which he was put soon made serious inroads on the funds he strove to save for the benefit of his American charge. In this regard Archbishop Troy, Bishops Moylan, Milner and others seem to have come to his aid and to have helped him save or recuperate his depleted resources. 39

Before the exile of Pius VII, Doctor Concanen safeguarded his vow of religious poverty by obtaining from that Pontiff permission to dispose of his possessions as he judged proper, in case death came upon him before he reached America-an eventuality he appears to have foreseen from the time of his consecration. For this reason, he made his last will and testament, on January 30, 1810. In spite of papal authority to do as he liked with his belongings, after consulting the good of his soul and satisfying the dictates of piety and gratitude, he felt that in case he did not use them himself, they should be returned to the Order whence they had been principally obtained. He divided, therefore, the residue of his modest estate between his own Province in Ireland and the American Province in whose establishment he had been highly instrumental. 40 A living tradi

39 Concanen, Rome, to Troy, Dublin, March 25, May 21, November 19, 1808; May 20, September 27, 1809; January 3, and 25, 1810; and Peter Plunkett, Leghorn, to Troy, Dublin, September 3, 1810 (all in Dublin Archives, ut supra); Concanen, Leghorn, and Rome, to Carroll, Baltimore, July 23 and 26, 1808, and August 9, 1809 (Baltimore Archives, Case 2, T 1); same, Rome, to Maréchal, Lyons, November 30, 1809, and February 12, 1810 (ibid., Case 14, U 2 and 3). At times his letters to Troy, in which he shows the efforts he made to save his property for the use of the Church in New York, make really pitiful reading.

40 Peter Plunkett, Leghorn (evidently to Carroll), September 3, 1810 (Baltimore Archives, Case 6, W 3); same, Leghorn, to Troy, Dublin, September 3, 1810 (Dublin Archives); John Joseph Argenti, Rome, to Troy, Dublin, March 7, 1812 (ibid.); Memoria per Illmo Signore Arcivescovo Olimpio, Direttore del Debito Publico (copy?)—a document of twelve pages and undated, but belonging to 1822 or early 1823 (ibid.); and a copy (perhaps an English rendition) of Concanen's will (Tallaght Archives— unlisted). If we accept the statements of this letter of Plunkett and the above Memoria, which are probably correct, and place on the English pound and the Roman crown or scudo the highest value possible for that date, Bishop Concanen had some four thousand dollars at the time of his death. Of this sum he bequeathed 100 pounds to his only sister, his nieces and nephews; 1,000 Roman crowns or scudi in part for Mass-offerings, and in part as a remuneration to certain persons who had deserved well of him; and 500 scudi to San Clemente, Rome, or his province of Ireland. The remainder he left to Saint Rose's Priory, in Kentucky. Thus, according to these documents, the proto-Dominican house in the United States was residuary legatee of Bishop Concanen to about $2,000, the amount which a tradition still living in the province tells us it received from his estate. We find an echo of this tradition in Spalding (Sketches of the Early Catholic Missions of Kentucky, p.

tion tells us that Bishop Concanen was a tall, well-built man. His splendid physique and commanding appearance were the more attractive because of his generous heart, his pleasant manners and his kindly, ascetic countenance. The same tradition tells us further that in him learning and humility, meekness and strength of character were most happily blended. It is no matter for wonder, therefore, that he appears to have been much loved by all with whom he came in contact.

At the time of his demise New York's first Ordinary was two or three and sixty years of age. His exiled friend and admirer, Pius VII, was deeply afflicted at the report of his death. 42 Had he been spared, much good for the Church in our great American metropolis, in spite of his years, might have been expected from his zeal, good judgment, and experience, his learning and amiable temperament. The young Diocese of New York might have been spared a long and sad widowhood. That Doctor Concanen was a man of singularly exalted character and admirable disposition is the verdict from many sources. His friendships and the high esteem in which he was held by two saintly Popes, by the Sacred Congregations at Rome, and by learned prelates in various parts of the world, and in his own Order; the universal confidence reposed in him and the honors that were thrust upon him; the affection that he unconsciously won from persons in every walk of life-all these declare his praise in a way that cannot be misunderstood. That his affectionate regard for the father of our American Hierarchy remained unchanged until the end is attested

154, Louisville, 1844), where we are told that this was the sum Saint Rose's received from Concanen. To the same institution he bequeathed two "parcels" of books, sacred articles, etc. But from Argenti's letter to Troy of March 7, 1812, and the fact that there are no books in the library at the Priory with the Bishop's name in them-and there is no tradition that any were ever received-it would seem that these two packets never reached their destination. Quite a different story is this from that which one reads in DeCourcy-Shea (o. c., p. 365): “By his will, made doubtless before his consecration, he bequeathed to the Dominican Convent of St. Rose, in Kentucky, his rich library and a legacy of $20,000; and these were also lost to the Diocese of New York."

41 This tradition is borne out by the information given Rev. J. W. Cummings of New York (Notes furnished by William F. McLaughlin from mss. of Bishop Bayley). See also Historical Records and Studies, Vol. ii (1900), Part I, pp. 101-102.

42 Cardinal Pamphili, Savona, to Propaganda, August 12, 1810 (Propaganda Archives, Diario di Propaganda dall' Anno 1808 all' Anno 1814, Sommario, No. 27, p. 177).

both by his letters and by the fact that on the eve of his death he began to prepare the way for the appointment, as his coadjutor, to New York, of an intimate and confidential friend of Archbishop Carroll, the Rev. Ambrose Maréchal, who later, indeed, became the third metropolitan of Baltimore.

REV. VICTOR O'DANIEL, O. P.,
Washington, D. C.

THE ATTITUDE OF SPAIN DURING THE

AMERICAN REVOLUTION

More than four score years ago the American people, attracted by the style of Irving, their first man of letters, began to read widely in the field of Spanish history. Those who became acquainted with Columbus did not doubt that in the Conquest of Granada and the Tales of the Alhambra they would find equal entertainment. In this expectation they were not disappointed. But they sought something more than entertainment. They longed to learn about the people who had given to civilization a new world, who had opened to the commerce of Europe the trade of the Pacific, who had circumnavigated the globe, and who had attempted to Christianize the aborigines of two archipelagos and two continents. Moreover, they desired to know something of the national characteristics of Spaniards, who had transferred to the New World the civilization of the Old, and whose descendants were their neighbors and in the War for Independence had been their friends. But the record of Spanish achievement in America could have been examined in the pages of some dull chronicle. In a form more attractive the literary art of Irving gave to his countrymen not only glimpses of olden times in Spain but impressions of antiquity interesting to all the human race. To Americans his descriptions of Spanish life appeared to be pictures of a distant past, but they were not. They were records, more or less faithful, of the Spain that he knew. The centuries had come and gone without greatly changing the daily life or the ideals of her people. In that country of romance Irving, whose genius lay somewhere in the enchanted region between fiction and history, found themes adapted to his taste.

Ten years after the appearance of Irving's life of Columbus, Prescott, who also had been captivated by romantic Spain, published The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella. This added definiteness of outline to the chief incidents in the golden age of Castile, while the Conquest of Peru, the Conquest of Mexico, and Philip II., a work upon which he was engaged at the time of his death, showed the rapid territorial growth of the Spanish empire and the great increase of its power. In brief, the pages of Irving and Prescott revealed for the first time to

their countrymen the outlines of an empire, perhaps the most splendid and powerful that the world had seen. Yet notwithstanding its grandeur it contained the elements of disaster and decay.

This empire, upon which the sun never set, squeezed from its subjects revenues nearly ten times as great as those of Elizabethan England. When the Virgin Queen had scarcely a battalion of regulars, the captains of Philip II. commanded a standing army of fifty thousand. Unlike other princes of modern times he held dominion of the land and of the sea, and during a part of his troubled reign was supreme on both. The air alone was free. In that element he could neither hush nor guide the tempest. At St. Quentin his soldiers inflicted on the French a decisive defeat, which they failed to improve; his Armada menaced the independence of England. In short, the power of Philip II. at one time surpassed even that of Napoleon, whose control stopped with the shore. But unlike the Emperor of France, the ruler of Spain, attached to an inherited system, was greatly lacking in originality. Besides an unequalled revenue, a victorious army, and a powerful navy Philip had merchantships, and commerce, and colonies. His people received and distributed the spices of the East and the treasure of the West. This superiority was well deserved, for Spain was the home of brave soldiers and renowned statesmen.

Englishmen are fond of praising the chivalrous and versatile Sidney, courtier, statesman, soldier, and poet. Indeed it is difficult to overpraise him. The England of James I. had Bacon, "the brightest, the wisest, and the meanest of mankind," and Jonson, Raleigh, and many other men of action who were also eminent men of letters. Startling as the statement may appear, in Spain such men were still more numerous. There were few Spanish men of letters who were not at the same time soldiers or statesmen. This must be the conclusion of a reader of the History of Spanish Literature, by George Ticknor, who belonged to the epoch of Irving and Prescott.

Not long did Spain remain at the zenith of her power. Even before the death of Philip II. there were murders, and massacres, and endless wars which wasted her substance. Time surely brought round its changes. The empire at the close of the seventeenth century was very different from what it was at the