s informed, that, although the constant use
made of the collection by its possessor for the correction of his
own work must prevent a full compliance with this request, yet any
particular books which he might designate should be sent to him, and, if
he were disposed to make a visit to Boston, the fullest opportunities
should be granted him for the prosecution of his researches. This
invitation Mr. Wilson did not think fit to accept. Books which were got
in readiness for transmission to him he failed to send for. He had,
in the mean time, discovered that "the American stand-point" did not
require any examination of "authorities." We regret that it should also
have rendered superfluous an acquaintance with the customs of civilized
society. The tone in which he speaks of his distinguished predecessor
is sometimes amusing from the conceit which it displays, sometimes
disgusting from its impudence and coarseness. He concedes Mr. Prescott's
good faith in the use of his materials. It was only his ignorance and
want of the proper qualifications that prevented him from using them
aright. "His non-acquaintance with Indian character is much to be
regretted." Mr. Wilson himself enjoys, as he tells us, the inestimable
advantage of being the son of an adopted member of the Iroquois tribe.
Nay, "his ancestors, for several generations, dwelt near the Indian
agency at Cherry Valley, on Wilson's Patent, _though in Cooperstown
village was he born_." We perceive the author's fondness for the
inverted style in composition,--acquired, perhaps, in the course of his
long study of Aboriginal oratory. Even without such proofs, and without
his own assertion of the fact, it would not have been difficult, we
think, to conjecture his familiarity with the forms of speech common
among barbarous nations.

But it is not merely through "his non-acquaintance with Indian
character" that Mr. Prescott was at fault. He was also, it appears, in a
hopeless state of ignorance in regard to the political institutions of
Spain. He knew nothing of the Spanish censorship, and its restrictions
upon the freedom of the press. "He showed his faith," writes Mr. Wilson,
"by the expenditure of a fortune at the commencement of his enterprise,
in the purchase of books and MSS. relating to 'America of the
Spaniards.'" This last phrase is marked as quoted, but we believe it to
be the author's own. "These were the materials out of which he framed
his _two_ histories of the _two_