IN undertaking to write a short history of English literature, it may be useful to place one's self, at the outset, in the position of a person to whom the subject is wholly new.

Every one possessed of any education cannot fail to be acquainted with a certain number of English books, and to know of the existence of many more; and also must often hear the names of English men or women, dead or alive, spoken of as having become distinguished through writing books. It is said, that, on the average, not fewer than two thousand distinct works, upon every conceivable subject, are published in this country every year. Now, this country in which we live has been inhabited by men more or less civilized, for at least thirty successive generations; and, although it is but of late years that our countrymen have taken to writing books at such a prodigious rate, it is obvious that the same causes which at the present day are continually adding to the number of English books must have

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been more or less at work for a very long time past; from which it follows that the entire stock of English books must be very large indeed. When we have arrived at this conclusion, various questions at once suggest themselves; such as, What proportion of all the English books that have been written since the English race settled in this island have been preserved. to our times? Are many of those that have survived worth preserving, or the contrary, and on what grounds? Were the old books written in the same sort of English that we now use? and, if not, what was the nature of the difference? These and many similar questions will naturally occur; and it is in order to furnish something like satisfactory answers, that the present work has been prepared.

The word "literature" is used in two principal senses, - to express the whole number of books that have been written in any language (thus we speak of the Greek, French, German, literatures, &c.); and also to signify the profession or pursuit of writing, as when we speak of a person addicting himself to literature. But the former of these two senses is much the more common; and it is the one which will be adhered to throughout the present work.

The English race first began to colonize this country about fourteen hundred years ago. Before that time, England was called Britain, and was inhabited by a people of Celtic origin, allied to the modern Welsh (and, more remotely, to the Irish), known as Britons. The language spoken by the Britons was quite different from English; and therefore, whatever books may have been written in that language, either before or after the arrival of the English race, they do not concern us, who are only inquiring into the history of English literature.

The first English who arrived on our shores called themselves Angles. They came from Schleswig-Holstein, that border-land between Denmark and Germany, which has been for centuries a bone of contention between the Dane and the German. But the language which they then spoke approached, on the whole, nearer to German than to Danish, though it exhibits points of resemblance to both. They were joined in their great colonizing enterprise by the Saxons, a people occupying both banks of the Elbe near its mouth, and by other German tribes. The language spoken by the Saxons seems to have agreed very closely with that spoken by the Angles, though it had probably fewer Danish peculiarities; and, in consequence of this close agreement, their common tongue has received the name of Anglo-Saxon. The Angles gave their name to the country, Angla or Engla-land, England.

In the course of about two hundred years from the date (A.D. 449) of their first arrival, these Angles and Saxons had established themselves in the greater part of England, and in the Lowlands of Scotland. Their language was spoken from the Orkneys to the Isle of Wight, and from Norwich to Dorchester. It may now be asked, Was this language like the English that we speak now? Did they write any books in it? And have these books been preserved ? These questions will be answered in the following section. SECTION 1.-ANGLO-SAXON LITERATURE (449–1066).

The language which our Angle and Saxon forefathers spoke was very different from ours; and the difference consisted principally in this: that a very large number of French and Latin words have, since their time, been added to the old stock, while many of their words have fallen into disuse. Another difference

is, that, while our grammar is very simple, theirs was very complicated. Consequently, however well acquainted we may be with English, we shall be able to make nothing of an Anglo-Saxon book without special study: at most we might recognize a familiar word or two here and there. This being the case, I do not intend to dwell upon this part of the subject; for, though we have got upon the English race, it is plain that we have not yet got to English literature. However, since what our forefathers thought and wrote can never be quite uninteresting to us, I shall give brief answers to the two other questions which I supposed to be asked, and also print, at the end of the section, a few lines from an Anglo-Saxon book, as a specimen of their language.

While they lived in Germany, and for the first hundred and fifty years after they landed in England, we do not know that the Angles and Saxons wrote any books: if they did, they have not come down to us. During all that time they were Pagans, worshipping Thor, Woden, and other imaginary deities, who were the objects of belief among the northern nations. But, about the year 600 after Christ, St. Augustine and other missionaries, who were sent from Rome by Pope Gregory the Great, commenced the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. At the same time that they taught them religion, these good men communicated to their disciples many other good and useful things; in particular, they instructed them in the use of the Roman alphabet, and taught them to read Greek and Latin books. How important this was will clearly appear, when we consider that, at that time, no literature existed in any other European language except these two. From reading and copying Greek and Latin books, the Anglo-Saxons soon advanced to writing

books in their own language. Of these books many have been preserved, and are now to be had in print. The great King Alfred is the author of many translations of Latin books, mostly histories, into Anglo-Saxon. The most interesting among these is his translation of "The Ecclesiastical History of the Venerable Bede," a work of the utmost value for the history of the AngloSaxon times. There is also a valuable book, called "The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle," which gives an account of most of the important events which happened in England, from the Christian era down to the year 1154: this book was put together by the monks of different monasteries. Of the poetry the greater portion is upon sacred subjects; but we have also a long and very curious poem called "Beowulf," in which are related the adventures and great deeds of northern warriors in Denmark and the south of Sweden. The rhythm of all the Anglo-Saxon poetry depended on what is called alliteration; the lines, arranged in couplets, were short, each containing two accents; and the general rule was, that two accented syllables in the first line of each couplet, and one accented syllable in the second line, should all begin with the same letter; e.g.,

Héofon to hrófe,
Hálig Scippend.

[Heaven for roof,
Holy Creator.]

The following extract is taken from "The AngloSaxon Chronicle;" it refers to the year 457:

Her Hengest and Esc his sunu gefuhton wið Bryttas, on bære stowe pe is gecweden Creccanford, and þær ofslogon feower pusenda wera. And a Bryttas pa forleton Cent-lond, and mid myclum ege flugon to Lunden-byrig.1

1 Note, that the character & represents the sound of th in this; and the character p, the sound of th in thin.