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YOKOHAMA SHANGHAI

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KELLY & WALSH, LIMITED

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HONGKONG SINGAPORE

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In the unlikely event of any one instituting a minute comparison between this edition and its predecessor, he would find minor alterations innumerable,—here a line erased, there a paragraph added, or again a figure changed, a statement qualified, a description or a list brought up to date. But take it altogether, the book remains the same as heretofore. It would seem to have found favour in many quarters, to judge from the manner in which, years after its first appearance, newspapers and book-makers continue to quote wholesale from it without acknowledgment; and the title, which cost us much cogitation, and which we borrowed ultimately from the Spanish phrase cosas de España, has passed into general use, even coming to supply titles for similar works written about other lands in imitation of this one.

The article on Archæology contributed by Mr. W. G. Aston, C. M. G., to the second edition, and that on Geology by Prof. John Milne, F.R.S., remain untouched. Best thanks, once more, to these kind friends, as also ​to Mr. James Murdoch, Mr. H. V. Henson, Rev. Dr. D. C Greene, and Abbé J. N. Guérin, who have supplied information on points beyond the scope of our own knowledge. To Mr. W. B. Mason and to Mr. W. D. Cox we are under special obligations,—to the former for constant advice and assistance during the progress of the work, to the latter for revision of the proofs, a task of a different order of difficulty in this country from what it is at home with printers whose native language is English. The greater part of the index has been compiled by Mr. E. B. Clarke, of the First Higher School, Tōkyō.

Miyanoshita,

November, 1904.