rdson's revisions; Cooke gives the introduction in its final
form, but one misses the full text which accompanied the book in its
heyday; and rarely are both Cooke and Shakespeare Head to be found in
the same library.

Richardson's complete introduction gains importance when we note that he
retained and revised it through seven of his eight editions of _Pamela_.
To see the text and follow Richardson's changes is to get an unusually
intimate view of his attitude toward his book, of his concessions and
tenacities, of Richardson the anonymous "editor" who could not keep the
author's laurels completely under his hat.

This present reprint, therefore, intends to give the fullest text of
Richardson's introduction, and to indicate his changes. The text is that
of the second edition, reproduced with permission of the Huntington
Library. Brackets, added to this lithoprint, show Richardson's principal
corrections: "4th" means that the bracketed lines were deleted in the
fourth and all subsequent editions; "4th, change 6" means that in the
fourth and subsequent editions the bracketed lines were changed to the
reading listed here as number six. Several changes within deleted
passages are discussed but not marked on the text.

Richardson's own editions of _Pamela_ appeared as follows: (1) November
6, 1740, (2) February 14, 1741, (3) March 12, 1741, (4) May 5, 1741,
(5) September 22, 1741, (6) May 10, 1742, (7) 1754, (8) October 28,
1761[1] (three months after Richardson's death). The first edition
prints Richardson's preface and two complimentary letters. To these the
"Introduction to this Second Edition" adds twenty-four pages of letters
and comment and the third edition makes no changes in the introduction
whatsoever, even retaining "this Second Edition,"[2] The fourth makes
some changes, and the fifth, considerably more. The sixth, a handsome
quarto in a row of duodecimos, abandons the introductory letters; the
seventh follows the fifth, and the eight makes some major cuts.

Notwithstanding Richardson's freedom in editing these letters -- and
Fielding's insinuation in _Shamela_ that they were Richardson's own copy
-- he wrote none of them. Jean Baptiste de Freval, a Frenchman living in
London, for whom Richardson was printing a book,[3] wrote the first. The
second probably came from William Webster, clergyman and editor of _The
Weekly Miscellany_, wherein the letter had appeared as an advertisement,
the first public reference