FORMING A COMPLETE HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN AND PROGRESS OF NAVIGATION, DISCOVERY, AND COMMERCE, BY SEA AND LAND, FROM THE EARLIEST AGES TO THE PRESENT TIME.
LATE COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF HIS MAJESTY'S NAVAL FORCES ON THE LEEWARD ISLAND STATION,
GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF THE ISLAND OF GUADALOUPE, &C. &C. &C.
Unused to the adulatory language of dedications, I am well aware that any such mode of address would offend your delicacy. While, therefore, I gratify my own feelings by inscribing this work with your valued name, I only use the freedom to assure your Excellency, that I have the honour to be, with the warmest sentiments of respectful esteem and sincere regard,
Your affectionate friend, and gratefully devoted servant,
In this enlightened age, when every department of science and literature is making rapid progress, and knowledge of every kind excites uncommon interest, and is widely diffused, this attempt to call the attention of the public to a Systematic Arrangement of Voyages and Travels, from the earliest period of authentic history to the present time, ought scarcely to require any apology. Yet, on appearing before the tribunal of public opinion, every author who has not cherished an unreasonable estimate of his own qualifications, must necessarily be impressed with considerable anxiety respecting the probable reception of his work; and may be expected to offer some account of the plan and motives of what he proposes to lay before the public.
The present work is the first of the kind that has ever been attempted in Scotland: and though, as already avowed in the Prospectus, the Editor has no wish to detract from the merits of similar publications, it might appear an overstrained instance of false delicacy to decline a statement of the circumstances which, he presumes to hope, will give some prospect of the work being received with attention and indulgence, perhaps with favour. It certainly is the _only_ General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels that has been hitherto attempted in the English language, upon any arrangement that merits the appellation of a _systematic plan_. And hence, should the plan adopted be found only comparatively good, in so far the system of arrangement must be pronounced the best that has been as yet devised. If this be conceded, and the fact is too obvious to require extended proof or minute elucidation, the Editor shall not feel mortified even if his arrangement may be considerably improved hereafter.
