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PREFACE 



RICHARD Jefferies was born at Coate 

 Farm, Wiltshire, November 6, 1848, 

 and died, after five years of almost contin- 

 uous suffering, August 14, 1887. 



His early work betrayed few signs of 

 promise: his later work gave perfect 

 expression to that old bucolic life and 

 nature-worship never wholly absent from 

 the world's literature in any age, and with 

 Jefferies seen even in the felicity of mere 

 title-pages, — TAe Dewy Morn, Amaryllis at 

 the Fair, The Pageant of Summer. 



Two books about this man, may be read 

 with profit : Sir Walter Besant's Eulogy 

 (1 888), aad'a shorter Study, by Mr. H. S. 

 Salt (1894). For so young a writer, coming 

 so late into possession of his powers, he has 

 left a matchless record in English letters; 

 a record that vnll remain when much of 

 brilliant impermanence is forgotten. 



The Story of My Heart, first published in 

 1883, is purely an autobiography of the 

 spirit; say indeed, an afiirmation, not of 

 the flesh but of the mystery become clear 



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