prehensive conceptions of the whole, rather than complete views of any single part.
In the last division of the work, I have entered upon dangerous ground. Party feelings are still active in relation to many of the movements and many of the men described in my later chapters. It is vain to hope that the views which I have taken will be every where acceptable. But I can conscientiously say that I have written of the latest, as of the earliest occurrences, without a sensation of partisanship, or of devotion to any cause less universal than the cause of truth.
The character of the publication not admitting frequent notes or large citations, it is right for me to state that, while, I have principally relied upon original authorities, I have also followed later writers to a considerable degree. To some works - Irving's Columbus, O'Callaghan's and Brodhead's Histories of New York under the Dutch, Sparks's Appendixes to the Writings of Washington, Lossing's Field Book of the Revolution, Duyckinck's Cyclopædia of American Literature, and Hildreth's History of the United States-I am under obligations which duty and inclination alike compel me to acknowledge.