THE object of this volume is to give a version of the original so strictly faithful as to be of service to the classical student; while the style, though perfectly simple and unpretending, may contain nothing so opposed to the idiom of our own language as to deter the general reader, who may wish to know exactly what the Greek historian wrote. To gain both these ends, however, except in a limited degree, is perhaps scarcely possible in translating an author like Thucydides; whose style is frequently so very obscure, as regards the meaning, and so totally different, as regards the form and arrangement of his narrative, from what we are accustomed to in our own writers of history. It may be well therefore to say, that wherever the two parts of the object I have mentioned seemed incompatible, the latter, as the less important, has been sacrificed to the former; particularly in the earlier part of the work, where the student naturally stands most in need of every help that can be given him. With this explanation, I venture to hope that the present version may be found, in not a few passages, to answer the end proposed better than any of those which preceded it. The very great additions which within the last few years have been made to our knowledge of the original, may reasonably exempt the expression of such a hope from the charge of arrogance. And though want of leisure, arising from more pressing occupations, has prevented my deriving all the benefit I might, have done from the works of more learned labourers in the same field, yet even an imperfect acquaintance with the annotations of such scholars as have recently edited Thucydides, could scarcely fail to give me a decided advantage over earlier translators. To one of those scholars, especially, I am bound most thankfully to acknowledge my very great obligations; though his eye is, alas! closed to such expressions of gratitude. It was under the personal instruction of Dr. Arnold that I had the happiness to make my first acquaintance with the language of his favourite author; and his annotations upon the work have never long been out of my hands, since they were first published. The text of his last edition is what I have adopted for this translation; and I have sometimes felt compelled to borrow the very words with which he rendered a difficult passage; for when his version was meant to be literal, it seemed almost impossible to change it without sacrificing some part of the sense. The very few notes, too, which were compatible with the form and design of the volume, are in many cases only extracts from, or references to, his more copious illustrations of the text: though the views of other editors, particularly of Haack, Bekker, Göller, Poppo, and Bloomfield, are also quoted on doubtful passages, where my mind was not quite made up, with respect either to the best reading, or the most probable interpretation. With such valuable aids at my command, my task might well have been executed far better than it is. But such as it is, I commit it very humbly to the judgment of the public; more particularly of those who are acquainted with the original, and will therefore be best able to appreciate the difficulties which a translator of Thucydides has to encounter
