Page:Sir Walter Raleigh by Thoreau, Henry David,.djvu/24

 the most original of the noteworthy group of Concord (Massachusetts) thinkers should have remained unknown for nearly sixty years. This is a veritable treasure wherewith still further to enrich the bibliography of the publications of our Society.

It may be well here to remark that simultaneously with this volume the Society has issued Thoreau's Journey West, the entirely unpublished MS. notes of which were discovered among the author's Journals, and purchased by Mr. Bixby at the same time he acquired the Sir Walter Ralegh. We are therefore permitted to bring out, as companion pieces, first editions of the first inedited important manuscript written by Thoreau, and also this narrative of his Western journey, which preceded his death by only a few months. These two items will doubtless prove to be one of the most important literary "finds" of the season.

We are fortunate, moreover, in having a special Introduction to each of them prepared by Franklin Benjamin Sanborn, the greatest living authority on Thoreau, of whom he was a life-long friend and neighbor.