ΤΟ THE RIGHT HON. SIR FREDERICK POLLOCK, LORD CHIEF BARON, &c. &c. &c. MY DEAR FRIEND, I beg your acceptance of this tribute of respect to your public eminence and affection for your private virtues. The first I can only offer in common with the universal voice of your country; but the last I hope you will allow me to boast as a privilege and cherish as a happiness peculiarly my own. The knowledge of each other for more than half a century may have made me somewi at garrulous in speaking of our early times; but age has not altered nor abated the feelings of cordial esteem and regard which began in youth, were increased in middle life, and now warm my breast with grateful and kindliest emotions towards you and all who look up to and love you. If the most sincere attachment can justify a dedication, you are too upright a judge to reject the plea of My dear Friend, April 16th, 1852. Your's most faithfully, W. JERDAN. AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. CHAPTER I. BIOGRAPHY! INTRODUCTORY. For many a lad I knew is dead, And when I think upon the past My weary heart is cold.-CAPTAIN MORRIS. MEMOIRS OF SELF! The I substituted for the WE, during so many years my familiar and protective critical plural, is a change of more importance than I could have expected. in I have had, it is true, some practice and experience in biographical writing, and was well acquainted with the difficulties with which it was beset; but, until I took the pen hand for my autobiography, I had not the faintest conception of the embarrassments and obstacles which stood in the way of a satisfactory performance of the altered task. The consideration and reserve due to others, the candour and veracity due to the public, and the fairness and justice due to myself, formed a combination of elements not easily to be reconciled VOL. I. B |