The Biography of the Book
and
Its Reviewers Reviewed.

[" It has occurred to me that perhaps it would be a good plan to
put a set of notes . . . to the ’Origin,’ which now has none,
exclusively devoted to the errors of my reviewers. It has
occurred to me that where a reviewer has erred a common reader
might err. Secondly, it will show the reader that we must not
trust implicitly to reviewers."—DARWIN’S LIFE. ii. 349.]

TO RICHARD FRANCIS BURTON.

The Thousand Nights and a Night.

Athwart the welkin slant the snows and pile
On sill and balcony, their feathery feet
Trip o’er the landscape, and pursuing sleet
Earth’s brow beglooming, robs the skies of smile:
Lies in her mourning-shroud our Northern Isle
And bitter winds in battle o’er her meet.
Her world is death-like, when behold! we greet
Light-gleams from morning-land in welcome while.

A light of golden mine and orient pearl—
Vistas of fairy-land, where Beauty reigns
And Valiance revels; cloudless moon, fierce sun,
The wold, the palm-tree; cities; hosts; a whirl
Of life in tents and palaces and fanes:
The light that streams from THOUSAND NIGHTS AND ONE.

Isabel Burton,
Tangier, Marocco: Feb. 19, 1886.