But when the time came to return to my first draft of a play, the tale

of love was the only thing to consider, and being now on the point of

producing the drama in England, America, and elsewhere, and requested to

prepare an edition of my story for the use of the audiences at the

theatre, I have thought myself justified in eliminating the politics and

religion from my book, leaving nothing but the human interests with

which alone the drama is allowed to deal. This has not been an easy

thing to do, and now that it is done I am by no means sure that I may

not have alienated the friends whom the abstract problems won for me

without conciliating the readers who called for the story only. But not

to turn my back on the work of three laborious years, or to discredit

that part of it which expressed, however imperfectly, my sympathy with

the struggles of the poor, and my participation in the social problems

with which the world is now astir, I have obtained the promise of my

publisher that the original version of "The Eternal City" shall be kept

in print as long as the public calls for it.

In this form of my book, the aim has been to rely solely on the

humanities and to go back to the simple story of the woman who denounced

her husband in order to save his life. That was the theme of the draft

which was the original basis of my novel, it is the central incident of

the drama which is about to be produced in New York, and the present

abbreviated version of the story is intended to follow the lines of the

play in all essential particulars down to the end of the last chapter

but one. H. C.

Isle of Man, Sept. 1902.




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