of his death excited but little interest on this side of the Atlantic, though forty years ago his name was familiar both to English and to American readers; but it is impossible to suppose that this undeserved neglect can be permanent. The opinion of those competent judges who are students of his works is emphatic in his favour; it is not too much to say that to read his books is to appreciate them, and that his place in American literature is a high and an assured one. The re-issue of his best works will now give the public an opportunity-I will not say of repairing a wrong done to a distinguished writer, for, as I have already shown, the decay of Melville's fame was partly due to circumstances of his own making-but at least of rehabilitating and confirming its carlier and truer judgment.