_Entirely rewritten by the ablest writers an every subject. Printed
from new type, and illustrated with Several Thousand Engravings and
Maps._
The work originally published under the title of THE NEW AMERICAN
CYCLOPAEDIA was completed in 1863, since which time the wide
circulation which it has attained in all parts of the United States,
and the signal developments which have taken place in every branch of
science, literature, and art, have induced the editors and publishers
to submit it to an exact and thorough revision, and to issue a new
edition entitled THE AMERICAN CYCLOPAEDIA.
Within the last ten years the progress of discovery in every
department of knowledge has made a new work of reference an imperative
want.
The movement of political affairs has kept pace with the discoveries
of science, and their fruitful application to the industrial and
useful arts and the convenience and refinement of social life. Great
wars and consequent revolutions have occurred, involving national
changes of peculiar moment. The civil war of our own country, which
was at its height when the last volume of the old work appeared, has
happily been ended, and a new course of commercial and industrial
activity has been commenced.
Large accessions to our geographical knowledge have been made by the
indefatigable explorers of Africa.
The great political revolutions of the last decade, with the natural
result of the lapse of time, have brought into public view a multitude
of new men, whose names are in every one's mouth, and of whose lives
every one is curious to know the particulars. Great battles have been
fought, and important sieges maintained, of which the details are as
yet preserved only in the newspapers, or in the transient publications
of the day, but which ought now to take their place in permanent and
authentic history.
In preparing the present edition for the press, it has accordingly
been the aim of the editors to bring down the information to the
latest possible dates, an to furnish an accurate account of the most
recent discoveries in science, of every fresh production in
literature, and the newest inventions in the practical arts, as well
as to give a succinct and original record of the progress of political
and historical events.
The work has been begun after long and careful preliminary labor, and
with the most ample resources for carrying it on to a successful
termination.
None of the original stereotype plates have been used, but every page
has been printed on new type, forming in fact a new Cyclopaedia, with
the same plan and compass as its predecessor, but with a far greater
pecuniary expenditure, and with such improvements in its composition
as have been suggested by longer experience and enlarged knowledge.
The illustrations, which are introduced for the first time in the
present edition, have been added not for the sake of pictorial effect,
but to give greater lucidity and force to the explanations in the
text. They embrace all branches of science and of natural history, and
depict the most famous and remarkable features of scenery,
architecture, and art, as well as the various processes of mechanics
and manufactures. Although intended for instruction rather than
embellishment, no pains have been spared to insure their artistic
excellence; the cost of their execution is enormous, and it is
believed that they will find a welcome reception as an admirable
feature of the Cyclopaedia, and worthy of its high character.
This work is sold to subscribers only, payable on delivery of each
volume. It is now completed in sixteen large octavo volumes, each
containing over 800 pages, fully illustrated with several thousand
Wood Engravings, and with numerous colored Lithographic Maps.