or the
trees, notes or interchapters have been inserted between the several
books, indicating the general lines of development followed by the great
literature which I have attempted to survey. To these I have for the
most part confined generalisations as distinct from facts.

I have, I believe, given in the notes a sufficient list of authorities
which those who desire to follow up the subject may consult. I have not
been indiscriminately lavish in indicating editions of authors, though I
believe that full information will be found as to those necessary for a
scholarly working knowledge of French literature. I had originally hoped
to illustrate the whole book with extracts; but I discovered that such a
course would either swell it to an undesirable bulk, or else would
provide passages too short and too few to be of much use. I have
therefore confined the extracts to the mediaeval period, which can be
illustrated by selections of moderate length, and in which such
illustration, from the general resemblance between the individuals of
each class, and the comparative rarity of the original texts, is
specially desirable. To avoid the serious drawback of the difference of
principle on which old French reprints have been constructed, as many of
these extracts as possible have been printed from Herr Karl Bartsch's
admirable _Chrestomathie_. But in cases where extracts were either not
to be found there, or were not, in my judgment, sufficiently
characteristic, I have departed from this plan. The illustration, by
extracts, of the later literature, which requires more space, has been
reserved for a separate volume.

I had also intended to subjoin some tabular views of the chief literary
forms, authors, and books of the successive centuries. But when I formed
this intention I was not aware that such tables already existed in a
book very likely to be in the hands of those who use this work, M.
Gustave Masson's _French Dictionary_. Although the plan I had formed was
not quite identical with his, and though the execution might have
differed in detail, it seemed both unnecessary and to a certain extent
ungracious to trespass on the same field. With regard to dates the Index
will, it is believed, be found to contain the date of the birth and
death, or, if these be not obtainable, the _floruit_ of every deceased
author of any importance who is mentioned in the book. It has not seemed
necessary invariably to duplicate this information in