Project Gutenberg's The Forsyte Saga, Volume I., by John Galsworthy

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Title: The Forsyte Saga, Volume I.
The Man Of Property

Author: John Galsworthy

Release Date: June 14, 2006 [EBook #2559]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FORSYTE SAGA, VOLUME I. ***

Produced by David Widger

FORSYTE SAGA, VOLUME I.

THE MAN OF PROPERTY

By John Galsworthy

_[ED. NOTE: The spelling conforms to the original: "s's" instead of our
"z's"; and "c's" where we would have "s's"; and "...our" in colour
and flavour; many interesting double consonants; etc.]_

TO MY WIFE:

I DEDICATE THE FORSYTE SAGA IN ITS ENTIRETY,
BELIEVING IT TO BE OF ALL MY WORKS THE LEAST
UNWORTHY OF ONE WITHOUT WHOSE ENCOURAGEMENT,
SYMPATHY AND CRITICISM I COULD NEVER HAVE
BECOME EVEN SUCH A WRITER AS I AM.

PREFACE:

_"The Forsyte Saga" was the title originally destined for that part of it
which is called "The Man of Property"; and to adopt it for the collected
chronicles of the Forsyte family has indulged the Forsytean tenacity
that is in all of us. The word Saga might be objected to on the ground
that it connotes the heroic and that there is little heroism in these
pages. But it is used with a suitable irony; and, after all, this long
tale, though it may deal with folk in frock coats, furbelows, and a
gilt-edged period, is not devoid of the essential heat of conflict.
Discounting for the gigantic stature and blood-thirstiness of old days,
as they have come down to us in fairy-tale and legend, the folk of the
old Sagas were Forsytes, assuredly, in their possessive instincts, and
as little proof against the inroads of beauty and passion as Swithin,
Soames, or even Young Jolyon. And if heroic figures, in days that never
were, seem to startle out from their surroundings in fashion unbecoming
to a Forsyte of the Victorian era, we may be sure that tribal instinct
was even then the prime force, and that "family" and the sense of home
and property counted as they do to this day, for all the recent efforts
to "talk them out."

So many people have written and