Outlines of English and American Literature

Outlines of English and American Literature is by William J. Long, and its title page calls it an introduction to the chief writers of England and America, to the books they wrote, and to the times in which they lived. The text gives, in brief outline, the story of Beowulf, and says the handwriting indicates that the manuscript was copied about the year 1100, but the language points to the eighth or ninth century.

A section headed Anglo-Saxon Songs says a few mutilated poems have been preserved beside the epic of Beowulf, and that one of the oldest of these poems is Widsith. The text says there are two poems which are especially significant: Merlin and the Gleam, which reflects Tennyson’s lifelong devotion to his art, and Crossing the Bar, which was his farewell. The text says it is doubtful if any American writer great or small has given more pleasure to young readers than Louisa M. Alcott with her Little Women (1868) and other stories for girls.