Excerpt from Autobiography and Anecdotes Notwithstanding I am sensible that for these seven years past and upwards my attention has been for the most part fixed towards husbandry, or in employment of an inferior nature, I once more put pen to paper; not because I am sensible of the accuracy there will be in my performance - the utmost extent of my abilities giving me little room to hope for this - but only to revive again, if possible, a knowledge of myself and letters, which time and my avocations have somewhat effaced. Now, if Cato at sixty years of age made himself thoroughly acquainted with the Greek tongue, it ought by no means to be deemed preposterous in me for to attempt recovering what I have lost in the Roman language at eight and forty. And if Man lius chose after a life of solitude to reassume his office of Dictator, and busy himself in affairs of state once more, it may the less be wondered at that, in treating of the occurrences of my family, I have recourse to a former custom of expressing my sentiments in Latin. And thus much will suffice by way of introduction. 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.