Byron, how he "strikes" them; but unless we are
ourselves saturated with his thought and style, unless we learn to
breathe his atmosphere by reading the books which he read, picturing to
ourselves the scenes which he saw,--unless we aspire to his ideals and
suffer his limitations, we are in no way entitled to judge his poems,
whether they be good or bad.

Byron's metrical "Tales" come before us in the guise of light reading,
and may be "easily criticized" as melo-dramatic--the heroines
conventional puppets, the heroes reduplicated reflections of the
author's personality, the Oriental "properties" loosely arranged, and
somewhat stage-worn. A thorough and sympathetic study of these once
extravagantly lauded and now belittled poems will not, perhaps, reverse
the deliberate judgment of later generations, but it will display them
for what they are, bold and rapid and yet exact presentations of the
"gorgeous East," vivid and fresh from the hand of the great artist who
conceived them out of the abundance of memory and observation, and
wrought them into shape with the "pen of a ready writer." They will be
once more recognized as works of genius, an integral portion of our
literary inheritance, which has its proper value, and will repay a more
assiduous and a finer husbandry.

I have once more to acknowledge the generous assistance of the officials
of the British Museum, and, more especially, of Mr. A. G. Ellis, of the
Oriental Printed Books and MSS. Department, who has afforded me
invaluable instruction in the compilation of the notes to the _Giaour_
and _Bride of Abydos_.

I have also to thank Mr. R. L. Binyon, of the Department of Prints and
Drawings, for advice and assistance in the selection of illustrations.

I desire to express my cordial thanks to the Registrar of the Copyright
Office, Stationers' Hall; to Professor Jannaris, of the University of
St. Andrews; to Miss E. Dawes, M.A., D.L., of Heathfield Lodge,
Weybridge; to my cousin, Miss Edith Coleridge, of Goodrest, Torquay; and
to my friend, Mr. Frank E. Taylor, of Chertsey, for information kindly
supplied during the progress of the work.

For many of the "parallel passages" from the works of other poets, which
are to be found in the notes, I am indebted to a series of articles by
A. A. Watts, in the _Literary Gazette,_ February and March, 1821; and to
the notes to the late Professor E. Kolbing's _Siege of Corinth._

On behalf of the publisher, I beg to acknowl