ON AMERICAN HISTORY BY HENRY W. ELSON, A.M. LECTURER OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR THE EXTENSION E178 .E63 V. 2 COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped June, 1900. Reprinted October, 1901 Norwood Press J. S. Cushing & Co. - Berwick & Smith Norwood Mass. U.S.A. 120 PREFACE THE cordial reception by the public of the first series of "Side Lights on American History," published a year ago, has been very gratifying to the author, and has far surpassed his expectations. The press notices also have been uniformly commendatory, many making special reference to the literary style. These facts have greatly encouraged the author in pre paring the present volume, which, it is hoped, will be received with equal favor. This volume begins where its predecessor left off, and covers the period of the Civil War and that which follows on to the present time. The original plan of choosing out the chief events, without attempting to give a complete history, has been followed, the object being to turn a flash-light here and there on the part that may be taken as a fair sample of the whole. V 320292 The author realizes the extreme difficulty in writing recent history. It is not want of material, but the necessity of dealing with living political issues without revealing a partisan bias, that constitutes the difficulty. Nor is it possible to weigh contemporary events and give them their true and final historic value; this must be left to the critical historian of the future. If, however, these side lights on our history shall stimulate the reader to further research, and shall give him a broader conception of, and a deeper love for, our great country and its institutions, the writer will feel amply repaid. H. W. E. PHILADELPHIA, PA., May, 1900. |