

This ebook was transcribed by Les Bowler.





                                 VATHEK;


                             AN ARABIAN TALE,

                                * * * * *

                                    BY

                          WILLIAM BECKFORD, ESQ.

                                * * * * *

                                   WITH

                     NOTES, CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY.

                                * * * * *

                                 LONDON:
                       GEORGE SLATER, 252, STRAND.

                                * * * * *

                                  1849.




MEMOIR.
BY WILLIAM NORTH.


WILLIAM BECKFORD, the author of the following celebrated Eastern tale,
was born in 1760, and died in the spring of 1844, at the advanced age of
eighty-four years.  It is to be regretted, that a man of so remarkable a
character, did not leave the world some record of a life offering points
of interest different from that of any of his contemporaries, from the
peculiarly studious retirement and eccentric avocations in which it was