PREFACE.

THE present edition of Schiller's Jungfrau von Orleans can pretend to offer nothing new. The editor has made conscientious use of the very considerable literature on the subject, and begs to express his indebtedness to the many commentators whose industry has made his task a light one.

He has aimed at supplying the special needs of the American class-room, and inasmuch as the Jungfrau, perhaps the easiest of Schiller's plays, is often read at an early stage of the student's progress, he has admitted a considerable amount of elementary matter into the notes, and has sought to aid the student in enlarging his vocabulary by pointing out, in the case of words which he is likely to meet for the first time, their connection with English in a simple way. As the play is not an historical one, he has made no effort to trace all its agreements or disagreements with history, a method which would obscure rather than elucidate the play, nor to show in detail the extent to which Schiller followed his authorities. These can be found conveniently presented in Boxberger's edition in Kürschner's National-Litteratur. The student should regard the heroine as a creation of the poetic imagination and to be studied in that light. She belongs to poetry, not to history.

The text followed is that of the last edition from Schiller's hand, with the few modifications that have been ac

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The original punctuation is fol

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cepted from other sources. lowed, except that the stronger pointing of later editions has been adopted where it does not affect the sense. editor has allowed himself the liberty, since the text is for the English-speaking student and should offer no needless difficulty, of substituting for the dash, which Schiller, following the fashion of his time, used so freely, some additional or alternative pointing. In this he has been compelled to use his own judgment, though Düntzer offers some suggestions toward the change.

The Jungfrau is not a great play, measured by the standard of Shakespere. It is not even the greatest of Schiller's plays. But it is a play of singular beauty: and sympathetic study will reveal a charm and a distinction that are not always to be found in the work of the so-called realistic school which so largely occupies the modern stage.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, CAMBRIDGE, July, 1894.