PREFACE
IN the course of the present year there died suddenly at Sandwich a gentleman who had only a short time previously taken up his residence in one of the curious old red-brick houses which, surrounded by large gardens, sleepily nestle in the shade of its venerable towers. He was reputed wealthy, his name given as Romney, being popularly supposed to denote ancestral, if not actual, connection with the town and district of that name on the South Coast. A man of highly-cultured tastes and of rare and varied information, he led a very retired life, divided between his books, the cataloguing of a valuable collection of antique gems, and cycle-rides into the surrounding country--for he was an ardent cyclist. A chance meeting on the Sandwich Flats, whereon he had lost his way one misty evening, was the commencement of a close friendship with the present writers, who, on Mr. Romney's demise soon after, were found to be designated his literary executors. A series of MS. stories, apparently intended for publication, furnished the sole explanation of this somewhat surprising provision. Whether, as might be imagined from their intimate record of the chief actor's career, they were derived from the notes of actual experience, or whether they were simply the result of imagination, they are here presented exactly as left by the author.