PREFACE.
WHEN I undertook to edit the 1740 Edition of "Drych y Prif Oesoedd for the Guild of Graduates of the University of Wales, I scarcely realised the amount of work involved. The text is reprinted here letter for letter, word for word, line for line and page for page.
Not one of its evident misprints has been corrected. I even fear that when passing the first sheets through the press I was too hard on what I now believe to be, in a few instances, Durston's imperfect type for the letter 'e.' Where the horizontal bar could not be traced it was printed as 'c.' My duty was mechanically to reproduce the text and reserve my own ideas for the Notes, and yet this reprinting of the original 1740 Edition was not an easy task; in addition to imperfect type one had to contend with words and even single letters in italics in most unexpected places, an orthography marred by many inconsistencies, all of which I have sought faithfully to reproduce, and capital letters almost everywhere misplaced.
In my account of the Author's Life I have not made a single statement of fact without conclusive evidence based upon careful research. A few inferences of my own are duly labelled as such. The dates in the life of Theophilus Evans are often at variance with those hitherto accepted, and much of the confusion and obscurity surrounding certain periods of his life are cleared up now for the first time.
The other chapters in the Introduction contain, I believe, much that is new, but I venture to hope
