University of Virginia Library

PREFACE.

When a writer calls his work a Romance, it need hardly be
observed that he wishes to claim a certain latitude, both as to its
fashion and material, which he would not have felt himself entitled
to assume, had he professed to be writing a Novel. The latter
form of composition is presumed to aim at a very minute fidelity,
not merely to the possible, but to the probable and ordinary course
of man's experience. The former — while, as a work of art, it
must rigidly subject itself to laws, and while it sins unpardonably
so far as it may swerve aside from the truth of the human heart —
has fairly a right to present that truth under circumstances, to a
great extent, of the writer's own choosing or creation. If he
think fit, also, he may so manage his atmospherical medium as to
bring out or mellow the lights, and deepen and enrich the shadows,
of the picture. He will be wise, no doubt, to make a very moderate
use of the privileges here stated, and, especially, to mingle
the Marvellous rather as a slight, delicate, and evanescent flavor,
than as any portion of the actual substance of the dish offered to
the public. He can hardly be said, however, to commit a literary
crime, even if he disregard this caution.

In the present work, the author has proposed to himself — but
with what success, fortunately, it is not for him to judge — to

keep undeviatingly within his immunities. The point of view in
which this tale comes under the Romantic definition lies in the
attempt to connect a by-gone time with the very present that is
fitting away from us. It is a legend, prolonging itself, from an
epoch now gray in the distance, down into our own broad daylight,
and bringing along with it some of its legendary mist, which the
reader, according to his pleasure, may either disregard, or allow
it to float almost imperceptibly about the characters and events,
for the sake of a picturesque effect. The narrative, it may be, is
woven of so humble a texture as to require this advantage, and, at
the same time, to render it the more difficult of attainment.

Many writers lay very great stress upon some definite moral
purpose, at which they profess to aim their works. Not to be
deficient in this particular, the author has provided himself with
a moral; — the truth, namely, that the wrong-doing of one generation
lives into the successive ones, and, divesting itself of every
temporary advantage, becomes a pure and uncontrollable mischief;
— and he would feel it a singular gratification, if this romance
might effectually convince mankind — or, indeed, any one man —
of the folly of tumbling down an avalanche of ill-gotten gold, or
real estate, on the heads of an unfortunate posterity, thereby to
maim and crush them, until the accumulated mass shall be scattered
abroad in its original atoms. In good faith, however, he is
not sufficiently imaginative to flatter himself with the slightest
hope of this kind. When romances do really teach anything, or
produce any effective operation, it is usually through a far more
subtile process than the ostensible one. The author has considered
it hardly worth his while, therefore, relentlessly to impale

the story with its moral, as with an iron rod, — or, rather, as by
sticking a pin through a butterfly, — thus at once depriving it of
life, and causing it to stiffen in an ungainly and unnatural attitude.
A high truth, indeed, fairly, finely, and skilfully wrought
out, brightening at every step, and crowning the final development
of a work of fiction, may add an artistic glory, but is never any
truer, and seldom any more evident, at the last page than at the
first.

The reader may perhaps choose to assign an actual locality to
the imaginary events of this narrative. If permitted by the historical
connection, — which, though slight, was essential to his
plan, — the author would very willingly have avoided anything of
this nature. Not to speak of other objections, it exposes the
romance to an inflexible and exceedingly dangerous species of
criticism, by bringing his fancy-pictures almost into positive contact
with the realities of the moment. It has been no part of his
object, however, to describe local manners, nor in any way to
meddle with the characteristics of a community for whom he
cherishes a proper respect and a natural regard. He trusts not to
be considered as unpardonably offending, by laying out a street
that infringes upon nobody's private rights, and appropriating a
lot of land which had no visible owner, and building a house, of
materials long in use for constructing castles in the air. The personages
of the tale — though they give themselves out to be of
ancient stability and considerable prominence — are really of the
author's own making, or, at all events, of his own mixing; their
virtues can shed no lustre, nor their defects redound, in the
remotest degree, to the discredit of the venerable town of which

they profess to be inhabitants. He would be glad, therefore, if —
especially in the quarter to which he alludes — the book may be
read strictly as a Romance, having a great deal more to do with
the clouds overhead than with any portion of the actual soil of
the County of Essex.