The "Gem" Classics Ve A Collection of World-famous Classics in dainty binding. Photogravure frontispiece. netian morocco. Per volume, $1.00. RASSELAS. BY SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D. RELIGIO MEDICI, ETC. BY SIR THOMAS BROWNE. THE STORY OF THE CHEVALIER BAYARD. BY EDITH WALFord. VATHEK: An Eastern Romance. By WILLIAM BECKFORD. FRANKENSTEIN OR THE MODERN PROMETHEUS. By MRS. SHELLEY. REFLECTIONS OF ROCHEFOUCAULD. "Unusually well made and attractive.” -Dial, Chicago. "For purity of text, elegance of typography, and beauty of external form, they cannot be equalled."-Church Standard Philadelphia. Preface. THE event on which this fiction is founded has been supposed, by Dr. Darwin, and some of the physiological writers of Germany, as not of impossible occurrence. I shall not be supposed as recording the remotest degree of serious faith to such an imagination; yet, in assuming it as the basis of a work of fancy, I have not considered myself as merely weaving a series of supernatural terrors. The event on which the interest of the story depends is exempt from the disadvantages of a mere tale of specters of enchantment. It was recommended by the novelty of the situations which it develops; and, however impossible as a physical fact, affords a point of view to the imagination for the delineating of human passions more comprehensive and commanding than any which the ordinary relations of existing events can yield. I have thus endeavored to preserve the truth of the elementary principles of human nature, while I have not scrupled to innovate upon their combinations. The "Iliad," the tragic poetry of Greece; Shakespeare, in the "Tem |