Autograph Note Signed (third person)

This powerhouse British statesman and politician served four terms as Prime Minister (between 1868 and 1894) and four terms as Chancellor of the Exchequer, among many other important posts. ANS (third person), 2pp (single leaf), 4½" X 7½", Whitehall, U.K., 14 October 1861. Very good. Inoffensive glue stains to lower half (blank) of verso. Boldly penned in brown ink: "The Chancellor of the Exchequer presents his compliments to Messrs. Macmillan and returns his best thanks for their kindness in presenting him with so interesting a work as the translation of the memoirs of M. De Tocqueville." In 1861 the London publisher Macmillan published the first translation into English of French diplomat, historian and "Democracy in America" author Alexis De Tocqueville's posthumous two-volume "Memoirs, Letters, and Remains of Alexis De Tocqueville." Gladstone famously described the U.S. Constitution as "the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man" -- a sentiment similar to De Tocqueville's description of the Constitution as "the most perfect federal constitution that ever existed." It would be interesting to know Gladstone's opinion of De Tocqueville's memoir.…