rounded, and there are
one or two matters of which I should like to unburden myself to the
reader. He will probably enquire why I have put the cart before the
horse, giving a sketch of the present condition of the country before
treating of its past history. The answer is that it was not originally
my intention to deal with the latter at any length; but when I came to
read and study the works which have appeared on the subject in French
and German (of which a tolerably full list is appended to this
treatise), so many topics of interest presented themselves for the
historical student that I determined to publish a connected history of
the country, however imperfect it might be, from the earliest times down
to the present day. And in this I was further encouraged by the fact
that the attempt has not yet been made in English, excepting in a very
perfunctory manner in Consul Wilkinson's work, published by Longmans in
1820, which is now quite out of date. That such a review of Roumanian
history, condensed as it necessarily is, was sure to be considered very
dry by many readers, seemed to be certain; I therefore placed it after
the description of the country as it exists to-day, and for those
readers the perusal of the last chapter of that part of the work,
dealing with the notabilities of the day, will probably suffice. But I
believe that some matters relating to the Roman conquest of Dacia, the
character and movements of the barbarians (of which I have prepared and
appended a tabular statement), the subsequent history of the country,
its struggles for freedom, and the condition of the inhabitants at
various periods, will be new to the general student of history and
sociology, and if my share has been badly done, it need not prevent him
from prosecuting enquiries, for which he will find ample materials in
the works of the continental writers to whom I have referred. As regards
the controverted questions of the descent of the modern Roumanians and
the foundation of the Principalities, I would direct his attention more
especially to the recent publications of Roesler and Pic, the first an
Austrian and the second a Slav writer, where he will find those subjects
fully and warmly debated.

The only other matter on which I desire to give an explanation is my
reason for not entering more minutely into what is called 'the Eastern
Question,' nor attempting, as other authors have done, to predict the
future relations of Roumania in re