r man I have
ever known. Even in the lowest state of his fortune, his great and
necessary frugality never hindered him from exercising, upon proper
occasions, acts both of charity and generosity. It was a frugality
founded not upon avarice, but upon the love of independency. The
extreme gentleness of his nature never weakened either the firmness of
his mind, or the steadiness of his resolutions. His constant
pleasantry was the genuine effusion of good-nature and good-humour,
tempered with delicacy and modesty, and without even the slightest
tincture of malignity, so frequently the disagreeable source of what
is called wit in other men. It never was the meaning of his raillery
to mortify; and therefore, far from offending, it seldom failed to
please and delight even those who were the objects of it. To his
friends, who were frequently the objects of it, there was not perhaps
one of all his great and amiable qualities which contributed more to
endear his conversation. And that gaiety of temper, so agreeable in
society, but which is so often accompanied with frivolous and
superficial qualities, was in him certainly attended with the most
severe application, the most extensive learning, the greatest depth of
thought, and a capacity in every respect the most comprehensive. Upon
the whole, I have always considered him, both in his lifetime and
since his death, as approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly
wise and virtuous man as perhaps the nature of human frailty will
permit.

I ever am, dear Sir,

Most affectionately yours,

ADAM SMITH.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME I

CHAPTER I.

The Britons.--Romans.--Saxons.--The Heptarchy.--The Kingdom of Kent--
of Northumberland--of East Anglia--of Mercia--of Essex--of Sussex--of
Wessex

CHAPTER II.

Egbert.--Ethelwolf.--Ethelbald and Ethelbert.--Ethered.--Alfred the
Great.--Edward the Elder.--Athelstan.--Edmund.-Edred.--Edwy.--Edgar.--
Edward the Martyr

CHAPTER III.

Ethelred.--Settlement of the Normans.--Edmund Ironside.--Canute.--
Harold Harefoot.--Hardicanute.--Edward the Confessor.--Harold

APPENDIX I.

THE ANGLO-SAXON GOVERNMENT AND MANNERS.

First Saxon Government.--Succession of the Kings.--The Wittenagemot.--
The Aristocracy.--The several Orders of Men.--Courts of Justice.--
Criminal Law.--Rules of Proof.-Military Force.--Public Revenue.--Value
of Money.--Manners

CHAPTER IV.

WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR

Consequences of the Battle o