Printed by Strahan and Spottiswoode, Printers-Street;

FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN,

PATERNOSTER-ROW.

PREFACE.

In the leading Poem of this Collection, the Author frankly acknowledges that he has so far failed, as to be under the necessity of sending it forth incomplete, or suppressing it altogether. Why he has not done the latter is of little importance to the Public, which will assuredly award him no more credit than his performance, taken as it is, can command; while the consequences of his temerity, or his misfortune, must remain wholly with himself.

The original plan was intended to embrace the most prominent events in the annals of