meanness, indeed only enough to make him partaker of the
imperfection of humanity, instead of the perfection of diabolism,
we have ventured to call him THE GREAT; nor do we doubt but our
reader, when he hath perused his story, will concur with us in
allowing him that title.




CHAPTER TWO

GIVING AN ACCOUNT OF AS MANY OF OUR HERO'S ANCESTORS AS CAN BE
GATHERED OUT OF THE RUBBISH OF ANTIQUITY, WHICH HATH BEEN
CAREFULLY SIFTED FOR THAT PURPOSE.


It is the custom of all biographers, at their entrance into their
work, to step a little backwards (as far, indeed, generally as
they are able) and to trace up their hero, as the ancients did the
river Nile, till an incapacity of proceeding higher puts an end to
their search.

What first gave rise to this method is somewhat difficult to
determine. Sometimes I have thought that the hero's ancestors have
been introduced as foils to himself. Again, I have imagined it
might be to obviate a suspicion that such extraordinary personages
were not produced in the ordinary course of nature, and may have
proceeded from the author's fear that, if we were not told who
their fathers were, they might be in danger, like prince
Prettyman, of being supposed to have had none. Lastly, and perhaps