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ENGLISH LITERATURE.

LONDON: PRINTED BY

SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE AND PARLIAMENT STREET

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PREFACE

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THE FOURTH EDITION.

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CONSIDERABLE additions have been made in the prior, or historical, portion of this work, particularly in the 'Norman Period.' Among these are:-A view of the legend of St. Graal, and of its incorporation in the cycle of Arthurian Romance (pp. 54-61); notices of Wireker and Richard of Bury; and a fuller account of the earliest English remains, in poetry and prose, such as the verses of St. Godric (p. 46), 'The Owl and the Nightingale' (p. 74), the rhythmic gospels of Ormin (p. 71), and the Ancren Riwle' (p. 75). In the chapter on the 'Early English Period,' a separate notice of Alliterative Poems (p. 81), from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century, has been introduced; and the review of Chaucer's works (pp. 88-122) has been re-cast and largely extended. In the following chapter the notices of Hawes, Lyndsay, Colet, and More have been enlarged, and new articles added on Warham, Tyndale, &c. In the chapter on the 'Elizabethan Period,' I have endeavoured to do more justice to the genius of Sidney (pp. 186 and 217), and have added more detailed notices (199-208) of Shakspere's various plays than had been given in former editions. In the

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