ht be made up by the intimate acquaintance with the subject
which I could lay claim to possess, as having travelled through most
parts of Scotland, both Highland and Lowland, having been familiar with
the elder as well as more modern race, and having had from my infancy
free and unrestrained communication with all ranks of my countrymen, from
the Scottish peer to the Scottish plough-man. Such ideas often occurred
to me, and constituted an ambitious branch of my theory, however far
short I may have fallen of it in practice.

But it was not only the triumphs of Miss Edgeworth which worked in me
emulation, and disturbed my indolence. I chanced actually to engage in a
work which formed a sort of essay piece, and gave me hope that I might in
time become free of the craft of romance-writing, and be esteemed a
tolerable workman.

In the year 1807-08 I undertook, at the request of John Murray, Esq., of
Albemarle Street, to arrange for publication some posthumous productions
of the late Mr. Joseph Strutt, distinguished as an artist and an
antiquary, amongst which was an unfinished romance, entitled Queenhoo
Hall. The scene of the tale was laid in the reign of Henry VI, and the
work was written to illustrate the manners, customs, and language of the
people of England during that period. The extensive acquaintance which
Mr. Strutt had acquired with such subjects in compiling his laborious
Horda Angel-Cynnan, his Regal and Ecclesiastical Antiquities, and his
Essay on the Sports and Pastimes of the People of England had rendered
him familiar with all the antiquarian lore necessary for the purpose of
composing the projected romance; and although the manuscript bore the
marks of hurry and incoherence natural to the first rough draught of the
author, it evinced (in my opinion) considerable powers of imagination.

As the work was unfinished, I deemed it my duty, as editor, to supply
such a hasty and inartificial conclusion as could be shaped out from the
story, of which Mr. Strutt had laid the foundation. This concluding
chapter [Footnote: See Appendix No. II.] is also added to the present
Introduction, for the reason already mentioned regarding the preceding
fragment. It was a step in my advance towards romantic composition; and
to preserve the traces of these is in a great measure the object of this
Essay.

Queenhoo Hall was not, however, very successful. I thought I was aware of
the reason, and supposed that, by rendering his lang