These lines will meet the eyes of some who will acknowledge their truth, and possibly if they like it may write and tell me so: some of my warmest friendships have originated in grateful letters of a similar character.
* * * * * It may also be worthy of mention that on this side of the Atlantic as well as on the other (see especially the case of N.P.

Willis) it has often been taken for granted that the author of "Proverbial Philosophy" has been dead for generations.

No doubt this is due both to the antique style of the book and to the retiring habits of its author: comparatively few of my readers know me by sight.

I could mention many proofs of this belief in my non-existence: here is one; a daughter of mine is asked lately by an eminent person if she is a descendant of the celebrated Elizabethan author?
and when that individual in passing round the room came near to the Professor, and was introduced to him as her father, the man could scarcely be brought to believe that his long-departed book friend was positively alive before him.

The Professor looked as if he had seen a ghost.
* * * * * Throughout this volume I wish my courteous readers to bear in mind that the writer excludes from it as much as possible the strictly private and personal element; it is intended to be mainly authorial or on matters therewith connected.