Page:A political romance (IA politicalromance00sterrich).pdf/13

 brary of the Dean and Chapter of York, where it was uncovered in September, 1905. A few weeks later another copy was found in a volume of pamphlets at the York Subscription Library. Still another copy, bound with other tracts, was discovered the next year in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge. So far as it is known, no other copies are extant. In none of the three cases was the librarian aware that he had in his possession an anonymous jeu d' esprit by Laurence Sterne.

Our reprint is from a beautiful transcript of the Hailstone volume made by Miss Elizabeth Hastings of London. She followed the text line by line and page by page, and the present edition reproduces so accurately the typography and the paging of the original that no bibliographical description is needed here. By comparing the reprint with the usual text of the Romance, the reader may see how ruthlessly Murdoch mutilated Sterne. To be brief, he "corrected" the humorist's English, substituting "elegant" phrases for quaint and homely idioms, and cut away the entire Key and two long letters that go with it.—"Alas! Poor Yorick!"

To understand Sterne's humorous pamphlet, one must have in mind the circumstances in which it was written; otherwise nothing can be made of it. After graduating from Jesus Col-