rved intact, save that where errors have obviously been
typographical, and not intended by the author, the editor has
corrected them--perhaps in a dozen instances only, for the original
proof-reading appears to have been rather carefully done. The
pagination of the original edition has in this been indicated by
brackets, as [54]. In the original, the publisher's "Advertisement"
and the "Table of Contents" were bound in at the end of the work,--see
collation in Field's _Indian Bibliography_,--but evidently this was a
make-shift of rustic binders in a hurry to get out the long-delayed
edition, and the editor has taken the liberty to transfer them to
their proper place; also, while preserving typographical peculiarities
therein, to change the pagination in the "Contents" to accord with the
present edition. In order clearly to indicate the authorship of notes,
those by Withers himself are unsigned; those by Dr. Draper are signed
"L. C. D."; and those by the present writer, "R. G. T."

REUBEN GOLD THWAITES.

Madison, Wis.,
February, 1895.

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

BY LYMAN COPELAND DRAPER.

In 1831, an interesting volume appeared from the press of Joseph
Israel, of Clarksburg, in North Western Virginia, prepared by
Alexander Scott Withers, on the border wars of the West. It was well
received at the time of its publication, when works on that subject
were few, and read with avidity by the surviving remnant of the
participators in the times and events so graphically described, and by
their worthy descendants.

Historians and antiquarians also received it cordially, universally
according it high praise. Mann Butler, the faithful historian of
Kentucky, declared that it was "a work to which the public was deeply
indebted," composed, as it was, with "so much care and interest." The
late Samuel G. Drake, the especial historian of the Red Man,
pronounced it "a work written with candor and judgment." The late
Thomas W. Field, the discriminating writer on _Indian Bibliography_,
says: "Of this scarce book, very few copies are complete or in good
condition. Having been issued in a remote corner of North-Western
Virginia, and designed principally for a local circulation, almost
every copy was read by a country fireside until scarcely legible. Most
of the copies lack the table of contents. The author took much pains
to be authentic, and his chronicles are considered by Wes