After the publication of _Ferdinand and Isabella_, its author rested on his oars, treating himself to social relaxation and enjoying thoroughly the praise which came to him from every quarter. Of course he had no intention of remaining idle long, but a new subject did not at once present itself so clearly to him as to make his choice of it inevitable. For about eighteen months, therefore, he took his ease. His correspondence, however, shows that he was always thinking of a second venture in the field of historical composition. His old bent for literary history led him to consider the writing of a life of Molière--a book that should be agreeable and popular rather than profound. Yet Spain still kept its hold on his imagination, and even before his _Ferdinand and Isabella_ had won its sure success, he had written in a letter to Ticknor the following paragraph:-- "My heart is set on a Spanish subject, could I compass the materials: viz. the conquest of Mexico and the anterior civilisation of the Mexicans--a beautiful prose epic, for which rich virgin materials teem in Simancas and Madrid, and probably in Mexico. I would give a couple of thousand dollars that they lay in a certain attic in Bedford Street." This purpose lingered in his mind all through his holidays, which were, indeed, not wholly given up to idleness, for he listened to a good deal of general reading at this time, most of it by no means of a superficial character. Ever since his little daughter's death, Prescott had felt a peculiar interest in the subject of the immortality of the soul, and had read all of the most serious treatises to be found upon that subject. He had also gone carefully through the Gospels, weighing them with all the acumen which he had brought to bear upon his Castilian chronicles. This investigation, which he had begun with reference to the single question of immortality, broadened out into an examination of the whole evidential basis of orthodox Christianity. In this study he was aided by his father, who brought to it the keen, impartial judgment of an able lawyer. Of the conclusions at which he ultimately arrived, he was not wont to talk except on rare occasions, and his cast of mind was always reverential. He did, however, reject the doctrines of his Puritan ancestors. He held fast to the authenticity of the Gospels, but he found in these no evidence to support the tenets of Calvinism.