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History have, therefore, become obsolete and others require correction and readjustment.

Teachers and students of English constitutional history have long been embarrassed by a text-book which, while indispensable as a whole, is in many points out of date. Hitherto they have had to go for newer light to a great variety of books and periodicals. English historians were apparently too much engrossed with detailed research to stop and sum up the advances that had been made. It has been left to a French scholar to supply the much-needed survey. M. PetitDutaillis, who was, at the time when he brought out the first volume of his edition, Professor of History in the University of Lille, but has quite recently been appointed Rector of the University of Grenoble, had already shown an intimate and scholarly acquaintance with certain periods of English history in his "Etude sur la vie et le règne de Louis VIII." and in his elaborate introduction to the work of his friend André Réville on the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. The twelve "additional studies and notes" in which he brings the first volume of the "Constitutional History" abreast of more recent research meet so obvious a need and, in their French dress, have been so warmly welcomed by English scholars, that it has been thought desirable to make them easily accessible to the many students of history who may not wish to purchase the rather expensive volume of the French edition in which they are included.

M. Petit-Dutaillis willingly acceded to the suggestion and has read the proofs of the translation. The extracts from his preface, given elsewhere, explain more fully than has been done above the reasons for and the nature of the revision of Stubbs' work which he has carried out.

As M. Petit-Dutaillis observes, in speaking of the French version of the "Constitutional History," the translation of books of this kind can only be competently executed by historians. It has in this case been entrusted

to a graduate of the University of Manchester, Mr. W. E. Rhodes, who has himself done good historical work. I have carefully revised it, corrected, with the author's approval, one or two small slips in the French text, substituted for its references to the French translation of the "Constitutional History" direct references to the last edition (1903) of the first volume of the original, and added in square brackets a few references to Professor Vinogradoff's "English Society in the Eleventh Century," which appeared after the publication of the French edition. The index has been adapted by Mr. Rhodes from the one made by M. Lefebvre for that edition.

THE UNIVERSITY,

MANCHESTER,

September 8th, 1908.

JAMES TAIT.

EXTRACTS FROM THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

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THE French edition of the "Constitutional History of William Stubbs is intended for the use of the students of our Faculties of Arts and Law . . . The "Constitutional History" is a classic and the readers of the "Bibliothèque internationale de Droit public"1 have seen it more than once quoted as a book the authority of which is accepted without discussion. It seems desirable, however, to emphasize the exceptional merits of this great work as well as to draw attention to its weak points and, as it is not an adaptation but a translationcomplete and reverent-that is given here, to explain why we have thought some additions indispensable All that we know of Stubbs inspires confidence, confidence in the solidity and extent of his knowledge, the honesty of his criticism, the sureness of his judgment, the depth of his practical experience of men and things. Despite the merit of his other works, and especially of the prefaces which he wrote for the Chronicles he edited, Stubbs only showed the full measure of his powers in the "Constitutional History." It is the fruit of prodigious labour, of a thorough investigation of all the printed sources which a historian could consult at the period when these three bulky volumes successively appeared. It is an admirable storehouse of facts, well chosen, and set forth with scrupulous good faith. The word "Constitution" is taken in its widest sense. How the England of the Renascence with its strong Monarchy, its House of Lords, its local institutions, its Church, its Nobility, its towns, its freeholders and its villeins was evolved from the old Anglo-Saxon Britain,

1. In which the translation is included.

this is the subject of the author's enquiry. With the exception of diplomatic and military history he touches upon the most diverse subjects. His book is at once a scientific manual of institutions and, at least from the Norman Conquest onwards, a continuous history of every reign. Mr. Maitland has called attention to the advantages of the plan which by combining narrative and analysis allows no detail of importance to escape, and gives a marvellously concrete impression of the development of the nation.2

Does this imply that the perusal of the "Constitutional History" leaves us nothing to desire? The French who have kept the "classical "spirit and reserve their full admiration for that which is perfectly clear, will doubtless find that his thought is very often obscure and his conclusions undecided. This is really one result of the vast erudition and the good faith of the author. This honest historian is so careful not to neglect any document, so impressed with the complexity of the phenomena that he does not always succeed in disposing them in an absolutely coherent synthesis

But inconsistencies of view and the relative obscurity of certain passages are not the only fault which impairs Stubbs' work. There is another, at once more serious and more easily remedied, a fault which is particularly felt in the first volume. The book is no longer up to date. The chapters dealing with the Anglo-Saxon period, especially, have become obsolete on many points. The revisions effected by Stubbs in the successive editions which he published down to his death, are insufficient. They do not always give an accurate idea of the progress made by research, and they are not even executed with all the attention to details which is desirable. Although the author had not ceased to be interested in history the task of revision obviously repelled him. The "Constitutional History" has grown

2. Maitland, Eng. Hist. Rev., xvi., 1901, p. 422.

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