ADVERTISEMENT.

THE volumes here submitted to the public, are the last performance of a man, whose works, though less known in this country than they deserve to be, have gained at home a greater share both of applause and animadversion than those of perhaps any living writer. His Atala, or the Amours of Two Savages in the Desert, and a short extract from his great work Genie du Christianisme, which appeared under the title of a Demonstration of the Existence of God, are the only part of his writings that has hitherto been laid before the English reader. Les Martyrs, ou le Triomphe de la Religion Chretienne, which may be considered as his masterpiece, yet remains wholly unknown here; though repeated editions of each of these performances evince the celebrity which they have acquired in France.

It was the latter that furnished occasion for the present Tour. When we behold an author, for the sake of a close adherence to truth and nature, quitting his native land, and exposing himself in once classic, but now barbarous countries, to every species of fatigue, hardship, and danger, at the expence of his fortune and his health, merely that he may give a faithful portraiture of the scenes which he has chosen for a work of fiction; it is impossible to withhold our admiration of the ardour and enthusiasm which alone could suggest the idea of such an enterprize, and communicate the fortitude and energy requisite for its accomplishment.