A PLUME OF FEATHERS AND AN ALMOND TREE ENCHANTED MUSIC SELECTIONS FROM MARLOWE, WITH CRITICAL NOTICE THE JEW OF MALTA'S IDEA OF WEALTH SELECTIONS FROM BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER, WITH CRITICAL NOTICE MELANCHOLY . A SATYR PRESENTS A BASKET OF FRUIT TO THE FAITHFUL . 143 145 SELECTIONS FROM MIDDLETON, DECKER, AND WEBSTER, WITH CRITICAL NOTICE FLIGHT OF WITCHES 158 PREFACE. THIS book is intended for all lovers of poetry and the sister arts, but more especially for those of the most poetical sort, and most especially for the youngest and the oldest: for as the former may incline to it for information's sake, the latter will perhaps not refuse it their good-will for the sake of old favorites. The Editor has often wished for such a book himself; and as nobody will make it for him, he has made it for others. It was suggested by the approbation which the readers of a periodical work bestowed on some extracts from the poets, commented, and marked with italics, on a principle of co-perusal, as though the Editor were reading the passages in their company. Those readers wished to have more such extracts; and here, if they are still in the mind, they now possess them. The remarks on one of the poems that formed a portion of the extracts (the Eve of Saint Agnes), are repeated in the present volume. All the rest of the matter contributed by him is new. He does not expect, of course, that every reader will agree with the preferences of particular lines or passages, intimated by the italics. Some will think them too numerous; sc me perhaps too few; many who chance to take up the book, may wish there had been none at all; but these will have |