PEEFATOEY 



The only part of my book I wish to preface is 

 the last part, — the foreign sketches, — and it is not 

 much matter about these, since, if they do not con- 

 tain their own proof, I shall not attempt to supply 

 it here. 



I have been told that De Lolme, who wrote a no- 

 table book on the English Constitution, said that 

 after he had been in England a few weeks, he fully 

 made up his mind to write a book on that country ; 

 after he had lived there a year, he still thought of 

 writing a book, but was not so certain about it, but 

 that after a residence of ten years he abandoned his 

 first design altogether. Instead of furnishing an ar- 

 gument against writing out one's first impressions of 

 a country, I think the experience of the Frenchman 

 shows the importance of doing it at once. The sen- 

 sations of the first day are what we want, — the first 

 flush of the traveler's thought and feeling, before 

 his perception and sensibilities become cloyed or 

 blunted, or before he in any way becomes a part of 

 that which he would observe and describe. Then 

 the American in England is just enough at home to 

 enable him to discriminate subtle shades and differ- 



