Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/14



prefatory words are needed for the Second Edition of the "History of Australia."

The Preface to the first is still a guide to the principle on which the History was framed, and which has been adhered to in the second edition. Condensation, excisions, and additions have been made; and criticisms on the first edition have, it may be hoped, contributed to the improvement of the second.

The statement of the Quarterly Review (April, 1885), that the History "must always be the standard authority on all points relating to the early history and growth of the Australian colonies," is a strong incentive to an author to strive to merit such praise.

There is one unpublished testimony from which a few lines may be quoted. Sir W. W. Burton, a Supreme Court Judge, often mentioned in the History, though blind when it was published, heard it read, and dictated a letter to the author, in which he congratulated his acquaintance of "more than forty years, on being the writer of two profound books, the historian of countries newly founded, whose uncertain origin you have explained, and in