excellent memory. She resided for fifty years at Munson, Mass., where she is favorably known, as well as her son, Dr. McKinstry, of Long Meadow, near Springfield, Mass., and her son-in-law, Mr. Seaton, chief clerk of the Census Bureau, Washington, D. C.

With Mrs. McKinstry's full consent to follow up the subject, several localities in Ohio and Central New York were visited by the writer in the autumn of 1881, and with the gleanings thus obtained, the family traditions, the letters written by aged people conversant with the topic and roused into action through the publishing of the statement referred to in the Century Magazine (then Scribner's), the following pages have been written. It is the only attempt of the Rev. S. Spaulding's relatives to set this matter in its proper light, a duty long delayed to the memory of an upright man.

ELLEN E. DICKINSON.

INTRODUCTION.

No. 12 WEST TWELFTH STREET,
NEW YORK, July 9, 1882.

IN my boyhood I resided in Onondaga Hollow (now Valley), and was acquainted with William H. Sabine, the grandfather of Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson, the author of this book, and well remember his residence, in which the Spaulding manuscript is said to have been kept for some years. I have not read this book myself, as my health will not permit it; but in conversation with Mrs. Dickinson I have become satisfied that she has introduced considerable original material, and has gathered from books already published a large amount of interesting matter relating to the subject of Mormonisin.

This seems to be the time to publish a narrative of the early history of Mormonism. The subject is exciting great interest at present; and as no books have been published relating to it for many years, the present generation has slight acquaintance with it.

With my knowledge of Joseph Smith and one of his first followers, Phelps, a Canandaigua printer, it has been for more than half a century the occasion of surprise and regret that such vulgar impostors should have obtained a following, which is even now drawing proselytes by the thousand from Europe.

THURLOW WEED.