ARTICLE IX.-THE TICKNOR SPANISH LIBRARY.

Catalogue of the Spanish Library bequeathed by George Ticknor to the Boston Public Library . . . by J. L. WHITNEY. Boston, 1879. Large 8vo. pp. xv., 476, double columns.

A VISIT to the Ticknor Spanish Collection in the Boston Public Library, awakens a line of reminiscences which would be flattering to the literary annals of any country. Early in this century four young men finished their university education and went abroad to make the journey of Spain with more than ordinary care. Filled with the aroma of that wonderful land, whose monuments bristle with the traditions of three thousand years, they devoted themselves to its history, its poetry, and its spirit, and returned home to develop their thoughts. One familiarized the world with the incomparable legends of Granada and her now peaceful vega; of the Alhambra and the Vermillion Towers; of the fate of Boabdil and the passage over the "Last Sigh of the Moor." Another told the story of letters, the marvelous genius of the Spanish pen, and illustrated the fierce but fruitless struggle of the intellect against the fatal alliance between the altar and the throne. He, too, filled the world with his one life-thought, and accomplished that wherein he had no predecessors, and has since had no peer.* The third wrote the most brilliant pages of Spain's civil history, from the time of her political autonomy down to the brink of her awful decline. The fourth caught the spirit

*Of course Spain touched in her pundonór, looked about for a quick avenger of Mr. Ticknor. The queen offered her University Professor of the National literature a handsome annuity to overshadow the American's book. After sixteen years of patient toil, Mr. Amador de los Rios, a true hater of foreigners, brought out seven large volumes of the "Critical History" which only reached, however, the close of the Fifteenth century. Well known scholars at Madrid have frequently assured the writer that Don José paused at a convenient period for his reputation, for he was a consummate critic in the origins of the literature. But Spanish honor was at least vindicated in the title, and, though the author lived eleven years after the seventh volume had seen the light, he never cared to pursue the vendetta further.

of the courtly poets of don Juan Segundo, immortalizing Manrique and the lighter lyrics of the Gil Vicente school.

What a record for our country in only fifty years! The Chronicle of Granada and the Alhambra, by Irving; the Ferdinand and Isabella, and the Second Philip, by Prescott; the History of the Spanish Literature, by Ticknor, and the Coplas de Manrique, translated by Longfellow, form a galaxy of which any nation might be justly proud. The three first were promptly turned into the leading languages of Europe, and in Spain they have long been naturalized glories.* At the portals of the Alhambra to-day, the Castilian versions of Washington Irving are served to the traveler with the local guide-book of the Moor Bensaken. The name Eerveen is as much a household word in Granada, as the gate of Elvira, or the little square of the Zacatin on the Darro.

In view of these facts, augmented of late by another illustrious name, that of Mr. Motley, the location of a great Spanish library in this country, is peculiarly appropriate. If five of our distinguished citizens have repaid to the Spains of Columbus the debt of the discovery, let us have a fitting monument to their genius and an incentive to further exertions. Why should we still have to go abroad to gather materials to illustrate any department of Peninsular history or letters? Other countries are rapidly filling the vacancies in their collections, and sparing their subjects the pains of long voluntary expatriation. The British Museum has shrewdly employed now for many years Spain's great bibliographer, don Pascual de Gayangos, and busied him with enriching its shelves with the thousands of Iberian waifs that are occasionally floated from their lurking-places of centuries. They have also had men of learning at the "National," at Simancas and the Colombina, making copies of the most important documents of history. The Bibliothèque Impériale, now Nationale, of Paris, has of late commissioned one of the ablest classical scholars of France to examine and technically describe the Greek manuscripts at the Escorial, Madrid, and Salamanca, ancient codices of Byzance,

* Between 1833, when the Spanish version of the Tales of the Alhambra first appeared at Valencia, and 1856, the date of the fourth and last volume of the translation of Mr. Ticknor's History.

presented by the Turkish Sultan about 1545, to don Diego de Mendoza, Ambassador of Charles at Venice, and by him bequeathed to Philip II. Germany is doing the same in Americana and the historical records of the Middle Age.

The insecurity of Spanish libraries is another argument in favor of such collections in better administered lands. Whatever they may say to the contrary, we know that their rarities are gradually disappearing from the Peninsula. The Colombina, at Seville, a collection made by Fernando Colon (Columbus) the admiral's son, comprising the leading publications of Spain and Italy during the first century of printing, has long been pillaged for most of the public and private libraries of Europe, though there is said to be perfect security now. The writer has on several occasions, during a period of many years, been offered venerable incunabula, some bearing on their covers the arms of Ferdinand and Isabella, stamped there four hundred years ago. But they find a ready, though always 'hazardous, market in the shops, whence they generally disappear from the country. Occasionally, it is true, the authorities are notified of such foraging by some righteous lover of old traditions. Our venerable friend, the late librarian of the National at Madrid,* nearly lost his position in 1875, on account of a large abstraction of valuable books of the Fifteenth century. An informer of the above sort notified the government of the robbery, committed of course by the porters, and after a few days of police work, the volumes were all seized on the back shelves of a well-known bibliopole. of the capital. Many other examples must be reserved which have passed under our eye, but those cited will suffice. The late severe Amador de los Rios, of whom we have already had occasion to speak, said thirty-five years ago, that foreign. gold is the cause. The fact, however, remains, and unless * The poet don Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch, now, if alive, seventy-four years of age. He was subsequently "jubileed," as they say-put on the retired listand Mr. Rosell, a younger gentleman, replaced him.

"For our part, we

In his Toledo Pintoresca, Mad., 1845, p. 150. His words are: thank the intelligent clergyman who guards those treasures (in the Archiepiscopal library of Toledo) with so much jealous care, and who, though poor, has uniformly held out against the temptations of foreign visitors in their efforts to secure copies of those coveted editions."

the missing treasures are absorbed by well guarded public libraries abroad, there are few guarantees for their transmission to posterity.

Not long ago several rich private collections, like those of Morante and Miro, were luckily sold at Paris; but a few, and among them, those of Salvá, Usóz, and Gen. La Romana, have been retained in the Peninsula.* The Duke of Osuna's splendid library, numbering more than 100,000 Spanish books and MSS. will soon be scattered to the winds, after four centuries of gathering. The present duke is the last of his title, having no succession, and his vast estates are already in the hands of administrators who allow him a handsome, but always insufficient, rente, while he maintains the family traditions as Ambassador of Spain at St. Petersburg.

These suggest a few of the reasons that justify the expense attending the accumulation of Spanish books in our country. Many others mights be adduced, if space were at our disposal. When we remember that as yet several departments of human investigation are without an historian, the documents of which exist to day, but may not fifty years hence, the question of possession becomes one of national interest. Certain episodes of the XVIth century in Spain, then the leading power in Europe, are yet wrapped up in contemporary records for the most part unique. The dissenting movement there is still to be written, though Usóz in his Reformistas Antiguos Españoles and Boehmer in his Bibliotheca, have contributed important auxiliaries. We have seen and examined more than 500 volumes of that century, of which there is scarcely a hint in Simon, Le Long, Reimmann, Vogt, Gerdes, Pellicer, and Castro, of the old bibliographers, or in Brunet, Græsse, Haym, Salvá y Mallén, and Gallardo, of the recent ones. Yet these little volumes (in few cases folios) are extant in one or two copies only, the sample copies of Inquisitorial mercy, preserved by the convents among the libros excomulgados. With these or their transcripts and what may now be copied from the archives of the ancient Inquisition, a corpus Reformatorum could be worthily compiled for Spain.

* Salvá's collection was purchased for about $35,000, by Senator Heredia of Madrid, who often allowed the writer to take rare books to his house. Usóz' invaluable treasures in Protestant worthies of the XVIth century, and LaRomana's gathered during the Peninsular war, went to the "National" in 1874 and 1875.

Coming now to the Ticknor Library itself, such an array of valuable works, yearly becoming more difficult to procure in proportion as their importance is understood, cannot be estimated by the ordinary tests, especially when it is considered that they were gathered during a period of more than fifty years. But the peculiar interest attached to the collection consists in the design with which it was originally made. Mr. Ticknor, in his preparations for the History of the Spanish Literature, was compelled to possess and handle, to read and sift, almost every accessible volume in any degree representative or characteristic of a period, from the introduction of the typographical art into the Peninsula down to the middle of the present century. Besides, the vast army of auxiliaries and tributaries illustrative of special subjects and men; translations, criticisms and monographs in the leading European languages, formed no inconsiderable portion of his available apparatus. Hence, though foreign collections may be remarkable for the number of editions of the same author, and for their dramatic, historical, poetical or ascetic repertory, few will be found to embrace so uniformly the complete catalogue of the best editions in each department and epoch, as does this sumptuous bequest of the illustrious American.

To mention a few of the notabilities of continental libraries and indulge in a little bibliographical gossip, a short digression may be allowed. Vienna and Wolfenbüttel are specially rich in Cancioneros and pliegos sueltos, or detached ballads of the time of Charles the Fifth. The Madrid university now possesses the Complutensian Library, founded in 1499 by Cardinal Ximénez, together with his personal copy of the great Polyglott, one of the six printed on fine vellum. The British Museum paid £500 for their copy, picked up in the Rastro or bric à brac quarter of Madrid, by a Jew!

The King's library (Bibliotèca particular de S. M.) in the Madrid Palace, has the set of early chivalry books from Amadis to Magalona; a superb Cervantes collection; the most beautiful uncut copy in existence of the original Cancionero General (Valencia, 1511); the Portuguese Cancioneiro Geral and that of Diniz; the Chronicle of Don Juan II., printed on vellum; a large paper copy uncut of the Ferrara or Jews'