INTRODUCTION TO THE
       PLANTATION EDITION


THE publication of a uniform edition gives
a writer by immemorial usage the opportunity
to address to the public an Introduction. That
the author of these works has this coveted op-
portunity would seem to him to be due to his
good fortune in selecting for his subject a phase
of life which held in itself a certain element of
interest: the old Plantation life of the South.
And if his work has any value, it is owing to his
having been fortunate enough to preserve in
some sort a picture of a civilization which, once
having sweetened the life of the South, has since
then well-nigh perished from the earth.
  Some protest has been made against the
writer's habit of picturing such old-fashioned
ladies and gentlemen as appear in his pages,
but inasmuch as they belonged to the life he has
endeavored to preserve, he is not responsible
                     vii