I find it has been represented to you that I have found fault with a design for a fan, which you exhibited last year at the Royal Academy. In answer to which I positively declare that it is impossible I should express any dislike to a particular drawing of so much merit, when I am so great an admirer of your works in general: my collecting your prints, together with the testimony of every artist of reputation with whom I am acquainted, and have heard me speak of you, must sufficiently prove the opinion that I entertain of you as an artist, and the malignant insinuations and aspersions of those persons that have imposed upon you must, of course, fall to the ground; this I am ready to prove to you by the evidence of many, if you will be so good as to inform me who are my accusers. This, I conceive, I have a right to ask, in order to clear up my injured reputation.

I am, Sir, with great respect,
Your most obedient servant,

Green Street, Leicester Fields,

Jan. 24th, 1781.

WM. WOOLLETT.

The Bartolozzi family are now extinct. The last was the late Madame Vestris. She was the daughter of Gaetano Bartolozzi, an engraver of no repute-the skill of Francesco Bartolozzi did not descend to his son. Where or when his daughter Lucia Elizabeth was born, has long been a question in dispute, and many wagers have been the result, but never satisfactorily decided, and Madame constantly evaded the enquiry-she has said her birth did not occur in England-but the year is now stated to have been 1797.

In a volume of autographs of Theatrical Celebrities, Madame, while a Lessee, wrote the following lines—

I'm that Belle Sauvage, only rather quieter, Like Mrs. Nelson turn'd a Stage Proprietor. Olympic Theatre, ELIZA VESTRIS.

March 28, 1835.

L. E. Vestris, or Eliza Vestris, were her usual signatures. Mrs. L. E. Mathews, after a long and painful illness, died on Saturday, the 8th inst., at Gore Lodge, Fulliam, in her 59th year; and in the morning of Thursday, the 13th, was interred at Kensal Green Cemetery. The funeral observances were very private, one mourning-coach, containing Mr. Charles Mathews, the physician who attended Madame in her last illness, and Mr. Morison, a private friend, followed the hearse.

ALONE IN THE WORLD.

The vaunted Well-beloved' Louis the Fifteenth died in 1774, and the new ministry, appointed on the advent of his successor, having more kindly views, were determined to abate the iniquitous oppressions of the preceding reign. Thus, one of the leading acts of their clemency was an inspection and revision of the registers of those confined as state prisoners in the Bastille, but in reality in many cases immured there solely under the malign influence of individuals. Many were liberated, and among them one who had been pent within the chill and damp walls of a narrow cell during forty-seven years. Closed from all communication with mankind, beholding no face, nor hearing any voice but that of the gaolers, who in succession, had daily to provide him with food during nearly half a century, he had endured all these horrors with untiring constancy, although wholly unapprised of the existence or fate of his family or relations.

At length, an unusual noise broke upon the stillness of the confines of his cell, the door opened, and a voice he had not heard before bade him-Come forth! He scarcely knew the import of the words, and, not daring to trust his senses, fancied it a dream. The mandate repeated, he advanced with hesitation, and with trembling steps reached the stairs of his prison; bewildered and confounded as he passed on, the hall, the court, and every space that met his eye seemed immense and vast beyond bounds. Stupified with the novelty of all he saw, his sight became incapacitated to sustain the strong glare of the broad daylight, and he stood still with fixed eyes, unable to move or speak, questioning the reality of his own feelings. Admonitory accents fell on his ear to proceed, and with some further efforts, in which he was partially assisted, he passed beyond the main entrance.

With some consideration, a carriage there awaited to conduct him to where he said he had formerly lived, but the motion affrighted and hurt him. He begged to be released, and supported on his way, was led to the street in which was his former habitation; but the house was no longer there! on its site stood proudly a public edifice. None of the objects which were there in his youth had remained; the buildings, of which he had retained Even the passers by were to him a new race, and though a partial recollection, had all changed their appearance. he looked anxiously in their faces, he knew them not, nor did they know him. His remembrance of all things seemed passed, and he stood motionless and bewildered. Surrounded by living beings, he recognised no one, nor they him; tears involuntarily relieved the acuteness of his feelings, and in the earnestness of his sorrow, he entreated to be conducted back to his lost home-the cold and dreary cell.

His antiquated appearance, his prison garb, the mention of the Bastille, and his imploring to experience it again as an asylum soon caused a great crowd to congregate. The oldest present thought of others still older, who might be able to afford him some solution of his inquiries respecting his family. At last an old man appeared, whose infirmities had rendered him unable to

work for fifteen years, but who had been a servant in his family he failed to recognise his former master, and in reply to the inquiries as to his wife, said she had died of grief and want thirty years gone by; his agonised questions as to his children, elicited simply some were dead, others had gone abroad, but where no one knew. No one of the friends he had borne in recollection were then living, and the old man's answers were uttered with all the stolidity and indifference of one who was speaking of events ordinarily long since passed and almost forgotten.

Wretched and unhappy, he felt the excess of his misery more amidst the crowd of strangers, no one of whom was in a condition to sympathise with him, though in a state of freedom, than before, when in his frightful solitude. He sought the minister by whose compassion he had been set at liberty, and throwing himself at his feet, begged of him to be sent back to the prison from whence he had freed him. Who, said he, can survive all his friends, all his relations, an entire generation? Who can hear of the loss of every one who was dear or known to him, without wishing for himself the solace of the grave? All these deaths, which come one by one and by degrees upon other men, have fallen upon me in one instant. Separated from scciety, I lived by myself; here, I can neither live by myself nor with strangers, to whom my despair can only appear as a dream. It is not to die that is terrible; it is, to die the last.

The minister, moved with commiseration, directed everything that humanity could suggest to alleviate his sorrows. His old servant was placed in attendance on him, and with him he retired into a seclusion in the heart of Paris, hardly less solitary than the cell that had been his abiding place for nearly half a century. His only consolation was to converse with him about his wife and children, with one constant result; a short period terminated his existence, and the thought that to the last appeared uppermost in his mind, was the impossibility of his ever encountering any one who could say to him-we have seen each other before-in fact, that he was alone in the world.

John Kidgell, rector of Godstone, in Surrey, he fled, not for his merits, from England, and died at Brussels, in May, 1781.

HENHAM EVENING BELLS.

Hark! now I hear those ev'ning bells,
What doleful tales their music tells:
Of pleasures past, of hours mis-spent,
Of youth to senseless vices lent;
Of childish joys in days of yore,
Of merry playmates now no more;
Of all that frightful change of things,
Which each succeeding season brings.

Softly ring on, melodious peal;
Your soft persuasive strains I feel,
Which give refreshment to the soul,
By calling to its proper goal:
For though each soul entrancing knell,
Seems some fair image lost, to tell
Of love entomb'd, of friendship dead,
Of infant hopes for ever fled;
And calls to mind the early time
When first I heard your melting chime
At life's and daylight's infant dawn,
When cocks first blew the trump of morn,
Bounding, I sallied forth to play
Free on the festive holiday.
Since which old times, the silv'ry head
Of fond paternal counsel's dead;
The child that was the ev'ning star
Of youthful pastime dwells afar;
The trusty dog, my father's pride,
Is swallow'd in Time's gulphing tide;
And fierce Erynnis tramples down
Those childish hopes, we now disown.
Yet still! ye soft melodious bells,
A tale of joy your music tells
To faithful flocks assembled here,
To drink of holy water clear;
For in the dusky cloister damp,
Where Vigilance hath lit her lamp,
The white wing'd angel Hope appears,
And my desponding genius cheers.

Hark! yet aloud the tuneful bells Are sounding, still their magic spells Which quell all harms and call the sheep The vigils of pure Faith to keep, Cheering the soul to hold in view For faithful flocks, green pastures new In those bright realms, fair Virtue's seat, Where kindred souls again will meet. The taper steeple points the way: The cock upon the vane doth say— Then follow me, nor turning round To ev'ry blast that sweeps the ground; But by a watchfulness on high, Bend to the spirit of the sky. Then jingle on, melodious bells, Of many hopes your music tells.

NOON-DAY LINES PRESENTED WITH SOME VIOLETS.

Did Letty know when pearl'd with dew,
How sweet these graceful violets grew,

Beside the thorny brake;
Or, breathe the fragrant morning air
O'er beds of primroses blooming fair-
Your pillow you'd forsake.
For paler than th' autumnal leaf,
Or the wan hue of pining grief,

The cheek of Sloth will grow ;
Perfume, nor wash, nor scented ball,
Can Nature's ruddy tints recall,

When once you let them go.

ORDER OF THE BLUE JACKET OR HUNTING COAT.

When Louis the Fourteenth had once established the opinion that he was the unlimited lord of the greatest monarchy in Europe, the slightest marks of favour became objects of ambition to men, who, like the French, are eager for all reputation. In 1661, Louis made a promotion of eight prelates and sixty-three knights of the order of St. Esprit, which had not since 1633, received any new knights, and seems to have fallen into neglect, if not contempt.

On this occasion, the King, in his Instructions to his Son, remarks that no recompence costs less to our people, and none touches hearts that are rightly constituted, more than these distinctions of rank, which are almost the first motive of all human actions, but especially of the greatest and the most noble; it is besides, one of the most visible effects of our power to give, when we please, an infinite value to that which in itself is nothing.' It is indeed one of the most surprising instances of the power of kings, and the fatuity of subjects! On the same solid grounds the king subsequently created a new order, and called it by his own name. The just-a-corps à brevet was another, and very peculiar invention for distinction: it was a coat or jacket of blue, embroidered with gold and silver, similar to one used by the king, which entitled the wearer to accompany his Majesty in his promenades at St. Germain, and to belong to his parties to Versailles or Marly. One of these brevets, signed by Louis, and countersigned Guenegaud, is preserved in the collection of the works of Louis the Fourteenth. Only a certain number were allowed; and on the death of a member, his jacket became as great a subject of contention as the armour of Achilles in the Grecian army. This desirable distinction seems at bottom to have been a hunting coat.

(Euvres de Louis Quatorze, tom. i. p. 143. Memoirs of the Affairs of Europe, 1824, pp. 145-146. The editor says, there was no further question of them after the peace of Aix-le-Chapelle in 1679; this does not appear to be the case. St. Simon talks of seeing the sons of the Dauphin dressed in them, and Dangeau mentions the death of a person who had the just-a-corps rose, long after the period mentioned. The distinction of just-a-corps bleu, and just-a-corps rose, is a mystery which my researches do not enable me to explain.

NOTES BY A BOOKSELLER.*

JOHN GAY, the ingenious poet, whom Pope stylesOf manners gentle, of affections mild;

In wit a man, simplicity a child.

Yet this character is proved untrue by the strong passions of which he was possessed, and the disappointment of which hurt him much, as we find in his life. I believe his Beggars' Opera did more harm to unthinking youth than all that Collins, Tindal, or Chubb ever wrote, for that gilded over iniquity with the veil of applause, and makes a hero of a debauched highwayman; encourages a daring thoughtlessness, and destroys the regard for serious consideration so absolutely necessary for our proper behaviour in life. Too feelingly I speak this, as I am persuaded I received much mischief from the strong impression this piece had on my lively imagination, and laid the foundation of the great misery I now suffer in a most exquisite degree.

His Achilles in Petticoats, is an absurd composition, not founded upon any history, or fable, or probability, and full of indelicacy. His Pastorals are natural and pleasing, ingenious and decent. The Trivia, a humourous and elegantly descriptive poem, but an heroic poem on so trivial a subject can only be looked on as a burlesque on some serious heroic poem, I should suspect it on Addison's Campaign.

WILLIAM GEORGE, D.D, a very learned, friendly, and facetious gentleman, was bred at Eton School, and then at King's College, Cambridge. Married Catherine, a daughter of Dr. Henry Bland, Master of Eton School, afterwards Provost of Eton and Dean of Durham. When Dr. Bland resigned the school, Dr. George succeeded as Head Master from the station below it. He He was a was an excellent Grecian and good critic. King's Chaplain, and I have often with pleasure dined with him at their room, for he was very agreeable company. He had good nature, but no politeness of behaviour, which was fully compensated by his open sincerity. He was a kind friend to me. He loved learned men, and was a ready encourager of their labours. His lady, very agreeable and good tempered at all times, studied to oblige him in everything. Oh! had mine in the year 1758 done so, misery had not come as it did, and vexation brought despair and ruin on poor ME, by overheating my anger.

Dr. George published nothing that I know of, but a sermon preached before the House of Commons, about 1730. Some years before he died, he was promoted to be Provost of King's College and Dean of Lincoln. He died in 1756, leaving a handsome provision for his widow and two daughters.

He left a well-chosen library, which was sold to

John Whiston, a son of the celebrated William Whiston, and formerly associated with Osborne and others, as the publishers of the Biographical Dictionary, 1761-2, in eleven volumes, 8vo. These unpublished notes are copiously embodied in a copy of that work intended for a new edition, and are replete with much personal and private anecdote.

Lord Spencer for fourteen hundred guineas, which was, I think more by two hundred guineas than their value, for I estimated them carefully.*

THE BARRIECO, OR BARAECO ?

The Estii, a tribe of Sclavonians, who inhabited the province now called Esthonia, on the Baltic, appear at a very remote period, to have migrated into Spain, and occupied a tract of country in Castile, comprehending Salamanca, Ciudad Rodrigo, Gallegos, and the banks of the Coa river; for Tacitus states that these wild people venerated the goddess mother under the image of a wild boar, which they carried with them on all their expeditions, and at this hour the rudely carved granitic images of a wild boar, or bear, or hippopotamus, are to be seen built into the Roman bridges of Salamanca and Ciudad Rodrigo, and also near the churches of Gallegos and San Felices, on the Coa. The name given by the Spaniards to these figures, is the Barrieco, or the roaring animal, from barus, grave; and echo, sound. Masdeu, in his Historica Critica de Espana, vol. v. p. 44, mentions the Barrieco or Baraeco, as a divinity unknown to the Romans. In the territory of Lisbon, was found the following inscription

Judæus licet et porcinum numen adoret
Et cœli summas advocet auriculas
Ne tamen et ferro succideret inguinis oram
Et nisi nudatum solveret arte caput.

Petronii Arbitri Fragmenta, ed. Jo. Maire. p. 101. The peasantry of Exmoor, in Devonshire, still call a sow, a Baarge; a corruption of Baraeco, or rather the latter word is derived from the former, which is Celtic. Can any reader of Current Notes, render any further elucidation of this little known mythological subject. A. N.

• The acquisition of this collection to the Spencer library was extremely fortunate. In that portion are the greatest rarities in English Literature, which still enrich that glorious depositary. In Whiston's time, early English poesy was at a low ebb, but among Dr. George's books were many uniques, which were probably considered mere trifles, waifs, or strays in the Cathedral library of Lincoln. Be it as it may, the late Dr. Dibdin took a hint, had a dig at the same mine, and produced a nugget-the Lincolne Nosegay. Ed.

JOHNSTON'S LIFE OF LINAcre.

Among the memorable families of Derbyshire is that of Linacre; and that county has been accredited as the birthplace of Thomas Linacre, the eminent physician; he was the tutor and friend of Sir Thomas More, Physician to King Henry the Eighth; and Founder of the College of Physicians in London. Sometime since being desirous of the printed life of that eminent man, I was told it was not procurable. Can any reader of Current Notes state the reason? for the party I employed was unable to give me the slightest information. Edinburgh, August 17. M. D.

The reason is not generally known, and when told may possibly startle our correspondent. The volume was printed in 1835, 8vo. pp. 264. There were 750 copies printed at the joint expense of Mr. Robert Graves, the editor, and Mr. Edward Lumley, the publisher. A few were demanded by public libraries under the copyright act, and some few copies were forwarded to the reviewers. The Literary Gazette denounced it vehemently, although the copy sent property of the writer, wholly uncut. The book was adto the Editor of that Journal, subsequently became the vertised, but only one copy was called for by one of the wholesale houses in the Row, and the volume was soon after thus disposed of-Messrs. Graves and Lumley retained each twenty-five copies; and the residue, more than 650 copies, was sold in quires to the paper maker, at uine shillings per ream.

Dr. Johnston in this work, places the birth of Linacre to about the year 1460, at Canterbury.

ROYAL BOOK-BORROWER.

August 31, 1422, being the Monday next following the Feast of the decollation of St. John the Baptist, between two and three o'clock in the morning, died at Bois Vincennes in France, Henry the Fifth, King of England. History has proudly distinguished him as a warrior, but he was disposed to reading, and in the paucity of books in the royal library was constrained to borrow from his subjects, and after his decease several were claimed by their owners.

In 1424, the Countess of Westmoreland presented a petition to the Privy Council, representing that the late king, Henry, had borrowed from her a book, containing the Chronicles of Jerusalem, and the Expedition of Godfrey of Boulogne, and praying that an order might be issued under the privy seal for the restoration of the said book.

It was granted with much formality. John, prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, also presented a similar petition to the Privy Council, stating that the late king had borrowed from his priory a volume containing the works of St. Gregory; that he had not returned it, but that in his testament he had directed its restoration. It was then in the possession of the Prior of Shine (now Shene, near Richmond), who refused to relinquish it. The Council, after mature deliberation, directed a precept, under the privy seal, to be sent to the Prior of Shine, requiring him to restore the volume, or to appear before the Council to state the reasons of his refusal."