JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. Duke University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Hispanic American Historical Review.The book review section of this issue is devoted to the republication of selections from nineteenth-century reviews of Prescott's writings. The reviews are accompanied by quotations from Prescott 's journals or correspondence. FERDINAND AND ISABELLA North American Review, XLVI (1838). We hold it therefore to be just matter of congratulation to the whole literary world, that this interesting and instructive chapter of modern history has at length been written, and so thoroughly that it will not require, as most Spanish history does, to be re-written. We are gratified that such a work has originated in this country; and pleased too to observe by a foreign advertisement, that it is in course of publication, under suitable auspices, at London, as well as here. Indeed it has probably already appeared there; and although we cannot anticipate for a large historical work by an unknown American, that kind of rapid and ephemeral popularity which greets the newest novel from a familiar hand, we shall be disappointed if the literary portion of the British public do not give the stranger a fair welcome, and admit him gradually to the place he is entitled to hold among the historians of our common language. At the commencement of the reign of their own young, beautiful, and accomplished queen, called to preside over the destinies of so great a nation,, at a moment demanding so much of wisdom, justice, moderation, and independence in its government, it would seem as if more than common interest might be felt in the authentic exhibition of these kingly qualities, in a female sovereign of such precious example and glorious memory, as Isabella of Castile, whose only fault was a virtue, perverted by the bigotry of the times. Nor can we republicans contemplate her true-hearted respect for the just rights of the people, so rare in that age, without some augmentation of that filial regard which we entertain for her as the mother of America,-an appellation to which this eminent woman is justly entitled; and if we cannot feel the same love for the cold-hearted and selfish Ferdinand, we may at least admire the depth of his policy, and the vigor of his administration, doing him the poor justice not to adopt those grossly exaggerated views of his hypocrisy and deception, which have so This content downloaded from 128.235.251.160 on Sat, 20 Dec 2014 20:32:32 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions HAHR FEBRUARYcommonly deformed the pages of other writers. The politicians and statesmen of both countries will find in the history of this reign much food for reflection ...