In forming his judgment Lowell seems to have used the broad means which great ambassadors have always had recourse to. That is, he did not merely sift the opinions he received from Spaniards, or put himself under the tutelage of any one man, but he attended the debates of the Cortes, he read the more intelligent journals, he talked with leaders of Spanish opinion, and be availed himself of converse with those foreigners travelling in Spain, whose impressions could be valued, and behind all lay an old acquaintance with Spanish history and literature, constantly added to, and an apprehension of Spanish character, reënforced by personal intercourse. In a word, he went about the business of an American minister to Spain with the same painstaking care and the same breadth of view which, as a scholar, he would employ on the interpretation of a great piece of literature. He did not neglect the commercial side of his business, but he properly made it subordinate, holding that he was not merely representing the country as an eminent consul, but was assisting at the high court of international comity. In the analysis which he attempts, he testifies to the kind of training which he brings to the task, by fixing his attention mainly on the leaders of parties, and studying their characters and aims. Especially is this true of his acute examination of the qualities of Señor Cánovas del Castillo, whom he regards as not only the ablest politician, but capable also of being Spain’s most far-seeing statesman, and he makes his observation more effective by the comparison which he draws between him and Señor Castelar. Mr. Adee, who, when Lowell went to Spain, was chargé d’affaires, in his intelligent and appreciative Introduction to “Impressions of Spain,” remarks that “necessarily lacking the knowledge of the true springs of national impulse deep down in the heart of the masses, he dealt with the surface indications, and analyzed the character and motives of the men on top, whose peculiarities most caught his attention.” It is quite as much to the point that Lowell did not assume a profound knowledge of the Spanish people, and that he wrote of the phenomena most on the field of his own activity as a minister resident. He was, moreover, too sound a scholar and too shrewd a man to indulge in philosophizing on a nation from the data furnished even by long study and some personal experience. Nevertheless, whatever he lets fall about Spain, as well as his more studied expression, indicates that kind of insight which was one of Lowell’s gifts of nature, and stood him in good stead as a critic of books, of men, and of nations.