similarly employed can appreciate the sense of inadequate performance
with which we regard what we have accomplished. We claim for our work
that we have devoted to it twenty years of almost unremitting
assiduity; that we have neglected no means in our power to ascertain
the truth; that we have rejected no authentic facts essential to a
candid story; that we have had no theory to establish, no personal
grudge to gratify, no unavowed objects to subserve. We have aimed to
write a sufficiently full and absolutely honest history of a great man
and a great time; and although we take it for granted that we have
made mistakes, that we have fallen into such errors and inaccuracies
as are unavoidable in so large a work, we claim there is not a line in
all these volumes dictated by malice or unfairness.

Our desire to have this work placed under the eyes of the greatest
possible number of readers induced us to accept the generous offer of
"The Century Magazine" to print it first in that periodical. In this
way it received, as we expected, the intelligent criticism of a very
large number of readers, thoroughly informed in regard to the events
narrated, and we have derived the greatest advantage from the
suggestions and corrections which have been elicited during the serial
publication, which began in November, 1886, and closed early in 1890.
We beg, here, to make our sincere acknowledgments to the hundreds of
friendly critics who have furnished us with valuable information.

As "The Century" had already given, during several years, a
considerable portion of its pages to the elucidation and discussion of
the battles and campaigns of the civil war, it was the opinion of its
editor, in which we coincided, that it was not advisable to print in
the magazine the full narrative sketch of the war which we had
prepared. We omitted also a large number of chapters which, although