George Ticknor, Life, letters and journals of George Ticknor
George Hillard, Ed.

[202] and little sorrow since we saw you. We all remember Dresden, and its hospitalities, with much pleasure and gratitude, and hope we have friends there who will not entirely forget us. Mrs. Ticknor desires that her acknowledgments and compliments may be offered to you.

I remain, my dear Prince,

Very faithfully and affectionately yours,

From Prince John, of Saxony.

dear Sir,¹—I have received, with great pleasure, your letter and the books and newspapers you had the kindness to send me. Mr. Stephens's work seems to be very interesting. I have, methinks, found some time ago a notice of it, in the ‘Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung.’ My sister being in this moment at Florence, the newspapers are to make a journey into the bel paese la dove'l si suona. I am sure the author will be much charmed by it, being not insensible to success. The annotations and preface to the ‘Uncle’ are very interesting for an European and German, because they show the difference of views and sentiments in the two peoples. Mrs. Jameson, the translator, was here, and is personally known to my sister.

I am glad you were content with the ‘Purgatorio’ and my theological annotations to it. These last are—like all hardly got children—favorite children with me. The translation of the ‘Paradiso’ is finished, but the studies which I must undertake, for the annotation to it, are yet more difficult than they were for the ‘Purgatorio’; and yet I would not give out something incomplete, so that the publication of this last part may yet be deferred some time. But I console myself with the nonum prematur in annum of Horace.

I am charmed to hear that you have had no sorrow in your family. For myself, I cannot say quite the same thing. My wife has suffered this last spring from a very serious illness, which presented even, one day, an immediate danger for her life, and was followed by a long and painful convalescence. . . . . Now, by the mercy of God, I hope to be almost relieved of every apprehension for the future. My children, likewise, were almost all more or less sick at the same time, yet none so seriously, and they are now all well again.

In Europe all is now peaceful, at least for the moment. The misfortune