PREPARER'S NOTE

This book was published in 1890 by Longmans, Green, and Co.,
London; and New York: 15 East 16th Street.

The epigrams in the book are given both in Greek and in English.
This text includes only the English. Where Greek is present in
short citations, it has been given here in transliterated form and
marked with brackets. A chapter of Notes on the translations has
also been omitted.



{eti pou proima leuxoia}
Meleager in /Anth. Pal./ iv. 1.

Dim now and soil'd,
Like the soil'd tissue of white violets
Left, freshly gather'd, on their native bank.
M. Arnold, /Sohrab and Rustum/.



PREFACE

The purpose of this book is to present a complete collection, subject
to certain definitions and exceptions which will be mentioned later,
of all the best extant Greek Epigrams. Although many epigrams not
given here have in different ways a special interest of their own,
none, it is hoped, have been excluded which are of the first