Page:Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home (Volume 1).djvu/13

x disqualifying influence of these circumstances will be comprehended without my opening the sanctuary of private griefs.

I was aware that our stayers-at-home had already something too much of churches, statues, and pictures, and yet that they cannot well imagine how much they make up the existence of tourists in the Old World. I have sedulously avoided this rock, and must trust for any little interest my book may possess to the honesty with which I have recorded my impressions, and to the fresh aspect of familiar things to the eye of a denizen of the New World. The fragmentary state in which my letters appear is owing to my fear of wearying readers less interested than my own family by prolonged details or prosing reflections, or disgusting them with the egotism of personal experience.

One word to my English reader, rather of explanation than apology, which I trust the case does not require. I have unscrupulously mentioned the name of such distinguished English people as it was my good fortune to see. I could have screened myself from reproach by giving merely their initials; but, as they are too well known for this device to