Eighty-one new peerages, 160 new baronetcies, 1,800 new Enighthoods are recorded in the new edition of "Burke." More than 30,000 names have also been added to the lists of the various orders of knighthood, fivesixths of them being in the Order of the British Empire.
It is a great volume 3,254 four super-royal octavo pages, and would have been greater still, Mr. A, Winton Thorpe, its editor, said recently in an interview with a representative of The Observer," had it not been that it was rigorously cut down in certain particulars where it was thought that Space might be saved.
The work of classification, arrangement, and correction is never-ending. "The reason one is able to keep pace with the very large number of changes that are oonstantly taking place is because," Mr, Thorpe said, "a definite method is adopted in carrying out the daily work. Every day all the newspapers are searched for notices of births, marriages, and deaths. For each of these reported happenings a form is sent to the family concerned asking for confirmation, In this way we obtain absolute accuracy. Each issue of the 'Gazette' is also gone through from the first page to the last for notices of new creations, promotions, and appointments.
"In order to ensure still greater accuracy nearly 20,000 proofs. are sent out for each issue, not only to the heads of families, but also to all collateral branches whose addresses are known. beyond all this, nearly every professional and amateur genealogist in the country is frequently writing to us, with the result that the most remote inaccuracies are brought to light. It is, for example, no uncommon thing for us to receive evi* dence, upon the discovery of an old family document, that someone who was said to have died in April, 1551, did not, as a matter of fact, die until August, 1552.
"The method of preparing a lineage in the case of a new creation for a-new entry in 'Burke' is to carry it as far back as it can be authentically traced, but the strictest evidence is required fore these earlier lineages are printed. We give every collateral living or dead who is or ever has been in remainder to the title. In many of the old families, 'Burke' goes back in this way to Saxon times, "It sometimes happens when new creations are made that persons entitled to have their names in the peerage will claim a pedigree which cannot be supported by the necessary evidence. As 'Burke' has always been regarded as the leading authority in these matters the greatest care has to be exercised that no past history shall be inserted which cannot survive the test_ of critical examination.
"There are, on the other hand,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.