PREFACE. The following pages have been compiled-scarcely composed-by me with the object of gaining, and possibly of imparting a more thorough knowledge and appreciation of the beautiful Poem with which they deal. Teaching and learning are so closely involved in each other, that I determined to adopt this method. If in my effort to learn, I shall have succeeded in teaching, this small attempt will not have been made in vain. Though it is destined to find its way into the hands of a very few friends only, it needs a word of explanation. I have endeavoured to tell the story of the Poem in the words of the Poet himself, adding only such sont |