University of Virginia Library

PREFACE
TO THE FIRST EDITION.

The writer of this tale has made an humble effort to
add something to the scanty stock of native American
literature. Any attempt to conciliate favour by apologies
would be unavailing and absurd. In this free
country, no person is under any obligation to write;
and the public (unfortunately) is under no obligation
to read. It is certainly desirable to possess some
sketches of the character and manners of our own
country, and if this has been done with any degree of
success, it would be wrong to doubt that it will find a
reception sufficiently favourable.

The original design of the author was, if possible,
even more limited and less ambitious than what has
been accomplished. It was simply to produce a very

short and simple moral tale of the most humble description;
and if in the course of its production it has
acquired any thing of a peculiar or local cast, this
should be chiefly attributed to the habits of the
writer's education, and that kind of accident which
seems to control the efforts of those who have not been
the subjects of strict intellectual discipline, and have
not sufficiently premeditated their own designs.

It can scarcely be necessary to assure the reader,
that no personal allusions, however remote, were intended
to be made to any individual, unless it be an
exception to this remark, that the writer has attempted
a sketch of a real character under the fictitious appellation
of “Crazy Bet.”