THE reader of the Illustrations is requested to bear in mind the object with which they were originally written, and not expect to find in them a plan or order which can be discovered only with reference to the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold. They follow the progress of the Pilgrim, and were, indeed, as well as the notes now appended to the Canto, for the most part written whilst the noble author was yet employed in the composition of his poem. They were, with the exception of the three or four last articles, put into the hands of Lord Byron, much in the state in which they now appear; and the partiality of friendship assigned to them the same place which is occupied by the notes detached from them. But the writer, on his return to England, considered that the appendix to the Canto would thus be swelled to a disproportioned bulk, and that the numerous readers of the poetry would be better pleased if the choice, whether or not they were to be furnished with a volume of prose, were to be left altogether to themselves. Under this impression, such only of the notices as were more immediately connected with the text of the poem, were added to that work, and perhaps the writer may, even in the present instance, have to apologize for not being contented with less copious extracts. Some of the longer notices of this volume are, it will be seen, dissertations not at all requisite for the