The fact that a well-printed edition of this notable story has not been in print either in England or America since its original publication in 1841 is a sufficient reason for the present edition.

It includes the valuable notes in which the author elucidated the "many legal topics contained in the work, enabling the non-professional reader to understand more easily the somewhat complex and elaborate plot of the story."

Of the story itself it is hardly necessary to speak. Always deservedly popular, it has been widely read for nearly fifty years in England and America, has been translated into French and German, and has only required to be presented in a pleasing form, with readable type and good paper, to insure it the circulation which it deserves.

Boston, 1889.