Count Rochambeau. The passage refers to a person of America."

"well affected to the cause

The specimens 10 and 11 in this Plate (XXVII.) afford examples of French running-hand towards the close of the eighteenth century. The first is from a note written by the weak but amiable Louis XVI., and addressed to Malesherbes, requesting him, as a personal favour, to accept an appointment which he had declined when offered to him by the minister Turgot. The second example is from a letter of one of the most remarkable of the revolutionary leaders, Robespierre. The letter from which it is taken is dated 13 Floreal, an 2 de la République. It is addressed to Lebas and St. Just, informing them that the "Comité" had taken every measure to assist their “zeal.” The hand is not unlike that of the king, but somewhat heavier.

The specimen, No. 1, Plate XXVIII., is from a letter also referring to the events of the French revolution; but by an Englishman, who denounces their danger and tendency-the eloquent Edmund Burke. The passage selected for extract is a characteristic one-" You have," says he, "an armed tyranny to deal with, and nothing but arms can pull it down." The letter is dated, "Beaconsfield, Jan. 25, 1791."

The last two examples are of the Italian running-hand of this period, from persons of very opposite characters-the clever charlatan, Count Cagliostro, and the tragic poet, Alfieri. The writing of Cagliostro has a much bolder character than that of Alfieri; but, at the same time, it conveys the idea of being an unsettled hand, or rather that of a person who had not acquired the art in childhood. The letter contains nothing about magic or mesmerism, and is merely an affectionate communication to his wife (Plate XXVIII. No. 3). The writing of Alfieri is small and neat, and suggests the idea of the labour and painstaking by which, rather than genius, even his greatest works were achieved. It is occasionally, however, notwithstanding its neatness, very indistinct; but the passage selected is perfectly legible. On the whole, we have seen the cursive hand of the seventeenth century make a steady advance towards the style of the present day.

THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. The first example of the common cursive hand of the nineteenth century (Plate XXVIII. No. 4) is from a letter written by William Pitt to Mr. Huskisson; which, though on mere routine official business, serves well to shew the clear, bold hand of the writer. It is dated, "Walmer Castle, March 27, 1803." Plate XXVIII. No. 5, is a letter from Sir Joseph Banks, one of the chief coadjutors in the foundation of our National Museum, to Lacépède, the great French naturalist. It is dated, "June 26, 1802."

The careless, hasty hand of the example, No. 6, Plate XXVIII., is that of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, one of the most eloquent but useless members of the first British Parliament of the nineteenth century; and also the author of the brilliant comedies, The Rivals and The School for Scandal. The letter illus

Y

trates the irregularity in pecuniary matters which marked the career of this man of genius. It relates to getting "the enclosed"-a promissory noterenewed.

Two specimens of French writing, at the zenith and at the close of the career of Napoleon, will illustrate the state of French running-hand in the early part of the present century. The first (Plate XXVIII. No. 7) is from a note written by Napoleon himself, as First Consul, to General Soult, then commanding "the army of invasion," as it was termed, stationed at Boulogne. This writing is remarkably cramped and bad, indeed all but illegible, as though written impatiently, and by one who felt this mode of communicating ideas irksome, and longed to issue the command vivâ voce, with the rapidity for which he was so well known. The next specimen is from a letter of his adopted son, Prince Eugene Beauharnais to his sister, the Queen Hortense, and describes his refusal of offers made to him by the allies, to secure to him the kingdom of Italy on his desertion of the fallen fortunes of Napoleon; which he indignantly

refused.

A few English specimens, of a still more recent period, must close this series. The first (Plate XXVIII. No. 9) is a characteristic passage from a letter of Lord Byron to Mr. Douglas, in which he speaks of the reception of his Cain, which he maintains to be "as Catholic as the Thirty-nine Articles."

Nos. 10, 11, and 12, are the signatures of our historian, Macaulay, and the celebrated American writers, Prescott and Irving.

163

CHAPTER XVI.

THE

ON THE WRITING-MATERIALS OF ALL AGES.

HE materials used in the art of writing belong to two distant epochs. The first period is that in which the characters were "engraved" with a sharp instrument on hard substances- such as metal or stone; the second that in which they were "written" with different liquids, or inks, on such substances as leather, linen, papyrus, vellum, &c.

Before the growth of wealth and luxury had taught nations to raise magnificent temples and stately palaces, whose walls the hieroglyphic sculptors covered with records of the pomp and pride of princes, more purely national memorials had found their place upon the native rock, the most convenient surfaces of which were smoothed for this purpose. Where no such rock existed in the situation required, a massive stone was reared by artificial means, and the record, whether referring to a victory, a new boundary, or any other event of national interest was engraved upon it. Such memorials have been described by Hebrew writers as TV (aumad), or (ammod), literally, the lips of the people, or, the words of the people; but actually meaning a pillar. Records in this form, and the early name they bore, account for the strange legends of mediæval times referring to speaking stones-a name by which such monuments were probably still called long after time had effaced the speaking record, and the original purport of the defaced stone was forgotten. In semi-barbarous epochs, like the era which followed the partial extinction of Roman civilisation, popular curiosity and superstition combined, would seek to give a meaning to the name of such "speaking stones;" and, as an example of the legends which thus arose, the Itinerarium Cambria of Geraldus may be cited, in which a stone is mentioned at St. David's, as the "speaking stone" (Lech Lavar), which was said to call out when a dead body was placed upon it. The most remarkable rock inscriptions still remaining are those of Assyria and Persia; but many national tablets of more recent date are still in existence. For the execution of such records, and those of the palaces of Egypt and Assyria, some kind of steel point must have been used, as no softer substance would have served to engrave them in granitic and basaltic slabs with the sharpness they still exhibit; which proves that the art of hardening steel, long thought a comparatively modern invention, was known to the ancient people of Asia and Africa. The engraving (p. 174) represents an Egyptian scribe in the act of engraving hieroglyphics with such an instrument; he is symbolically represented with the head

of the ibis, which was sacred to the god Thoth, the reputed inventor of the Egyptian system of writing. It has been engraved by Mr. Forster, in his treatise on the hieroglyphic system; and he deciphers the accompanying inscription, as, "Writes the scribe with the sharp point." Similar instruments were used, but probably with the assistance of a mallet or hammer, for engraving the great rock inscription and other records of Assyria and Persia. The Greeks termed an instrument of this kind a graphion, with which they afterwards wrote upon tablets of lead covered with a coating of wax, or on ivory, bronze, glass, chalk, plaster, and other similar materials.

Calmet states that tablets of wood or stone are the most ancient writing surfaces used for ordinary purposes; and that in the time of Moses tablets of wood were probably the most usual, as there is no word in the Pentateuch which appears to refer to scrolls of any pliable material, such as leather, linen, or papyrus. Indeed, the term sepher (TDD), which in our English translation is rendered a "book," was applied in the Hebrew records of a certain epoch to a small bundle of written tablets. It is evidently derived from the same root as the Greek kɛpaç, a stone, which clearly points to engraved stones as the earliest kinds of records. Nearly all the passages in the Bible in which writing is mentioned, refer, in fact, either to records of this kind, or to tablets of lead or wood, sometimes described as coated with wax.

Before the use of papyrus, or any analogous substance was known as a material for writing on, thin bricks were frequently used in Central Asia; and the Chinese wrote on slips of the bamboo, and on metal, examples of which are still preserved in China, written in characters of the earliest kind. The Chinese bamboo tablets are still prepared for writing by being scraped smooth with a sharp tool, and then submitted to great heat, which so hardens them that they can be engraved upon almost like a soft metal, which is done with a sharp graver, like that of the Egyptian scribe. These slips are then, as formerly, joined together by means of bark thread, and when folded formed a "book," similar in form to the Indian manuscripts of the present day, or the "sepher,” so often translated as "book" in the Bible.

In Greece, similar, though not identical, methods of writing prevailed; and it is stated by Plutarch, Aulus Gellius, and Diogenes Laërtius, that the laws of Solon were engraved on wood. The Greeks called the tablets on which they engraved their laws kúpßus and ažoves. Such tablets as these were similar to those of Cyrene, on which the genealogies of the citizens were recorded; among which, Synesius tells us that his own was preserved from father to son, in direct descent from Hercules. The first name applies, it is thought, to triangular tablets formed of stone, and the last to square tablets of wood; though some reverse them. The wood was sometimes whitened with a preparation of chalk, &c., to make the engraved letters more distinct; such were the tablets of the Roman prætor, called album, upon which his decrees were written; from which circumstance, and the custom of writing the headings of