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Society of Danish Antiquaries, under whose patronage he has been enabled to bring it before the public, in so handsome a style of typography. It is one of the most valuable Contributions ever made to the study of the history and geography of our continent. We trust that some zealous student of these subjects will be immediately found, who will put the Icelandic authorities into an English dress, and prepare them, with a proper literary apparatus, for the perusal of the general reader.

ART. X. History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic.By WILLIAM H. PRESCOTT. In Three Volumes. Boston; American Stationers' Company.

John B. Russell.

THE reign of Ferdinand and Isabella has been diu desideratum in English, indeed we may say, European literature. Saving the invidiousness of national distinctions in Anglo-Saxon literature, we might add American;- for it seems now to be fairly admitted, that some faint gleams of a literary dawning in the West, have at last, reversing Nature's order, become distinctly visible to foreign optics. It is certainly astonishing that the most brilliant page of modern European history (for such we esteem this era of Spain,) should have been left unwritten for three centuries. Equally astonishing it may be abroad, that it should have been first written on this speculating side of the Atlantic, and in this monetary age, (a vile invention,) by a scholar heretofore unheard of in the world of letters.

We have said, unwritten. In our own language this is literally true; and almost equally so in any language of Europe, unless we go back to the old contemporary chroniclers,- mere malleable materials, or to the Spanish historiographers of the sixteenth century, who wrote not even in their mother tongue, but in the universal language of the learned in that day; a dead language then, vainly attempted to be revived, since buried, and in great danger, alas! of being absolutely forgotten. Within human memory, two petty works only have appeared upon the transatlantic continent, professing to be histories of this reign; one in French, and one in German. Our author,

in his Preface, with all becoming courtesy, commends each of them moderately; and sooth to say, very moderate commendation is quite as much as the subjects deserve. Their slender notoriety is, perhaps, proof enough of this, considering that both were published some distance back in the last century. What native currency they may have had in their day, we know not; but we much doubt whether many English or American scholars of the nineteenth century have ever heard of either Vincent Mignot, or Rupert Becker, or their respective histories. Yet the Abbé Mignot was a member of the French Academy,-"conseiller clerc au grand conseil,"a nephew of Voltaire's, rich and liberal withal, why not justly entitled to all the patronage of letters which his merits would permit? He is commended, too, in the "Biographie Universelle," as a very laborious and learned man, who wrote several historical works; among them a History of the Empress Irene, a History of Joanna the First, Queen of Naples, a History of the Ottoman Empire, the most esteemed of his productions, and, in 1766, "Histoire des Rois Catholiques Ferdinand et Isabelle," in two small duodecimos, on which the remark of his biographer is, "sujet bien choisi, mais exécuté médiocrement;" which means, a miserable book. It is added, "the author never cites his authorities; but one may easily see he has consulted only Mariana and Ferreras." Indeed, one may easily see that with half an eye; for he himself candidly states it in his own preface. "Excepting for the discovery of the New World," says he, "I have not found, in all the authors who form the collection entitled Hispania Illustrata," (a voluminous and learned compilation,) elsewhere, any thing, or scarcely any thing, which Mariana and Ferreras, the two Spanish historians best known, have not recorded." This is much as if one were now to write a work devoted exclusively to the reign of Elizabeth, and tell us he could find nothing on the subject worth looking at, besides Hume and Lingard. For Mariana and Ferreras wrote histories of Spain, the one in Latin and Spanish, the other in Spanish alone, quite as general, as the English histories referred to. Mariana's, as old as the sixteenth century, used to enjoy a high reputation; but more for graces of style, than for profoundness or accuracy. Ferreras is not thought to have even this degree of literary merit. He is esteemed little more than a laborious annalist, who, between 1700 and 1732, published

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sixteen quartos of the history of his country, beginning just after the Flood. Both these authors having been duly done into French, their translations afforded the easiest possible reference to this very learned and laborious Abbé, who could find nothing anywhere else. With such facilities, he threw off a flimsy, superficial narrative of the most striking events of the reign, put together with no great art, but readable and lively enough, being a Frenchified view of Spain, somewhat à la Voltaire, but without his literary grace and brilliancy.

As for Von Rupert Becker, we know nothing of his personal history which does not appear in his title-page, where he is styled, in fact he has no style at all, and his Preface, which dates from Dresden. His work, entitled, "Geschichte der Regierung Ferdinand des Katholischen, Konigs von Spanien," or, "History of the Reign of Ferdinand the Catholic, King of Spain," in two slender duodecimos, appeared in 1790-91. Its literary character, among his own countrymen, may be gathered from the "Bibliotheca Historica" of Meuselius, who says, "This history, the author of which seems to have drawn from pure sources, is 'sat bene, licet passim paullo negligentiùs composita;'"-the dark symbol, doubtless, of a transcendental puff!

In truth, however, the German seems to be a more careful writer, so far as his matter is concerned, than the French Abbé; and he is withal a man "having authority," or, rather, authorities; not very recherchés, to be sure, nor greatly numerous; but he cites them occasionally, such as they are, chapter and verse, with exemplary scrupulosity, so that any one may follow him, who has leisure and inclination, as far as he likes, and see what he shall see. For our own part, we have seen enough to satisfy us, that, using only the most common-place references, he has yet an entire respect for plain, unvarnished facts, so far as his authorities go; so he has also for the House of Austria; still his sentiments are liberal, with a subdued tendency to be enthusiastic on the subject of constitutional liberty. He is a perfectly moral writer; and occasionally plunges into a depth of original reflection, which rarely obscures the pages of the Abbé Mignot. In short, there is a degree of dull respectability about him, which, in our judgment, nearly justifies the eulogium of his learned countryman, Meuselius. To be sure he calls Aragon Spain, and makes Ferdinand king of it, which is passing somewhat

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lightly over the reign of Isabella, and might ruffle a little the old pride of Castile. Still it is all "sat bene" for five hundred small duodecimo pages of large German print; and our reader has already spent on it quite as much time as it de

serves.

But if France and Germany have done little, Great Britain has added nothing. There is no history of this reign in English. Dr. Robertson, in the first chapter of his "Charles the Fifth," despatches Ferdinand and Isabella in about twenty pages, in which he has recorded at least half as many errors. The clever "History of Spain and Portugal," in five duodecimos, prepared for Lardner's "Cabinet Cyclopædia," doles out to the illustrious pair four and twenty pages in Castile, and five for Ferdinand alone in Aragon. There are a few other glimpses here and there in English literature of great things done in Spain in those days; and there has always been a sort of vague tradition that Ferdinand and Isabella were a very remarkable brace of sovereigns. But wherein their greatness consisted, unless it were in the discovery of America by a duly authorized agent, has been left by the British writers mainly to conjecture, or at best to loose inference from sweeping assertions and obscure hints.

America, even before the publication of the history now under review, has done something more than this. Irving's lives of Columbus and the other Spanish voyagers of that age, gracefully and thoroughly illustrate these foreign adventures; and his Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada gives a glowing picture, something between history and romance, of one other brilliant achievement in the administration of the Catholic sovereigns. So several European writers of eminence, Hallam, Roscoe, Milman, Fléchier, Sismondi, have treated, in a popular historical form, particular topics involving at times partial views of Spanish affairs under this administration. It is from such incidental notices concerning Spain, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, that a few scattered rays of light have occasionally broken in upon the general reader, serving only to make the surrounding darkness visible and palpable. There has been no comprehensive history of that age and country. The succeeding reigns, from Ferdinand and Isabella downward, through the long lines of the House of Austria, and the House of Bourbon, have all been copiously narrated, with more or less of accuracy, and various degrees of literary merit,

by Robertson, Watson, Thompson, Dunlap, and Coxe. Yet the great period of all has been singularly left behind. Nor has either one of these popular historians done any thing effective, towards illuminating the reader with a knowledge of the Spanish constitution, or of the great national features and characteristics, which, combined with peculiar civil and political institutions, and modified by the operation of external causes, carried this people at one time to such a pitch of glory and power as has seldom been equalled in the history of nations, and have since plunged them into a degree of abasement, almost equally unparalleled. Robertson's "Charles the Fifth" is a general history of Europe. It opens with an entire volume, devoted to the progress of European civilization, from the dark ages down to that period, exhibited, by the way, far more fully in each of the other leading nations than in Spain, of which the account is meagre and unsatisfactory, and after all not always accurate. His hero, although on the mother's side hereditary monarch of Spain and its dependencies, was also, through the father, heir to the kingdom of the Netherlands and the archduchy of Austria, whence he soon became elective emperor of Germany. Spain is swallowed up in these immense relations, and soon lost sight of. Charles himself looked upon this as a foreign principality, devolving upon him by a sort of lucky accident, and chiefly valuable as an aid to his German and Flemish governments. There was his whole soul; in those his great schemes were unfolded; and for them his brilliant part was played on the theatre of Europe. The historian participates in these feelings of the hero. His visits to Spain are short and far between; and all we learn of the Spaniards is, that, under the conduct of a German emperor, their famous infantry was a terror to all parts of Europe. The historians of Philip the Second, and the Third, have trod in the footsteps of their illustrious predecessor. Their works. might well be denominated, a history of the wars and persecutions of the Netherlands. With the exception of a chapter or two, embracing the insurrection and expulsion of the Moors, and the expeditions against the Turkish and Barbary powers, their three volumes are wholly devoted to the civil, political, and military affairs of the Low Countries, and the topics incidentally connected with them. These writers (Robertson, Watson, and Thompson) doubtless deserve respect; but not as historians of Spain. And when we have come down to

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