Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Publishers do not want ideal histories, complete in form, exhaustive in matter, but histories which will interest the public. Exhaustive histories are sometimes very exhausting to their readers. Again, I wished to give a picture of ascertained facts, and therefore made it a rule to deal with subjects which have been thoroughly discussed by specialists or illuminated by the publica tion of great works like Bishop Reeves' Aa'amnan's Co/mnba, and Dr. Todd's Wars of the Gaea'nil.