in 1800, frontispieced by a very crude picture of a black-a-moor about to attack a tiger. As early as 1709 we find _Lebens und Liebes-Geschichte des Königlichen Sclaven Oroonoko in West-Indien_, a German translation published at Hamburg, with a portrait of ‘Die Sinnreiche Engelländerin Mrs. Afra Behn.’ In 1745 _Oroonoko_ was ‘traduit de l’Anglois de Madame Behn,’ with the motto from Lucan ‘Quo fata trahunt virtus secura sequetur.’ There is a rhymed dedication ‘A Madame La M. P. D’l . . .’ (35 lines), signed D. L.****, i.e., Pierre-Antoine de la Place, a fecund but mediocre writer of the eighteenth century (1707-93), who also translated, _Venice Preserv’d_, _The Fatal Marriage_, _Tom Jones_, and other English masterpieces. There is another edition of de la Place’s version with fine plates engraved by C. Baron after Marillier, Londres, 1769.