The pedigrees of our county families, arranged in diagrams on the
pages of county histories, mostly appear at first sight to be as
barren of any touch of nature as a table of logarithms.  But given a
clue--the faintest tradition of what went on behind the scenes, and
this dryness as of dust may be transformed into a palpitating drama.
More, the careful comparison of dates alone--that of birth with
marriage, of marriage with death, of one marriage, birth, or death
with a kindred marriage, birth, or death--will often effect the same
transformation, and anybody practised in raising images from such
genealogies finds himself unconsciously filling into the framework
the motives, passions, and personal qualities which would appear to
be the single explanation possible of some extraordinary conjunction
in times, events, and personages that occasionally marks these
reticent family records. 

Out of such pedigrees and supplementary material most of the
following stories have arisen and taken shape. 

I would make this preface an opportunity of expressing my sense of