towards you, is one who seems puzzled, with his hand thrust behind under his hat, and scratching his head it is perfectly evident what his state of the game is. Opposite the first, is a man, with his right hand drawing out a card, and looking across the table, doubting whether there is not some foul play under the smiles of his opponent. On the back of his chair leans a dark gloo. my character, not attending to the game, with all the marks of a lazy, desponding, silent, smoke-dried frequenter of an ale-house. The fourth, at the game, I do not at this mo

ment recollect; but between him and the third is the woman of the house, a kind of slattern, rather interested in the game,and with a fat, slabbering baby, almost tumbling out of her arms, and reaching towards the cards. It is altogether most complete piece of humour.Every thing bears the marks of a careless, frolicking house. There is a shelf with an omnium gatherum' perfectly in character-a fiddle half out of a green bag, &c. &c.

His pictures I am told are sold at an enormous price, and he surely merits it. F. W.

MEMOIRS OF ALDUS MANUTIUS,

OR THE ELDER ALDUS.

[Amongst those who have hitherto exercised the art of printing,an art,of which the imperfect attainment is as easy, as real superiority is rare, Aldus the Elder, and his son, Paulus Manutius, are entitled, on every account, to the first rank. Filled with an enthusiastick ardour for the literature of Greece and Rome, they sacrificed those advantages of fame and fortune, which could only be obtained from works of their own and spent their whole lives in rescuing the ancient writers from that obscurity, in which eight ages of barbarism had involved them. Not content with preserving them from destruction, they were desirous of rendering the study of them universal, and undertook to reproduce them under such less expensive forms, as would render them attainable by a greater number of readers. Common know!edge and moderate talents were sufficient for the printing of books of scholastick divinity, jurisprudence, and mysticism, which at this period almost exclusively engaged the press; but to quit the long-frequented path, undismayed by the difficul ties attending the first publication of ancient authors, and more particularly Greek authors, required, along with no common degree of erudition, all the energy superiour genius, joined to the most unabating perseverance. Many learned mén of these first periods of the revival of letters have rendered their whole lives famous, by the revival of one, or a very small number, of these precious writings, which have not passed through the darkness of ages, without more or less of alteration; but the celebrated printers, whose history is now to be perused, are the only ones whose brilliant catalogue of editions,published and laboriously corrected by themselves, is at the same time nearly the entire list of master-pieces of ancient litera

ture.

of a

In the midst of continual labours, and the cares which were incessantly required through a long series of years by the difficult and learned editions, which each month and week issued from their presses, these indefatigable men still, them selves, found leisure for the cultivation of literature; and they have left several works, which evince their profound knowledge, and still retain a well-deserved

estcem.

Paulus Manutius, in particular, acquired, by a constant study of the works of Cicero, a purity and elegance of style, which will always be admired in those letters and prefaces, which he wrote in the Latin language. His Commentaries on Cicero are still in the hands of all those, who would study to advantage the orations

of that father of eloquence; and his treatises of antiquity are read less now, only on account of their being replaced by more modern works, which are indebted to him for some of the most valuable of their contents.

Aldus Manutius, son of Paulus, the last of this illustrious family shines with less splendour in the list of renowned printers. Indeed,it may be said,without injustice towards him, that if he had not been the son of Paulus Manutius, if he had not succeeded to the excellent Aldine press, it would seldom be remembered that he had ever been a printer; but if his inclination gave a different direction to his pursuits and studies, if even he did not in any thing equal his father and grandfather,his numerous works,nevertheless, prove that he was industrious and learned, and justify, to a certain degree, the elogiums bestowed upon him by many of his cotemporaries.

The history of these three learned printers has never been completely written, although many biographers give a longer or shorter account of them All those who have spoken of the state of literature during the sixteenth century, could not but mention with distinction the Aldine family among its greatest ornaments. But the passages which we find in De Thou, and many less celebrated authors,are rather testimonies of esteem, than historical relations, and are by no means sufficient to make these printers known, as they deserve to be, by every friend of literature.

In the last century, Unger, in Germany, Zeno, at Florence, Manni, at Venice,Laz zeri, at Rome, and Maittaire and Tiraboschi, left accounts, more or less detailed, of one or other of the three Aldi. The first of these writers, Unger, who published his work in 1729, has loaded it with digressions foreign to the subject, which necessarily render it, on the whole, uninteresting and forbidding. Geret, who reprinted this work at Wittemburg, 1753,in quarto, has added notes, correcting many errours, and supplying many omissions,but these only serve to render it more confused. The catalogue of the Aldine editions, found in these two publications is likewise so incorrect, that it is altogether useless.

Manni has given his work a more historical form;it is therefore read with greater interest than the unconnected,tedious,paragraphs of the German author. Like Unger, he has written only of the elder Aldus; his account of the Aldine editions is very incomplete and has the great fault of containing some vague account of several editions, which have never existed.

Father Lazzeri, who published at Rome, in 1754—58, some account of Paulus Manutius, in the introduction to A Collection of Manuscript Letters of several learned Men, relates, with minute exactness, all which he thought in the least referred to Paulus Manutius. Letters, prefaces, manuscripts, nothing escaped the re searches of this laborious jesuit; and if he could have avoided useless details, limited his quotations, and introduced them more appropriately, his work would have been less tedious and much more read."

The best memoir relative to this family, in every respect,that has been published, is that which Apostolo Zeno has given of the younger Aldus, prefixed to “ Epistole famigliari di Cicerone tradotte." 1736,2 vol. 8vo under the title, Notizie Manuziane, and without any list of the Aldine editions. By this short piece, as by many others, he has proved that a good writer may treat of literary history in such a manner as to deprive it, in a great degree, of its dryness and dullness; and his bibliographical and critical works are eminently distinguished from all others of the same kind. We are assured that he had written a complete and methodical work upon the three nutii, but that being robbed of it when preparing it for the press, he could never bring himself to resume it.

Cardinal Brienne, who had long laboured to realize his favorite project of an universal library, caused a catalogue of the Aldine editions to be printed at Pisa, in 1790,which he had methodically arranged, with the assistance of P. Laire, his librarian, who died a short time since at Auxerre, where the library of the department of Yonne had been confided to his care. This list entitled" Serie dell' edizioni Aldini," was reprinted the following year, at Padua, with some additions, and in 1791, at Venice, with the profession of " emendations and additions," which, however, exist only in the title page.

These several works, or rather fragments of works,although numerous,are insuffiscient. The" Serie" presents only an uninteresting list, destitute of notes and pre-" Vol. V. No. IX.

3 K

liminary observations. As for the other accounts, they are dispersed in many volumes, the greater part of which are not easily obtained, and which few readers would be tempted to collect. Besides, we should search the whole of these writ ings in vain, for that succession of clear and precise ideas, without which, all reading becomes painful, and remains unprofitable.

It is therefore hoped, that, to those who take an interest in all that concern literary history, who love the typographick art,and those labours which tend to preserve and multiply the productions of genius, the following account will prove acceptable and satisfactory.-[Monthly Magazine.]

ALDUS MANUTIUS was born either in 1446 or 1447, but more probably in the latter year, at which time the typographical art, still in its infancy, produced only sheets of designs rudely cut in wood, and accompanied by a few lines of description, still more rudely executed, so that the same period which produced this inestimable art, gave birth to one of its greatest improvers and

ornaments.

Some have thought he was born at Rome, because in most of his editions he styles himself Aldus Romanus; but in some of them, we find that his native country is positively ascertained. In the "Thesaurus Cornucopiae," 1496, in the first and second volume of Aristo, 1495-97, he calls himself " Manutius Bassianus," from Bassiano, a small town inthe duchy of Sermonetta. Aldus had the misfortune of being placed under the tuition of an ignorant pedagogue, who, instead of skilfully developing the promising talents of his pupil, uselessly fatigued him, by making him learn grammar out of the "Doctrinale Alexandri de Villa-Dei," a dry and abstruse work, written in barbarous verse. Such was the scarcity of elementary. books at that time, that those children destined to receive a liberal education, who had not the happiness of being entrusted to the care of a master capable of removing their difficulties, were obliged to study the ridiculous and unintelligible jargon, honoured by the pompous name of the "Doctrinale " Aldus never forgot how much this book had har

rassed him; one of his first literary labours, therefore, was the composition of a Latin grammar,which he first printed in 1501, and of which many editions have since appeared, both from his own press, and from many others in different parts of Europe. During the childhood of Aldus, many Latin grammars had been published less exceptionable than that of Villa Dei ; but the Accidence of Aldus totally obliterated all remembrance of that contempt. ible rhapsody. The grammar of Aldus cannot, indeed, boast either the precision or the analytical order of the best of our modern elementary books, but the Dumarsais,the Condillacs, the great men of the Port Royal had not then appear. ed: here therefore, as in typography, Aldus has the undoubted merit, of being almost the first, who, by his labours, enabled those that followed him to succeed still better.

He quitted this ignorant master, and came to Rome, to receive lessons of Gaspar de Verona, and of Domizio Calderino, of the same city, both celebrated professors of the Belleslettres, under whom he made the most rapid progress He cherished

a

grateful remembrance of their at tentions to him, and in several of his prefaces, he gives them testimonies of his great esteem and veneration.

His first studies seem to have been confined to the Latin language, and it was not till he arrived at years of maturity that he applied to Greek. At the time of his leaving Rome in order to return to Ferrara he took lessons of the celebrated