INTRODUCTION.

In proposing to give an account of the Rise and Progress
of English Literature within the space of some three
hundred pages, it is desirable-in order to avoid mis-
conception, and perhaps in a measure to anticipate
certain not unreasonable objections to books of brief
compass-that the precise nature of the account here
intended should be clearly defined; and that both what
it includes and what it does not include should be
plainly set forth. And, first, as to what it does not in-
clude. Inviting as it might be to swell this Introduction
with promises, it must at the outset be admitted that
original research and a philosophic plan do not come
within its scheme. To trace the growth and develop-
ment of those great latent forces which have determined
the direction and the course of English Literature-to
recount its history,' and 'to seek in it for the psy-
chology of the people,' must be left to larger and more
ambitious works. In this it is simply designed to give
a concise and, as a rule, chronological record of the

principal English authors, noting the leading charac-

teristics of their productions, and, where necessary, the

prominent events of their lives. Its primary object is

to assist those whose time and opportunities are

restricted;—an object prescribing very definite limits.

But, within these limits, care has been taken to make

the dates and facts as accurate as possible, to verify all

statements from trustworthy sources, and, as far as is

consistent with its plan, to avert the charge of super-

ficiality. In other words, cursory though the work

must necessarily be in many respects, the compiler has

endeavoured, as far as it goes, to render it exact in

detail and particulars, and to make it, if possible,

better than the engagement of his title-page.

meane Argument,' writes Ascham in The Scholemaster,

'may easelie beare the light burden of a small faute,

and haue alwaise at hand a ready excuse for ill hand-

ling: And, some praise it is, if it so chaunce, to be

better in deede, than a man dare venture to seeme.'

'A

The Divisions or Chapters, in which the book is

arranged, are shown so clearly in the foregoing table of
Contents that it would be superfluous to repeat them
here. The reader is warned, however, that they are
not scientific, but conventional :-not adopted because
our national literature can, in the author's opinion, be
unalterably pigeon-holed in the compartments in ques-
tion; but because it has been found easier and more

convenient to class them in this manner. With a view to curtail mere lists of lesser names, a number of the least important have been consigned to a Dictionary Appendix ; and in illustration of those portions of the earlier chapters which deal with the formation of the language, a few Extracts are printed at the end of the volume. As exhibiting, even in an imperfect degree, the structure of English at different periods, these passages may not be without interest; but they can scarcely be regarded as typical samples of the literary quality of the works from which they are taken. For such, the student is referred to some of the professed collections of longer specimens, or, better still, to the authors themselves. A great writer,' it has been aptly said, 'does not reveal himself here and there, but everywhere.' To be studied to any good purpose, he can only be studied as a whole.

A HANDBOOK

OF

ENGLISH LITERATURE.

CHAPTER I.

FROM A.D. 600 TO THE NORMAN CONQUEST.

600-1066.

1. THE COMING OF THE ENGLISH.-2. THE OLD ENGLISH LANGUAGE, ITS DIA. LECTS AND VERSIFICATION.-3. THE EPIC POETRY.-4. THE INTRODUCTION OF CHRISTIANITY AND LEARNING.-5. RELIGIOUS POETRY.-6. LYRIC AND SHORTER POEMS.-7. THE PROSE WRITINGS.

1. The Coming of the English.-There is a strange appropriateness in the fact that the poem which perhaps contains the oldest verse of the wide-spread English race should be a record of wanderings. It bears the name of Widsiɣ—the Far-Journeyer. 'Always wandering with a hungry heart,' this old English scop, like Tennyson's Ulysses, could not 'rest from travel,' and in the bald lines of his verse he 'unlocks his word-hoard' to tell how he had

travelled through strange lands, and learnt Of good and evil in the spacious world,

Parted from home friends and his kindred dear.

These 'home friends' were those of the mainland, for the poem in its earliest portions goes back to the days when the English tribes dwelt on and near the Cimbrian peninsula. To this day between the Fiord of Flensborg and the river Slei in East Sleswig the little district of Angeln preserves the name of the Angles; northward were the Jutes, while to the south along the coast and

As to the conflicting views in regard to the date of Widst, see Stopford Brooke's History of Early English Literature, 1893, i. 323–326.

B