41 Crowndale Road N. W.
Jan 10th 1870
My Dear Sir
I am making application for the vacant post in Dr Birch’s department and I should esteem it a great favour if you could give me a testimonial Dr Birch desires to impress on the appointing trustees that as his assistant will have the care of the Assyrian collection and have to work upon it, it is desirable that he should be an Assyrian student – the last paper I have published is a notice of Mr Norris’s dictionary in the North British Review for October 1869 another article of Mine you will find in the part for January 1870 but I have no copies or I would send you one I am getting up matter for a history of Babylonia & Assyria and translations of all the principal historical texts and for a grammar & dictionary of the Akkad language but there is no chance of publishing them for the present – an account of the reign of Sennacherib by me will appear soon in the Zeitschrift – I have not heard for some time how you are getting on with the Assyrian I should be glad to see the second part of your Glossary
Yours respectfully
George Smith
Fox Talbot Esq