Since it has been suggested that I ought not to suffer several glaring,
though (as I think) unimportant, errors to pass unnoticed, as if I were
not aware of them, I mention the most conspicuous. The Author says the
Royal Exchange was built by Charles II.; that the piece of water at
Blenheim covers eight hundred acres, whereas I am told it covers only
two hundred and fifty;--he calls the great Warwick Beauchamp, and not
Neville:--alluding to Sir Walter Scott's 'Kenilworth,' he calls Varney,
Vernon; and he lays the scene of Varney's murder of his wife at
Kenilworth, instead of at Cumnor.--There may be more such mistakes for
aught I know. Such are to be found in every account of a foreign country
I have ever seen, with the exception of some two or three works of
faultless correctness and veracity, which nobody reads. Of these Carsten
Niebuhr's may be taken as a representative. Whoever has had the good
fortune to see a work on Germany, which was considerably accredited
here, commented with marginal notes by an intelligent and veracious
German, may have had a fair opportunity of comparing the sum of
misstatements between the two countries. Of our 'natural enemies' I say
nothing, nor of our irritable child, whom so much has been done to
irritate, across the Atlantic. Of Italian travellers, Eustace is given
up as nearly a romance-writer; Englishmen believe Forsyth to be
extremely correct, but instructed Italians point out errors grosser than
any of those here noticed. After all, errors of the kind are (except to
tourists) comparatively unimportant, when they relate to countries which
are not explored with a view to science, but merely for the purpose of
giving the general aspect, moral and physical, of the country. Whoever
succeeds in doing that with anything like fairness, may be regarded as
having effected as much as the extreme difficulty of obtaining accurate
information, even on the spot, will admit; and, in a work like the
present, which makes no pretension to any higher character than that of
chit-chat letters to an intimate friend, will have accomplished all that
it is fair to look for.
It has also been suggested that I ought to have given the names of the
persons alluded to at length, instead of merely copying the initials
given in the original. To this I can only reply, that had I the
inclination, I am totally without the power. I know nothing of any of
the persons or incidents recorded; nor have I any means, which are not
equally at the command of all my readers, of guessing to whom the Author
alludes in any case. Inquiries of the kind are as foreign to my tastes
and pursuits as the society in question is from my station in life. I
have regarded these incidents solely in the light of illustrations of
national manners; and the applying them to individuals is a matter in
which I should take not the slightest interest. But since it is obvious
that this is not the common taste, I have rather thought to obscure than
to elucidate those parts of the book which are objectionably personal.
If I could have done this still more, without entirely changing the
character of the work, I should have done it. But by any such material
change I should have made myself, in some sort, responsible for its
contents: which, as a mere translator, I can in no way be held to be.
Whenever I find that the English public are likely to receive, with any
degree of favour, such a German work as it would be my greatest pride
and pleasure to render into my native tongue to the best of my ability,
I shall be too happy to share with the illustrious and humanizing poets
and philosophers of Germany any censure, as I should feel it the highest
honour to partake in the minutest portion of their glory.
* * * * *
Hitherto I have found no encouragement to hope that any such work as I
should care to identify myself with, would find readers.
* * * * *
The Reviews and other Journals (which, for the most part, have been
divided between excessive praise, and censure equally excessive, of this
slight but clever work) have, of course, not been sparing in allusions
to the personal character of the Author. Of that, and of all that
concerns his residence here, I am utterly ignorant. When I projected the
translation of the book, I believed it to be, what the title announces,
_The Letters of a deceased Person_. All that I now know of the Author's
personal history while in England, (if information from such sources may
be called knowledge,) is gained from the writings of his reviewers.
Whether their representations be true or false, I have not the slightest
interest in discussing. Even if every several anecdote related by him
were a lie, it would remain to be considered, whether or not his remarks
on England and English society tallied in the main with those of other
instructed foreigners, and with those of the more impartial and
enlightened portion of Englishmen.