Soon after Lowell's death Charles Eliot Norton
wrote to Leslie Stephen: "I mean to publish, by and
by, a selection of his letters, strung on a brief thread of
Memoir"; -- and later he added, "I do not propose to
make a formal biography. I shall state such facts as are
necessary for giving the outline of the course of his
really uneventful life, -- uneventful, I mean, in the
external sense. . . . and then I shall endeavour to
illustrate his real life by his letters."

A similar purpose has controlled the editors of these
volumes. Norton's correspondence, from the beginning
to the end of his life, provides an abundant record
of his thought and action. The problem has been to
choose, from a supply exceeding the need, the passages
which shall most accurately and significantly illus-
trate his life. The editors have attempted the rôle less
of critics than of interpreters: much has been left to
Mr. Norton himself -- and to the reader.

Yet in a work of this nature -- composed chiefly of
letters -- there must needs be great omissions. Indi-
vidual habit in regard to the preservation of corre-
spondence plays an important part. The inclusion of
some names and the absence of others must throw the
image slightly out of focus. But in one case the ma-
terial exists, in another it does not: the circle of life as
it appears in letters is like a wheel from which spokes
are missing.

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