That
INDEX EXPURGATORIUS. 569
$7. That ingenious trifler, Mr. Horace Walpole, has given us (Royal and Noble Authors, vol. i. p. 67—81.) a very curious article of the brave and learned Earl Rivers. He is, however, inaccurate in the account of a tournament in Smithfield between the Earl and the great Bastard of Burgundy. 1. The tournament which was held just before the death of Philip, Duke of Burgundy, that is to say in the beginning of the summer 1467 (V. Mémoires d’Olivier de la Marché, p. 489, &c. in 4to. à Gand, 1566, et Chronique de Bourgogne dans le second volume de Philippe de Comines, p. 189.) could have no relation with the nuptials of Duke Charles and the Princess of England, which were ce. lebrated in July, 1468. From this mistaken date Mr. Walpole extracts a very puerile reflexion. The hero and the virago might think the combat of their near relation a proper compliment to their union; but the brother of Edward the Fourth’s wife can scarcely be deemed a near relation of Edward’s sister. 2. Mr. Walpole draws his account of the combat from an Englishman who thought that when the champions were parted the superiority was clearly on Earl Rivers’s side. Olivier de la Marche was of a different opinion; but he viewed the whole affair with the partial eyes of a subject of Burgundy. Mr. Walpole shews at least an equal partiality to the English knight, when he ex- © tols Earl Rivers’s generosity, for disdaining the first day to make use of the advantage he had gained by killing the Bastard’s horse. The advantage itself was a contravention of the laws of chivalry; the Earl was forced to excuse himself both to the king, who expressed great anger, and to his adversary, who readily accepted his excuses and his assurances that the blow was purely accidental. (V. Oliv. de la Marche, p. 91. Mémoires sur la Chevalerie par M. de St. Palaye, &c.) Iam sorry Mr. Walpole never met with Olivier de la Marche. He might have added to his article of Earl Rivers a multitude of those little anecdotes he is so fond of.
38. M. de Buffon often sacrifices truth to eloquence, and consistency to variety. In the fourth volume of his Natural History, (V. Discours sur la Nature des, Animaux, p. 13—34.) the brain is the general sensoriam of the animal; and the centre of the whele nervous system,
VOL. III. 4D with
570 INDEX EXPURGATORIUS.::
with which it communicates by. an universal action and réaction ;"in a word ‘the seat of sentiment and the ‘spring of action in every créature — destitute of an intellectual soul. Such is the basis.of M. de: Buffon’s profound though obscure metaphysics. But in the seventh volume (Discours sur les Animaux Carnassiers,-p. 13, 16, &c.)-this basis is entirely overturned. The brain is degraded into dead matter, inseniible, and scarcely organized, which serves only to transmit to the nerves the nourishment it had received from the arteries. The diaphragma succeeds to all the former powers of the brain, at least to many of them ; for M. de Buffon disdains to acquaint us either with the defects he ‘discovered in his old system,.or with the parts of it he still chooses to retain, and the manner he connects them with his new principles. Instead of a candid confession that he had been seduced by a delusive though brilliant hypothesis, he endeavours to make the world forget it, by observing a profound silence on that head, in the copious and curious index he has drawn up himself for his great work. ©
39. M. de Buffon seems.to be a.very poor classical scholar. He always cites Aristotle in Latin, and most of his-quotations from the ancients appear borrowed from Gesner ‘and Aldrovandus. It is a great pity, as this ignorance:has deprived him of many.curious materials. His admirable history of the elephant (Histoire Naturelle, tom. xii. p. 1—93.) might have been still more curious and equally authentic ; since I think the testimony of a Pliny, &c. who appeal to the whole Roman people as to. what they saw in the amphitheatre, deserves as much credit as the stories a traveller brings back from Congo or Siam. M. de Buffon might perhaps have determined with less confidence that the climate-of Europe is too cold for elephants. (V. p..30—47.) Iam sensible that there are no examples of that animal’s multiplying or even subsisting in a state of nature beyond the limits of Asia and Africa. But there are many of the elephant’s being employed in war in Spain, Sicily, and the southern parts of Italy, of their going through all the fatigues of a campaign, &c. Those of Hannibal perished indeed in the severe winter marches that general made-over the Alps and Apennines. A curious passage of Juvenal (Sat: xii. 102.) informs us that droves of
elephants
INDEX EXPURGATORIUS. 571
elephants belonging to the emperor, were kept in the fields round ‘Ardea. ‘They were probably maintained: for the public shews ; and it is to other droves of the same nature that we are to refer, the elephant’s bones found in Tuscany and other parts of Italy; (V. Dissertazioni del Cavalier Guazzeri, p. 68, &c.)
40. Father Pagi, to whom good letters have many obligations, shews (in his Dissertatio Hypatica, p. 368.) that he read history. like a monk. A writer or two of his own complexion had made use of the words consulatus, fasces, &c. in speaking of the Saracen-kings of Corduba, (the khalifs of Spain of the house of Ommiyah.) Now as the kings of France, Italy, &c. of those ages, really took the title of consul, Father Pagi very sagaciously concludes that the Arab khalifs imitated their example, without ever reflecting on the enormous difference there was between them. The northern.chiefs had adopted the religion and manners of the conquered nations, and still revered the power they had overturned. The Musulmans detested that religion, were strangers to those manners, and despised that power. The successors ‘of the Prophet would have disdained a title which levelled them with the servants of the Christian dog. In them the imitation, of the Roman style would have been absurd ; -in-the authors of those times it was easy and natural. Sallust was a more correct writer than Eulogius or the Abbot Samson of Cordova; yet Sallust (Bell. Jugurth. c. 12.) speaks of the Lictor proxumus of a Numidian prince, who had guards and officers, but who certainly had no lictors. This translation of ideas is common in all languages.
41. Olearius, as quoted by M. de Buffon, (Histoire Naturelle, tom. xi. p. 241.) rejects with scorn the antipathy which the ancients have supposed between the horse arid the camel; and of which they have related such celebrated instances. Every caravan, and every stable in Persia is, according to Olearius, a proof of the contrary. But this reasoning is very fallacious. The instances mentioned by the ancients suppose those animals unacquainted with each other, meeting for the
4D2 first
378 INDEX EXPURGATORIUS.
first time, and left entirely to their natural impressions. But it is not the least proof of the empire of man over the animals, that by habit and education he can subdue those impressions, and can establish a degree of harmony and even of familiarity between the most discordant natures. The dog and the cat are domestic evidences of this assertion.
42. Pliny, speaking of an animal, (Machlis,) supposed to be the rein. deer, says the creature was only to be found in Scandinavia. Cesar describes the same animal as a native of the Hercynian forest in Germany. M. de Buffon is struck with this contradiction, (Histoire Naturelle, tom. xii. p. 82.) which is indeed only apparent. Our author, who is a better naturalist than an antiquarian, did not know that the vast island or peninsula of Scandinavia was considered by most of the ancients as a part of Germany; (V. Cluver. German. Antic. l. iü. p. 159, &c.} that the ocean was the northern boundary of Germany ; (Tacit. de Morib. German. c. 1, &c.) that the Hercynian forest
lest itself in the most remote parts of that unknown country. (Cesar de Bell. Gallic. L vi. c. 25.)
43. M. de Buffon asserts (Hist. Natur. tom. xi. p. 229.) that the camel has been so completely subdued by man, that there remains po individuals of the species in a state of nature and freedom. This may be true enough in our times, but it was not so in those of Diodorus Siculus. That curious traveller says there were wild camels in Arabia. (Bibliot. L. iii. c. 44. Edit. Wesseling.) The fact seems probable in itself, and it confirms M. de Buffon’s opinion, that the camel was
originally a native of Arabia, for whose sandy deserts he and he alone seems formed.
44. M. Marmontel has made a singular mistake in his elegant trans-
lation of Lucan. That poet had said of the Gallic Druids, (Lucan. Pharsal. I. 1, v. 452.)
Solis nosse Deos, et cœli numina vobis Aut solis nescire datum.—
In
INDEX EXPURGATORIUS. 573
In the French version of the Pharsalia, this exclamation is turned into a panegyric of the doctrine of the Gallican church: ‘ Vous seuls avez le privilège de choisir entre tous les dieux, ceux qu’on doit adorer, ceux qu’on doit méconnoitre.” But the poet was admiring not the truth but the singularity of the Druidical system of theology. Observing how much it disagreed with that of other nations, he cries out, “ The knowledge of the Gods has been granted or has been refused to you alone.” (V. le Lucan de Marmontel, tom. i. p. 32.)
45. The King of Prussia appears throughout his writings an enemy to the English. His description of the battle of Blenheim is a glaring instance of his partiality. (V. l’Art de la Guerre, chant vi.)
Ainsi le grand Eugène, à ce fameux village Où Tallard et Marsin s’étoient très mal postés, D'un effort général donna de tous côtés, &c.
The » history contained in these lines is as erroneous as the poetry of them is indifferent. The great Eugene, to whom the sole glory of the day is ascribed, commanded the right wing of the allied army, and was so well opposed by Marsin and the Elector of Bavaria, that his repeated attacks made no impression on them. It was his colleague, the Duke of Marlborough, who improved the many blunders of Tallard, passed the rivulet, broke the centre of the French army, took the flower of their troops in the village of Blenheim, and, in a word, obtained a complete victory. (V. Mémoires de Feuquières, tom. wi. p. 857— 387. - Kane’s Campaigns, p. 57—61. Histoire Générale par Voltaire, tom. v. p. 277.)
46. The translator of M. de Haller’s poems has inserted a note which is to me incomprehensible. The poet (p. 112.) had exclaimed with indignation, “ Où coule aujourd'hui le sang des Muhleren et des Bubenberg?” Bubenberg, (adds the translator,) ‘ famille d’une ancienne noblesse à Berne ...... Muhleren, un officier de cette famille, qui étoit aussi d’une ancienne noblesse, fit paroître son courage dans la défense de
Morat
574 INDEX EXPURGATORIUS.
Morat contre Charles le Hardi en 1476.” 1. If the family was noble, as.it certainly was, it seems superfluous to add that each individual of it was so likewise. 2. Iam perfectly well acquainted with the Bubenberg who defended Morat so gallantly against Charles the Hardy. His name was Adrian; and neither Schilling, a contemporary historian, nor that indefatigable collector, M. Leu, (in his Helvetic Dictionary, ) makes the least mention of that extraordinary name of Muhleren, which I never.heard of, but which M. de Haller himself seems clearly to separate from that of Bubenberg. This passage is more singular, as I have some reason to believe that the translator is M. de Tscharner, of one of the best families of Berne; and who has written with applause a history of his own country in the German language. (V. Choix des Poësies Allemandes, par M. Huber. tom. ili. p, 242.)
