baffled. By royal command, at the sug gestion of Mazzochi, the manuscripts. were lodged in the Museum at Portici, and numbered; but, owing to the folly of the Spaniard, were not classed in two divisions, so as to denote the quantity found in each of the two respective rooms. THEIR DEVELOPEMENT. To advance the developement and interpretation of these volumes, Charles III. instituted a society; it consisted of members, the most celebrated in that country for their literary attainments,→→ the Marquis Tannucci, Mazzochi, the Prelate Baiardi, and some few others. When Piaggi, the inventor of the process, which I have more circumstantially described in my former letter, had, together with his scholar, Vincenzo Merli, unrolled a page, or any tolerable series of characters, in any fragment, they submitted, in either case, whatever they had gained, to Mazzochi, who applied himself most successfully to the elucida tion of it. The first manuscript they opened had the title of the work, and the name of the author, at the end, that is, upon the most interior part of the roll. The work, as the title imported, was upon music, the name of the author Philodemus. Perhaps it may not be thought totally uninteresting, should I lay before your Royal Highness a view of some specimens of titles, and names, and other final inscriptions from those "Papiri," which were opened under my direction. At the end of the manuscript, No. 1042, which Camillo Paderni began to unrol 23d January, 1802, and finished 22d March in the same year, there are, 66 MR. HAYTER'S LABORS. Before the commencement of my la bors in 1802, there had been opened, during more than forty years,only eighteen manuscripts. Of what materials their substance was formed, I have already mentioned. The process or mode of opening them, has been described in my first letter. The points, at which the papyraceous" sheets were fastened together by a cement or gum, are often visible. I should conceive, that the longest roll, composed of these cemented sheets, could not have exceeded, in any instance, forty feet, and no sheet could have been longer than three feet, or thereabouts; the breadth of the sheet, as it must naturally suggest itself, must constitute the length of each roll, which, taking all the manuscripts one with ano ther, is a varying measure from somewhat less than a palm to something, but very little, more than a foot. In writing, the ancients placed the length of the roll horizontally, and the breadth was perpendicularly divided into columns, as they are called, or pages, with a varying interval between each, sometimes of more, sometimes of less, than an inch. When the whole mass was folded into a volume, or roll, they began to fold it at the end. Hence, as I have observed before, the name of the writer and title of the work have hitherto, except in two instances, been found in the innermost part of the manuscript. Very inconsiderable pieces of the stick with “ umbilici," or rollers, round which the folds were made, and of its heads, have been * These dots are inserted by me to shew, found in very rare instances; but in each that there is a chasm. instance they are either pulverized, or reduced reduced to a black and friable coal. The colour of the volumes is extremely different one from the other, in shades of a tawny, a deep or dark brown, and black, to that of the darkest charcoal. Of the latter are those of Philodemus, already unrolled; and all the Greek manuscripts, indeed, are of a blacker shade than the Latin, which are of the first. The inference from this respective state of colour in the different manuscripts, reust naturally be, that they were found in two different rooms; one of these rooms must have been less affected than the other, by the heat of the volcanic matter. But the less any manuscript has been affected by that heat, the more difficulty has been always encountered in opening it, for the reason which I have assigned in my first letter. It is remarkable, that all the Latin manuscripts, which I have attempted to unrol, have heen of a tawny or brown colour; and, therefore, one of them (which is the frag ment of a Latin poem before-mentioned) was opened with great difficulty. Another produced only unconnected scraps of broken pages or columns, in a state the more to be lamented, as, from some common words, as well as Roman proper names, it might be concluded to be Something historical. Of others, it was found totally impracticable to separate the substance, even in the smallest portions. All these, consequently, must have been lodged in one of the two rooms, different from that in which those of of Philodemus and the Greek writers were kept. 'The only mode of selecting a manuscript from the Royal Museum for developement, was very simple, but not always effectual; yet, at the same time, whenever the small brush, which they wetted and applied, in this case, to the outside surface of a manuscript, caused the exterior fold to raise itself singly in a detached state from the next under it, that manuscript, most completely justified the experiment, however simple, by a more entire separation of each fold in the volume, especially from the middle part, even to the end, and by a more entire preservation of letters, both in form and in colour. So many persons of erudition, and good sense, Russians, Germans, Swedes, Greeks, Spaniards, French, Italians, and even English, said so much of chymical experiments, as likely to contribute to the greater and more productive facility of unfolding the most conglutinated A LATIN POEM. Monday, November 29th, 1805. "The " Papiro, ,"* No. 817, which had been consigned to Don Camilla Paderni, was finished. There was no name, or title, at the end. It was the fragment of a Latin poem. Many entire verses in series were found. The poem appears to be historical. It speaks of Alexandria, Egypt, Cæsar, the Battle of Actium, a siege, the queen, &c. The same day, another "Papiro," No. 831, was chosen, and consigned to the same Don Camillo Paderni." MODE OF COLLATING. If I might be permitted, I would here exemplify to your Royal Highness this most troublesome part of my employ ment. The first piece of the eleventh book of Epicurus, which, to repeated view and minute observation, exhibited the ap pearance of a tolerably entire and individual column, was copied, as such. As in every other instance, where any part of a manuscript had been copied, so in this, I first collated the copy with the dark original, letter for letter. Then I began, with all possible attention, mixed, however, with extreme distrust, both of myself, and of the thing itself, to attempt lumns of every manuscript, the most the interpretation. In the different coperfectly unrolled, there have been al *The copper-plate far-simile copy of this" Papiro" is now at Oxford! What an immense price, indeed, the Pere Montfaus con, whose grand aim in his Itinerant researches, was to find in some book a specimen of ancient Latin orthography, would have set upon this fragment! In fact, the Chevalier Seratti, then Secretary of State for "Case Reali," when I communicated to him the discovery of this Latin fragment, exclaimed, with much rapture, that this discovery was worth aff my pains, and all the expence of our government. ways ways found wanting many letters, often a word, or, more rarely, a whole sentence, or whole sentences, respectively. For the just interpretation, it was impossible, it would at least have been unjustifiable, to have proceeded otherwise, than I invariably used to do in the case of each "Lacuna." Its dimensions I exactly ascertained by an accurate, often retraced, mensuration. This rigid mensuration was then applied by me in the same manner, and agreeably to the form, under which that same manuscript presented every given character, to as many characters as, conjecturally, and consistently with the supposed sense of the context, I wished to replace in that " Lacuna." When I was entirely satisfied, that these mensurations were accurate, and that the conjectural letters, thus supplied, expressed the very sense of the author, or, at least, some not inapplicable sense, the copyist was ordered by me to make a partial facsimile of that "Lacuna," and of the letter which immediately came before it, and, also, of the letter which immediately came after it, and then make in the "Lacuna" itself a fac-simile transcript of each character, which had been supplied, in strict conformity to the usual distances between the respective letters in the same manuscript. When this whole process admitted, "modulo, ac pede," and in aptest correspondence, my substituted, or supplied, characters, I wrote them, in my own interpreted copy of that manuscript with red ink, in order to distinguish them from the actually existing characters of the original. After having gone through this process in the quoted instance of the first piece of the abovenentioned eleventh book of Epicurus, after having repeated several times this process, in consequence of the alteration which, the surface, by the detachment and loss of several of its particles, repeatedly exhibited, I found, that, after this repeated process, and the laboured, tormenting, and most unsatisfactory, supplemental conjectures of a month, both in the Museum and at home, as well for the vacant letters, as for the sense, my whole interpretation was necessarily wrong. This piece, which was supposed to form one column, was at last discovered to consist of two halves, one of which really belonged to the situation which it occupied, the other, to a preceding column. Of the violent transposition of characters by the same transposition of particles, in the same column, an example is afforded in the following extract from my journal: Wednesday, 6th February, 1805. "The "Papiro," No. 26, which had been consigned to Don Antonio Lentari, was finished, and at the end were the characters, MANUSCRIPTS DISCOVERED AND NOW IN The dialect of the fragments of the eight books of Epicurus is attic; that of Polystratus and Colotes, is so to a certain degree only. The dialect of the Treatise upon Anger, I think, is somewhat attic; the language of that treatise, in general, is superior to all the rest. If one except the Latin poem, the subjects of all the manuscripts at Oxford are biographical, or physical, or philolo gical, or moral, or theological. In dif ferent places of different works, there are short poetical quotations from lost poets. One quotation from the Odyssey is incalculably precious, because we find, in this quotation, the same language, expression for expression, as in the present editions. The whole of the present text, therefore, of the poet, boasts an authenticity of a very remote period, certainly not less than sixteen hundred and thirtytwo years, if an illative argument of this nature may be regarded as of weight in this case, which, as purely accidental, is unquestionably freer from cavil than most other cases. It may be added, with great truth, that all these manu scripts, which -nec ignes, Nec poterat ferrum, nec edax abolere vetustas, even if the consideration of their high antiquity be excluded, even if no value be affixed to them, as the most legitimate criterions of orthography in the two learned languages, these manuscripts, I must say, are still inestimable, because the compositions, preserved in them, had been supposed to have been irrecoverably lost. DEPUTATION FROM NAPLES. At the commencement of the year 1806, it was well known that his Sicilian majesty intended to leave Naples, and that the queen and the royal family, would also be obliged soon afterwards to leave it, I thought it my duty to solicit the official interposition of his majesty's minister for the removal of the manu scripts, scripts, both originals, and copies. The want of Sinstruction from government for that purpose, I was told, still prevented his official interposition; at the same tine his majesty's minister directed me to go in his name to the Chevalier Seratti, with a representation of the necessity there was to remove these objects. This secretary of state, instead of entering inmediately into the subject of my visit, chose, with great violence, and with foaming mouth, and in the most unjustitiable terms, to heap upon me, whose mission was certainly not at all political, the most heavy invectives against his majesty's forces, which had been landed at Naples. At last, having, in the course of an half hour, most amply vented his rage, he returned, in a softened tone, to the cause of my visit: he assured me, that removal would injure the original "Papiri," and was besides not necessary; "we shall soon be at Naples again." After the departure of the king, the hereditary prince was regent of the kingdom. For the same reason, and in the same manner, as his majesty's minister had not yet received instructions, I was directed to wait upon his royal highness, who informed me, that the king, at the time of his departure, in which he was accompanied by the Chevalier Seratti, had given strict orders for not removing the manuscripts. From these orders the regent could not deviate. It must be confessed, the political character of Chevalier Seratti was generally regarded as not favourable to the interests of Great Britain, but strongly inclining to the French party. Whatever may be the truth, I must have some right to question his good faith, at least, when Nec cineri servata Fides. The Chevalier dé Medici succeeded the Chevalier Seratti in office. The Monday before our flight from Naples, in February, 1806, I was again directed, upon my application to his majesty's minister, who had not yet received his instructions, to go to the new secretary of state. The Chevalier, who was not then, it should seem, in the secret, desired I would, in his name, order Pirro Paderni, who had succeeded La Vega, as keeper of the Royal Museum, immedi ately to prepare all the "Papiri" for removal. This I did about noon that very day. Pirro Paderni expressed much alacrity in his apparent readiness to execute this order; but he told me, that he would go that very afternoon to the secre3 tary of state, from whom, for his own se curity, after the orders of the king, he must in person receive a written com mand for the purpose. The whole scene was then shifted. The next morning I was informed, the orders of the king, with regard to these manuscripts, were in revived force. What else could be expected? Your royal highness may be pleased to consider, that the Chevalier Seratti, and others still higher, who were never suspected of too much anglicism, would, in the instance of these manu scripts, avail themselves of every cir cumstance that seemed to justify a noncompliance with the demands of your royal highness's superintendent. The circumstance that his majesty's minister would not officially, much less urgently, insist upon the removal of the manu scripts, gave the party, who opposed that removal, a fair pretext for that opposition. This party said, and I heard it repeated, that this removal could not have been wished by government, otherwise his majesty's minister would have interposed. So far this party may be thought to be supported by some justification, provided your royal highness could, for a moment, be reconciled to the measure of abandoning to the com. mon enemy those objects. For the acquisition of them a person had been sent to Naples, under your own royal commission, and received in that character by the Neapolitan court. In the acquis sition of them, that person had several years employed the most continual and the most embarrassing study and fatigue, and at the expence of his majesty's go vernment, and under the sanction of an act of parliament, in the kingdom of a sovereign, who is under the most essen. tial obligations to Great Britain. With the before-mentioned pretext, however, not only all the original manuscripts, which would be injured, it was said, by removal, but even the engraved fac simile copies of some books of Epicurus, unfolded during my superintendency, (and surely these could not be injured by re moval) were abandoned to the common enemy. Besides, this pretext enabled two different parties to secure the attain ment of their wishes, directed as they were, upon different motives, to the same end. The one branch consisted in those men, who would not follow the court to Sicily. These men must have been eager to retain at Naples all the royal property, which would gratify their new masters, and secure for themselves, to any degree, means of indulgence or protection. The other branch consisted of those who had been employed about these manuscripts; Rosini, Peter la Vega, the unfolders, and the copyists, wished to retain, as, in fact, they retain, the same employment under the French. Both these branches of the same party, protected by the queen, obtained, through Seratti, the king's order for not removing these manuscripts, nor those engraved fac simile copies. To these motives must be added another, if I may call indifference a motive, for relinquishing these manuscripts. This indifference of men in the two Sicilies, with regard to literature in general, and therefore with regard to these manuscripts, is remarkable. For instance, a Marquis Berio, with whom I was well acquainted, had one of the best libraries in the world: he possessed the reputation of learning, and of the encouragement of the learned. This eminent letterato, in the frequent visits he made me at Portici, would al ways come to my own house, to the museum never. A man of that country, now high in office at Palermo, asked me,. whether the text of those famosi papiri were not Arabic. More than two hundred " Papiri" had, heen opened wholly, or in part, during my stay at Naples. The experience of every day had added infinite facility and skill, with accurate and secure, but rapid, dexterity, to each unfolder and copyist. Hence, with these increasing advantages, every one of the remaining fifteen hundred, or as many of them as could be opened, would be opened, and copied, it was reasonably and universally cal culated, within the space of six years at the most. The enemy can, therefore, in addition to the original manuscripts themselves, enjoy the advantage of this improved skill in the persons, whom I employed about them. At Palermo it was in vain that I ap plied to the Chevalier Seratti to obtain permission to have for my use, and with a view to publication, a single manuscript, that is, a single fac simile copy, of all the fac simile copies which were brought from Naples, although they had: been unfolded and copied under my. direction, and although they had all been corrected, and many of them had been interpreted and translated by myself. This minister of state wished, as he had with the most corrupt and most inde corous misconduct, contributed to deprive your royal highness of all the ori ginal manuscripts, and of some of the most valuable engraved fac simile copies, to have been also as successfully guilty with regard, to all those fac simile copies. The auspicious return of the Right Honourable Sir William Drummond, his majesty's minister at that court, this second time the successor, as the first time the predecessor, of Hugh Elliot, esq. defeated all the intentions of the Chevalier Seratti. The Chevalier dé Medici, the successor of the Chevalier Seratti, complied at once with the demands of Sir William Drummond, and consigned to him, by order of the king, all the fac simile copies, which are now. at Oxford. Of these, the Treatise upon Death, and the Fragment of the Latin Poem, together with the Greek and Latin alphabets, were immediately engraved under my superintendency at Palermo. AN Historical and Topographical Description OF CHELSEA AND ITS ENVIRONS; interspersed with Biographical Anecdotse Illustrious and Eminent Persons who have resided in Chelsea during the three preceding Centuries. BY THOMAS FAULKNER, of Chelsea. Mr. Faulkner has made the best use of a good subject. The vicinity of Chelsea to the meuopolis, and its pleasant site on the banks of the Thames, have for many ages made it the retreat of statesmen and of persons engaged in the active scenes of life; hence its history involves personal anecdotes of those whose memory is the most dear to the recollections of Englishmen. Our limits do not allow us to do that justice to Mr. Faulk ner's work which it deserves, but most of our readers will be amused by the following passages, and for others of equal curiosity we refer them to the work itself. For our parts we wish every considerable parish round London had an historian of the taste and industry of this writer. |
