1[491] She has left, in the whole country, a very good memory. Her last years were very retired. In the year 1855 she had submitted to an operation for cataract, which relieved her at least of the almost complete blindness which was her fate. She could again write and read, but at a certain distance her eye—the one was entirely lost— was very feeble. Since this time she had abandoned her authorship. The political situation of the last period, since 1866, preoccupied her much, and I believe that the war of this summer has much contributed to abridge her life. Yet her death was a very gentle one. She died in the moment when the priest was on the point of reaching her the sacrament, almost without a single-pang. To her last hour she continued a true friend to her family, and a sincere and pious Christian. I wrote you already, in my last letter, of the successes of our arms and the honorable part which my troops and my sons have taken in it. Now they are before Paris, and form a part of the blockade of this immense city. May God give us soon an honorable peace, and put an end to the bloodshed, and all other calamities of war. The internal confusion in France is a difficulty for the success of negotiations. Adieu, dear friend. I am, with the sincerest sentiments, Your affectionateJohn.
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1 These letters closed this correspondence, and Mr. Ticknor's is the last, from his hand, that has come into the possession of his family. After Mr. Ticknor's death, King John wrote a letter of condolence, as warm, as simple, and sincere as any received at that time, and he afterwards went over the whole correspondence with great care, both his own and Mr. Ticknor's letters, with reference to the present memoir,—specified which of his own letters must be excluded from publication, and gave other directions which have been duly observed. A year after Mr. Ticknor's death, Mr. Charles Eliot Norton was received in a private audience by the King, in his cabinet, and before closing the interview his Majesty took him into a more private room,—where all the objects gave token of its being the scene of his secluded labors and retirement,—in order to show him an engraving of Mr. Ticknor hung there, desiring him to tell Mrs. Ticknor where he had placed it.
Boston, J. R. Osgood and company, 1876.
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