N. COOKE, MILFORD HOUSE, STRAND,

[OFFICE OF THE "NATIONAL ILLUSTRATED LIBRARY,"]

AND ALL BOOKSELLERS.

1854.

210. d. 82.

I HAVE thought that a selection from Sir Walter Ralegh's great work, "The History of the World," would not prove unacceptable at the present day, and that there is room for another Life of that illustrious man. Of the many biographers of Sir Walter, a few have been, perhaps, indiscreetly panegyrical, whilst some, (Hume and Southey for instance), have attacked his fame with a virulence, for which an envy of his extraordinary abilities can alone account. I must not disguise it from myself, that my admiration of Ralegh may have led me to take a favourable view of his character upon some points on which others have put an ungenerous, or at least, an unwarranted construction; but I do not hesitate to say, that my high estimate of Sir Walter is founded upon a more intimate