text:  Come then to our aid oh ye heavenly Muses! who enabled Homer to sing in such persuasive words the fates of Troy and of its wooden horse; for surely a subject which is so deeply connected both with wood and horses is not beneath your notice; but perhaps as poetry is gone out of fashion at the present time you will depute one of your humbler sisters rejoicing in the name of Prose to give us a few hints in the composition of our great history