Excerpt from The Bliss Book: A Romantic History of the Bliss Family From the Time of Its Beginning in England, to Its Advent Into America, and Illustrating the Conditions of Life of the English Ancestors of Many Others of the Founders of New England

The author has often studied for weeks, and occasionally through the night, trying to determine the full significance of a single item of evidence, or to clear up a hazy point, which when accomplished would scarcely add anything noticeable to his story. Such discrepancies and difficulties are of altogether too frequent occurrence in the work of an original inquiry into the history of a family. Hencethe inquirer whose method is to be fastidious in point of accuracy, and artistic or sympathetic in the manner of the presentation of his facts and observations, must become insensible, if his means permit, to the lapse of time whilst searching in the archives, verifying a debatable item, and weighing each word with which he attires his framework of facts. Moreover, above all, he must not rest with being a mere compiler, like some of the old genealogists who were content to publish a bare skeleton of cold names and dates that sadly needed to be clothed with some semblance to life. Therefore, the zeal of an author in such efforts should be esteemed a wise reason for what, to impatient subscribers, may seem an unaccountable delay in the completion of his work. It would be an affectation to deny that books of this class can only be made, by the present author, under the expectation of some subscriptions, for he has no one to thank for any particular assistance in the cost (over $5000) and the entire work of preparing and illustrating the manuscript of The Bliss Book, save for the encouragement courteously given to him by Frederick Spencer Bliss of Hartford, Connecticut, William H. Bliss of New York City, and Sir Henry W. Bliss, of England, to whom the author's thanks are hereby expressed.

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