nrich the edition."]

[Footnote 163: Editor's Preface.]

[Footnote 164: _Dryden_, Vol. IX, p. 226.]

[Footnote 165: _Ibid._, Vol. IX, p. 2.]

[Footnote 166: In this connection Scott's review of Todd's edition of
Spenser is interesting. He takes exception to the lack of an
appearance of continuity in the biography, caused by the long
quotations included in the body of the narrative; and censures the
editor for not having used the history of Italian poetry in
elucidating Spenser's work. (_Edinburgh Review_, October, 1805.)]

[Footnote 167: Review of Todd's _Spenser_.]

[Footnote 168: _Dryden_, Vol. I, p. 6.]

[Footnote 169: _Familiar Letters_, Vol. I, p. 229; and _Dryden_, Vol.
I, p. 6.]

[Footnote 170: _Dryden_, Vol. I, pp. 402-3.]

[Footnote 171: _Dryden_, Vol. I, p. 403.]

[Footnote 172: _Ibid._, p. 404. Mr. Saintsbury thinks that Scott's
prefatory introductions to the plays are often "both meagre and
depreciatory"; also that Scott's judgment on Dryden's letters is
rather harsh, for him, and that after he had begun to write novels he
would not have been so impatient of remarks on "turkeys,
marrow-puddings, and bacon."]

[Footnote 173: _Ibid._, Vol. I, p. 405.]

[Footnote 174: _Ibid._, Vol. X, p. 307 ff.]

[Footnote 175: _Ibid._, Vol. XIV, pp. 136 and 146.]

[Footnote 176: _Ibid._, Vol. I, p. 405.]

[Footnote 177: In order to give a more specific view of Scott's
methods, two or three of the introductions to well-known poems may be
briefly analysed. The introduction to _Absalom and Achitophel_
occupies 111/2 pages, of which about 21/2 are given to quotation from a
tract which Scott thought furnished the argument to Dryden, and which
was unnoticed by any former commentator. Scott's remarks follow this
outline: Position of the poem in literature, and history of its
composition; origin of the particular allegory as applied to modern
politics; a parallel use of the allegory (with a quotation from
_Somers' Tracts_ in illustrations); aptness of the allegory; merits of
the satire--treatment of Monmouth and other main characters; changes
in the second edition to mitigate the satire; characterization of the
poem as having few flights of imagination but much correctness of
taste as well as fire and spirit; other objections by Johnson refuted;
success of the poem; history of the first publication and of the
replies and congratulator