OR, THE FREEMASON. A SPANISH TALE. 、 BY THE AUTHOR OF "DON ESTEBAN.” IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: HENRY COLBURN, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. PREFACE. 1 THE author of the following tale, encouraged by the favourable manner in which his previous work, DON ESTEBAN, has been received, ventures a second time to appear before the public, and again to claim its indulgence. The garb which he has in the present instance assumed would, doubtless, entitle him to a still greater degree of favour, if he could but flatter himself, that the diligence with which he has laboured had enabled him to wear it with advantage. In glancing, however, over the difficulties against which he has had to struggle in the course of his work, he can hardly hope that he has so far succeeded in his object, as not to stand in need of some sort of apology. M513891 In the first instance, the task of writing in a language foreign to him, and in which he has not yet had sufficient practice to enable him to exhibit the correctness of style, elegant turn of expression, and strictness of colloquial idiom, which are necessary to do justice to the variety of subjects his work embraces,-this task is at all times sufficiently arduous even to greater proficients in the language than the Author.* A second great obstacle which he had to surmount, arose from the obligation which, from the beginning, he imposed upon himself, to relate throughout nothing but facts, whether they had reference to political events, the * In his former work a similar apology was offered to the public, the author considering himself in need of a similar indulgence; but some of the critics did him the. honour to disbelieve his assertion, and even treat it as "uncandid," under the impression, that it was either a translation by an English hand, or written originally in English by a native. However flattering to his vanity may be the opinion formed by those gentlemen, the author begs that he may be allowed to rectify it, and to assure them, that Don Esteban, as well as the present work, was originally written in English by himself. domestic incidents recorded in his book, or the public or private characters introduced; of course, however, presuming to use his own discretion in the plan of his story. This he has done with the view of presenting a more faithful picture of Spanish manners, and Spanish habits ; but it has considerably increased the difficulties which his inexperience in novel-writing already opposed to him. It will be readily allowed, that it is no easy matter, without infringing on the established principles of novel-writing, to carry on faithfully, and in chronological order, through a period of six busy years, the history of the Secret Association to which the hero of the tale belonged,to make several public individuals actors on a scene, where, nevertheless, they speak no more than what they have actually uttered,—to preserve the localities,-give characteristic sketches of provincial habits and scenery, — and interweave with the whole, the private adventures of an individual. He would fain have accomplished this difficulty; but he cannot, nor, if he |