[269c] The best edition of Charlotte Brontë’s Villette is that in the “Haworth Edition,” published by Smith, Elder & Co., with an Introduction by Mrs. Humphry Ward.
[269d] Charles Dickens’ novels, of which David Copperfield is generally pronounced to be the best, should be obtained in the “Oxford India Paper Dickens” (Chapman & Hall and Henry Frowde). A serviceable edition is that published by the Macmillans, with Introductions by Charles Dickens’s son, but that edition still fails of Our Mutual Friend and The Mystery of Edwin Drood, of which the copyright is not yet exhausted.
[269e] Anthony Trollope’s novels are being reissued, in England by John Lane and George Bell & Sons, and in America in a most attractive form by Dodd, Mead & Co. All three publishers have a good edition of Barchester Towers, Trollope’s best novel.
[269f] Boccaccio’s Decameron is in my library in many forms—in 3 volumes of the Villon Society’s publications, translated by John Payne; in 2 handsome volumes issued by Laurence & Bullen; and in the Extra Volumes of Bohn’s Library. There is a pretty edition available published by Gibbons in 3 volumes.
[270a] Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights forms a volume of the Haworth Edition of the Brontë novels, published by Smith, Elder & Co. It has an introduction by Mrs. Humphry Ward.
[270b] Charles Reade’s Cloister and the Hearth is available in many forms. The pleasantest is in 4 volumes issued by Chatto & Windus, with an Introduction by Sir Walter Besant. There is a remarkable shilling edition issued by Collins of Glasgow.
[270c] Victor Hugo’s Les Misèrables may be most pleasantly read in the 10 volumes, translated by M. Jules Gray, published by J. M. Dent & Co.
[270d] Mrs. Gaskell’s Cranford can be obtained in the six volume edition of that writer’s works published by Smith, Elder & Co., with Introductions by Dr. A. W. Ward; in a volume illustrated by Hugh Thomson, with an Introduction by Mrs. Ritchie, published by the Macmillans, or in the World’s Classics (Henry Frowde), where there is an additional chapter entitled, “The Cage at Cranford.”
[270e] The translation of George Sand’s Consuelo in my library is by Frank H. Potter, 4 volumes, Dodd, Mead & Co., New York.
[270f] Lever’s Charles O’Malley I have as volumes of the Complete Works published by Downey. There is a pleasant edition in Nelson’s “Pocket Library.”