Prescription. of unfamiliar lands. Mexico spreads her matchless valley, her lake, and her imperial city before our eyes; we wander through the royal gardens, beneath the giant cedars of Tezucuco; the golden halls of the Inca and the blazing temples of the sun unfold themselves before us; we follow the silver-shod cavalry of Pizarro through the flowery dales of the Cordilleras; or we ascend through the pastures of the llama or the stern regions where the condor hovers in the tropical sun around the peaks of the Andes. The account of the triste noche, the rueful night, in which, after the death of Montezuma, Cortes and his band retreated across the lake and along the broken causeway, cutting their way through a nation in arms, is one of the finest pieces of modern historical painting. In the Reign of Philip II. unflagging strength and unabated fire are displayed in the treatment of the troubles in the Low Countries, the siege of Malta, the rebellion of the Mexicans, and the battle of Lepanto.
Mr Prescott's chapters on manners and literature are not less lively and picturesque than his record of contemporary events which these chapters illustrate. Of modern historians he was one of the first to acknowledge and to exhibit the importance of this kind of illustration, which his immediate predecessors had been too much in the habit of neglecting. In another respect also his works set an example well worthy of general adoption. Not content with embodying the result of his own researches, he constructed a road to the fountains from whence he had drawn and the mines in which he had toiled, in order, to use his own words, "to put the reader in a position for judging for himself, and thus for revising and, if need be, of reversing, the judgments of the historian." Of all his chief authorities he has left us elaborate biographical notices, showing their means of obtaining a true knowledge of facts, the circumstances and influences to which they were exposed, the complexion of their minds, and the value of their evidence. Were this method of writing history general, we should lose some ingenious books, but we should also escape the noxious influence of many dishonest ones. On those who read critically Mr Prescott's plan must have already had a wholesome effect. From him many such readers must have learned to distrust even the most brilliant of the writing craft who withhold the grounds of their faith and facts, who cite sparingly and loosely, and impudently tell the world that they have drawn materials, perhaps for caricatures of the past and slanders on the dead, from sources so numerous as to defy specification.
As a critic and essayist, Mr Prescott would have attained great eminence had he pursued that path of letters. His essays on Cervantes, Molière, Scott, and Italian narrative poetry are written with much taste and with a just appreciation of their subjects. His reviews are none of them examples of the slashing style of criticism. When he turned aside from his own chosen course, it was for the purpose of throwing some fresh light upon the old masterpieces, or of bidding an unknown fellow-labourer welcome to the temple of Fame. If a blockhead was to be lashed or a knave exposed, he left them to critics who loved to perform such operations. It was very characteristic of his gentle and genial nature that he prefaced his volume of essays, which most readers will be disposed to regard as eminently calm and candid in tone, with the wish "that some of his critical judgments had been expressed in a more qualified and temperate manner." When those who knew and loved Mr Prescott shall have passed away, his memory will still be cherished by his countrymen, not only for the sake of works which will always rank amongst the chief monuments of American literature, but also for the sake of his pure and graceful life, which did honour to the literary calling. (W. S.)