Note
In offering you this, the most singular romance that I have ever written, I feel constrained to say, that the most remarkable characters and incidents here exhibited, are drawn from well-known persons and events of real life. These circumstances are here presented with only such judicious change of times, places, and proper names, as is dictated by the prudence and delicacy which also withholds me from pointing out more definitely the sources whence they were derived.
E. D. E. N. S.