Excerpt from The Collected Writings of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 12 WE now reach the class of De Quincey's writings described in the prospectus of this edition under the collective title of tales, romances, and prose phantasies. The present volume and the next are devoted to the pretty numerous specimens that have come down to us of De Quincey's faculty in writings of this order. The more ordinary double-title of Tales and Romances may suffice, indeed, for the contents of this volume; but something additional is required for the description of the contents of the next, and Tales, Romances, and Prose Phantasies may there, accordingly, be the more fitting title. How much has had to be done for the recovery of the relics of De Quincey' s literary industry m the shape of still readable and interesting Tales and Romances will be under stood when we announce that more than two-thirds of the bulk of the present volume consists of matter not included in the previous sixteen-volume edition of De Quincey's Col lected Writings. On all grounds, the first place in the volume is due to the romance entitled Klosterheim, or The Masque. This romance, a tale of imaginary incidents in Germany in the time of the Thirty Years' War, is certainly the most care fully-written, as well as the most extensive, of all De Quincey's efforts in this kind of prose-fiction, and has the distinction, moreover, of being one of the very few produc tions of his pen which appeared originally in independent book-form, and not as mere magazine papers. It was first published in 1832 by Messrs. Blackwood of Edinburgh, in 3. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.