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

[251] be most agreeable to him, to approach him on this subject, and see if anything can be done in my behalf? I cannot but think that it would be worthy of him to permit a part of his library to be planted on this Western continent, where, at some time or other, it will bear fruit, and where it will never cease to be remembered that it was once the property of the first man of his time in Germany. If it comes into my hands it will, I think, be kept together, and never leave the Western world. . . . .

I work away constantly at my ‘History of Spanish Literature,’ after which you kindly inquire. It is now approaching 1700, after which there is not much, as you well know. . . . .

Your friends here are all well, except Mr. Pickering, whose strength is much broken down by complaints in the organs of digestion. Prescott gets on well with his ‘Conquest of Peru,’ and will then take up Philip II. He desires to be kindly remembered to you, and so does Mr. Pickering, whom I saw yesterday, and so would your other friends if they knew me to be writing, for we all remember you with a very sincere and lively interest.

Yours always faithfully,

Geo. Ticknor.

Do you know of old Spanish books anywhere to be obtained in Germany or elsewhere? . . . .

Mr. Prescott was, naturally, the confidant of his friend during the whole progress of the work, from its inception to its publication; and when the manuscript of it was complete, it was submitted to his examination and correction, as his histories had been placed in Mr. Ticknor's hands for a similar revision. He was at this time hesitating over his plans for writing the ‘History of Philip II.,’ doubting whether his infirmities would permit him to undertake it, and he devoted some weeks of this period of comparative idleness to the task of friendship, described by Mr. Ticknor as ‘an act of kindness for which I shall always feel grateful, and the record of which I preserve with care, as a proof how faithful he was, and how frank.’¹ Returning the manuscript with nineteen quarto pages of memoranda, in the handwriting of his amanuensis, Mr. Prescott also sent a note of eight