certain amount of sea-room. One does not get one's sea legs, so to speak, till a sheet or two of print has been let loose. Hence I have not been able to include more than four or five voyages in the present volume but they will surely serve as Winter Nights' Tales. They should be read when the stormy winds do blow, do blow.
The story of The Argonauts had been told so well by Kingsley that I dared not commit the sacrilege of producing a rival version. I have to thank Messrs. Macmillan for permitting me to utilise his "Heroes." Mr. Alfred Nutt with his usual kindness has provided me with a version of Maelduin, in which he has had permission from Dr. Whitley Stokes to use his translation which appeared in the Revue Celtique. Hasan I have retold in an abridged form, using as my "originals" the three translations from the Arabic, none of which were sufficiently simple to suit the audience for whom I intended his Adventures. For my Icelandic I have had to resort to the friendly offices of the Rev. J. Sephton, who has been good enough to translate the Eric Saga for this volume, while I have combined with it an adaptation of Thorkill's "Voyage to the World Beyond the Ocean," from Saxo Grammaticus, utilising for that purpose Mr. Elton's version published by the Folk-Lore Society. To all these gentlemen I hereby record my grateful thanks.
As the world grows old and grey, and men become everywhere alike, the value of the imagination for ornament and for delight will become more and more
