 demand was strong, it was set up again immediately. I made a
few unimportant alterations and additions, and added a Preface, of which I
cannot say that I am particularly proud, but an inexperienced writer with a head
somewhat turned by unexpected success is not to be trusted with a preface. I
made a few further very trifling alterations before moulds were taken, but since
the summer of 1872, as new editions were from time to time wanted, they have
been printed from stereos then made.
    Having now, I fear, at too great length done what I was asked to do, I
should like to add a few words on my own account. I am still fairly well
satisfied with those parts of »Erewhon« that were repeatedly rewritten, but from
those that had only a single writing I would gladly cut out some forty or fifty
pages if I could.
    This, however, may not be, for the copyright will probably expire in a
little over twelve years. It was necessary, therefore, to revise the book
throughout for literary inelegancies - of which I found many more than I had
expected - and also to make such substantial additions as should secure a new
lease of life - at any rate for the copyright. If, then, instead of cutting out,
say, fifty pages, I have been compelled to add about sixty invita Minerva - the
blame rests neither with my publisher nor with me, but with the copyright laws.
Nevertheless, I can assure the reader that, though I have found it an irksome
task to take up work which I thought I had got rid of thirty years ago, and much
of which I am ashamed of, I have done my best to make the new matter savour so
much of the better portions of the old, that none but the best critics shall
perceive at what places the gaps of between thirty and forty years occur.
    Lastly, if my readers note a considerable difference between the literary
technique of »Erewhon« and that of »Erewhon Revisited,« I would remind them
that, as I have just shown, »Erewhon« took something like ten years in writing,
and even so was written with great difficulty, while »Erewhon Revisited« was
written easily between November 1900 and the end of April 1901. There is no
central idea underlying »Erewhon,« whereas the attempt to realize the effect of
a single supposed great miracle dominates the whole of its successor. In
»Erewhon« there was hardly any story, and little attempt to give life and
individuality to the characters; I hope that in »Erewhon Revisited« both
