admiration and delight with which it was received
will no longer surprise.

One circumstance more respecting a work so important by the quantity of
historical knowledge which it diffused among the mass of readers, and
the influence which it exerted over the public mind during half a
century, deserves to be here adverted to. Baldwyne and his
fellow-laborers began their series from the Norman conquest, and the
same starting-point had been judiciously chosen by Sackville; but the
fabulous history of Geffrey of Monmouth still found such powerful
advocates in national vanity, ignorance and credulity, that succeeding
editors found it convenient to embellish their work with moral examples
drawn from his fictitious series of British kings before the invasion of
the Romans. Accordingly they have brought forward a long line of
worthies, beginning with king Albanact, son of Brute the Trojan, and
ending with Cadwallader the last king of the Britons, scarcely one of
whom, excepting the renowned prince Arthur, is known even by name to the
present race of students in English history; though amongst poetical
readers, the immortal verse of Spenser preserves some recollection that
such characters once were fabled. In return for this superfluity, our
Saxon line of kings is passed over with very little notice, only three
legends, and those of very obscure personages, being interposed between
Cadwallader and king Harold. The descent of the royal race of Britain
from the Trojans was at this period more than an article of poetical
faith; it was maintained, or rather taken for granted, by the gravest
and most learned writers. One Kelston, who dedicated a versified
chronicle of the Brutes to Edward VI., went further still, and traced up
the pedigree of his majesty through two-and-thirty generations, to
Osiris king of Egypt. Troynovant, the name said to have been given to
London by Brute its founder, was frequently employed in verse. A song
addressed to Elizabeth entitles her the "beauteous queen of second
Troy;" and in describing the pageants which celebrated her entrance into
the provincial capitals which she visited in her progresses, it will
frequently be necessary to introduce to the reader personages of the
ancient race of this fabled conqueror of our island, who claimed for
his direct ancestor,--but whether in the third or fourth degree authors
differ,--no less a hero than the pious AEneas himself.

But to return to the personal circumst