ſketched it but to himſelf ſix or ſeven years ago, at his firſt accidental diverſion into the walk of antiquities. And he has had the patient reſolution to work upon it ever ſince. Had he foreſeen the full extent of his ſcheme at firſt, he ſhould never have had the hardineſs to form it. Had he foreſeen in any part of the execution the time and the labour which the reſt would have coſt him, he had certainly ſhrunk back from the attempt, and had cloſed the whole work immediately. He proceeded on the model before him, ever flattering himſelf to the laſt, that a few months more would diſmiſs him from the employ, and remit him again to thoſe profeſſional ſtudies which he had very unwittingly deſerted. He once deſigned to have deduced the hiſtory only to the Conqueſt. He afterwards deſigned to have folded up the hiſtory below it in a few general and comprehenſive notices. And he is not ſorry to have been thus inſenſibly led on in the execution, till he had actually gone too far to recede; till he had a juſt claim upon himſelf for the completion of the ſmall remainder. The whole is divided into four Books, containing as many periods, the Britiſh and Roman-Britiſh, the Saxon,, the Daniſh and Norman-Daniſh, and the Modern. Three are already completed. And one is here preſented to the public.
The reader muſt not expect in this work merely the private unintereſting hiſtory of a ſingle town. He may expect whatever curious particulars can with any propriety be connected with it. Whatever ſerves to illuſtrate the general antiquities of the kingdom or the county, whatever ſerves to mark the general polity of our towns, whatever ſerves to lay open the cauſes and the circumſtances of any momentous events that affect the intereſts of Mancheſter, all theſe the author propoſes to examine, to aſcertain the doubtful, to retrench the falſe, and to clear up the obſcure in them. He will endeavour clearly to fix the poſition of all the Britiſh tribes and accurately to define the extent of all the Roman provinces in the iſland, which has been hitherto the philoſopher's ſtone of antiquities. By a new teſt that ſeems to be abſolutely deciſive, he will endeavor
