however, it seemed likely that the improved and illustrated edition which he meditated would be a posthumous publication.  But the course of the events which occasioned the disclosure of the Author’s name having, in a great measure, restored to him a sort of parental control over these Works, he is naturally induced to give them to the press in a corrected, and, he hopes, an improved form, while life and health permit the task of revising and illustrating them.  Such being his purpose, it is necessary to say a few words on the plan of the proposed Edition.

In stating it to be revised and corrected, it is not to be inferred that any attempt is made to alter the tenor of the stories, the character of the actors, or the spirit of the dialogue.  There is no doubt ample room for emendation in all these points,—­but where the tree falls it must lie.  Any attempt to obviate criticism, however just, by altering a work already in the hands of the public is generally unsuccessful.  In the most improbable fiction, the reader still desires some air of vraisemblance, and does not relish that the incidents of a tale familiar to him should be altered to suit the taste of critics, or the caprice of the Author himself.  This process of feeling is so natural, that it may be observed even in children, who cannot endure that a nursery story should be repeated to them differently from the manner in which it was first told.

But without altering, in the slightest degree, either the story or the mode of telling it, the Author has taken this opportunity to correct errors of the press and slips of the pen.  That such should exist cannot be wondered at, when it is considered that the Publishers found it their interest to hurry through the press a succession of the early editions of the various Novels, and that the Author had not the usual opportunity of revision.  It is hoped that the present edition will be found free from errors of that accidental kind.

The Author has also ventured to make some emendations of a different character, which, without being such apparent deviations from the original stories as to disturb the reader’s old associations, will, he thinks, add something to the spirit of the dialogue, narrative, or description.  These consist in occasional pruning where the language is redundant, compression where the style is loose, infusion of vigour where it is languid, the exchange of less forcible for more appropriate epithets—­slight alterations in short, like the last touches of an artist, which contribute to heighten and finish the picture, though an inexperienced eye can hardly detect in what they consist.