erusino, and other works which are current among the public, and
perhaps without the author's name. He is commonly called MIGUEL DE
CERVANTES SAAVEDRA. He was for many years a soldier, and for five years
and a half in captivity, where he learned to have patience in adversity.
He lost his left hand by a musket-shot in the battle of Lepanto: and
ugly as this wound may appear, he regards it as beautiful, having
received it on the most memorable and sublime occasion which past times
have over seen, or future times can hope to equal, fighting under the
victorious banners of the son of that thunderbolt of war, Charles V., of
blessed memory." Should the friend of whom I complain have had nothing
more to say of me than this, I would myself have composed a couple of
dozen of eulogiums, and communicated them to him in secret, thereby to
extend my fame and exalt the credit of my genius; for it would be absurd
to expect the exact truth in such matters. We know well that neither
praise nor abuse is meted out with strict accuracy.

However, since this opportunity is lost, and I am left in the lurch
without a portrait, I must have recourse to my own tongue, which, for
all its stammering, may do well enough to state some truths that are
tolerably self-evident. I assure you then, dear reader, that you can by
no means make a fricassee of these tales which I here present to you,
for they have neither legs, head, bowels, nor anything of the sort; I
mean that the amorous intrigues you will find in some of them, are so
decorous, so measured, and so conformable to reason and Christian
propriety, that they are incapable of exciting any impure thoughts in
him who reads them with or without caution.

I have called them _exemplary_, because if you rightly consider them,
there is not one of them from which you may not draw some useful
example; and were I not afraid of being too prolix, I might show you
what savoury and wholesome fruit might be extracted from them,
collectively and severally.

My intention has been to set up, in the midst of our community, a
billiard-table, at which every one may amuse himself without hurt to
body and soul; for innocent recreations do good rather than harm. One
cannot be always at church, or always saying one's prayers, or always
engaged in one's business, however important it may be; there are hours
for recreation when the wearied mind should take repose. It is to this
end that alleys of trees are planted to wal