those passages where I had misapprehended or failed to express the
author's meaning, and to incorporate in the English work various
additions and corrections which do not appear in the original.

"In executing the translation I have endeavoured to follow the original
as closely as is consistent with a due regard to the difference of
idiom. Many of our translations from the German are so literal as
to reproduce the very order of the German sentence, so that they
are, if not altogether unintelligible to the English reader, at
least far from readable, while others deviate so entirely from the
form of the original as to be no longer translations in the proper
sense of the term. I have sought to pursue a middle course between
a mere literal translation, which would be repulsive, and a loose
paraphrase, which would be in the case of such a work peculiarly
unsatisfactory. Those who are most conversant with the difficulties
of such a task will probably be the most willing to show forbearance
towards the shortcomings of my performance, and in particular towards
the too numerous traces of the German idiom, which, on glancing
over the sheets, I find it still to retain.

"The reader may perhaps be startled by the occurrence now and then
of modes of expression more familiar and colloquial than is usually
the case in historical works. This, however, is a characteristic
feature of the original, to which in fact it owes not a little
of its charm. Dr. Mommsen often uses expressions that are not
to be found in the dictionary, and he freely takes advantage of
the unlimited facilities afforded by the German language for the
coinage or the combination of words. I have not unfrequently, in
deference to his wishes, used such combinations as 'Carthagino-Sicilian,'
'Romano-Hellenic,' although less congenial to our English idiom,