umorous phases of social existence
which, as in the best of artificial tragedies, are permitted to appear
in real life as the foil of that which is truly sorrowful. To depict
events that are simply amusing may not be the highest and best
function of a writer; but if he has a strong impulse to undertake
such a task in the intervals of more serious work, it may be that he
performs a duty which is more obvious because the common inclination
of those who tell the story of human life is to present that which is
sad and terrible, and to lead-the reader, whose soul has bitterness
enough of its own, into contemplation of the true or fictitious
anguish of others.

At any rate, an attempt to show men and their actions in a purely
humorous aspect is justified by the facts of human life; and if
fiction is, for the most part, tragedy, there is reason why much of
the remainder should be devoted to fun. To laugh is to perform as
divine a function as to weep. Man, who was made only a little lower
than the angels, is the only animal to whom laughter is permitted.
He is the sole earthly heir of immortality, and he laughs. More than
this, the process is healthful to both mind and body, for it is the
man who laughs with reason and judgment who is the kindly, pure,
cheerful and happy man.

It is in a village wherein there is elbow-room for the physical and
intellectual man that the characters in this book may be supposed to
be, to do and to suffer. It would be unfair to say that the reader can
visit the spot and meet face to face all these people who appear in
the incidents herein recorded, and it would be equally improper to
assert that there is naught written of them but veritable history. But
it might perhaps be urged that the individuals exist in less decided
and grotesque forms, and that the words and deeds attributed to them
are less than wholly improbable. And if any one shall consider it
worth while to inquire further concerning the matter, let him discover
where may be found a community which exists in such a locality as this
that I will now describe.

A hamlet set upon a hillside. The top a breezy elevation crowned
with foliage and commanding a view of matchless beauty. To the west,
beneath, a sea of verdure rolling away in mighty billows, which here
bear upon their crests a tiny wood, a diminutive dwelling, a flock of
sheep or a drove of cattle, and there sweep apparently almost over a
shadowy town which nestles between two o