HAWTHORNE: IRVING: LONGFELLOW WHITTIER: HOLMES: LOWELL THOREAU: EMERSON BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 1892 AL 498.83.2 HARVARD Copyright, 1880, BY HOUGHTON, OSGOOD & CO. Copyright, 1891, BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A. PREFACE. In making a selection of American Prose the principle which controlled in American Poems has been followed. The book does not profess to be representative of the authors included, but complete papers or stories have been taken of a length permitting a fair display of some of the author's characteristics. The object has been to set before the reader some of the higher forms of prose art as interpreted by American writers, and to cultivate a taste for the enduring elements of literature. As before, an attempt has been made to lead the student from the simpler to the more involved and subtle forms, and throughout the book the literature of knowledge has been less regarded than the literature of power. The best result will be reached if those who use this volume are impelled to ask for the fuller works of the authors whose acquaintance as writers of prose they may here make. In American Poems a brief biographical sketch of each writer was given; and since a similar plan in this volume would have required some repetition, the editor has preferred to make the introductions more general in character, with a view to suggesting points of critical inquiry in literature, for such a volume as this |