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The want of a short and easy introduction to the study of Icelandic has been felt for a long time—in fact, from the very beginning of that study in England. The Icelandic Reader, edited by Messrs. Vigfusson and Powell, in the Clarendon Press Series, is a most valuable book, which ought to be in the hands of every student; but it still leaves room for an elementary primer. As the engagements of the editors of the Reader would have made it impossible for them to undertake such a work for some years to come, they raised no objections to my proposal to undertake it myself. Meanwhile, I found the task was a more formidable one than I had anticipated, and accordingly, before definitely committing myself to it, I made one final attempt to induce Messrs. Vigfusson and Powell to take it off my hands; but they very kindly encouraged me to proceed with it; and as I myself thought that an Icelandic primer, on the lines of my Anglo-Saxon one, might perhaps be the means of inducing some students of Old English to take up Icelandic as well, 1 determined to go on.

In the spelling I have not thought it necessary to adhere strictly to that adopted in the Reader, for the editors have themselves deviated from it in their Corpus Poeticum Boreale, in the way of separating 'ǫ' from 'ö', etc. My own