respects. But he is now projecting a new impression against the rebels, which will at once stop the mouths of all carping grammarians, and give Milton in particular the thrashing he so richly deserves. You therefore, like the little herald-fish, precede the shark Saumaise, in his awkward attempts to latinise some of our forensic terms, viz. Countie-court,' Hundred,' &c. This occurs, with much of the abundant demonstration here referred to, in his Pro Populo Anglicano Def., viii., and is happily translated by Dr. Symmons in his Life of Milton, p. 366. It implies some "clippings of the Corinthian metal" to try to mend it; but his candor will forgive me, though with his gold I combine Washington's brass in the experiment. Who to our English tuned Saumaise's throat, The imputation, however, of bribery is indignantly repelled by Johnson, as what "might be expected from the savageness of Milton" (Life of Addison); and, with a suspicious degree of soreness it is true, denied by Saumaise himself in his posthumous Reply, in which he affirms, that Dr. William Morley brought him nothing from the exiled Prince but a letter of thanks for his exertions." Wood too, in his Athena Oxonienses,' ii. 770 (most probably, upon this authority) asserts the same thing, and pronounces Milton an impudent liar' for having reported the contrary. This little pilot-fish (the Gasterosteus Ductor) is most frequently found in the Mediterranean, and in the tropical menaced 'impression' on our shores: and we are sharpening our harpoons, to drain from him whatever oil or blubber he can be made to yield upon the occasion; not a little delighted, by the bye, with the more-than-Pythagorean benevolence of that great character, who in pity to the brute and fish-kind (upon which even Lent itself has no compassion) has provided so many tomes to wrap them in, and bequeathed to so many thousand of poor tunnies and pilchards a paper coat a-piece. Ye pilchards, and ye fish who glide parts of the Atlantic Ocean. Catesby calls it Perca Marina Secteria, or the Rudder-fish. The latter name it probably obtained among sailors, from being often seen toward the stern of ships. Osbec indeed, who describes it as Scomber cæruleoalbus cingulis transversis nigris sex, deduces it from it's following the dog-fish, to which it is supposed to point out some victim. By Daubenton it is rather referred to it's attending the shark, which it precedes (or rather super-cedes) by about a foot and a half, closely imitating all it's movements, and dexterously seizing the floating remains of it's prey. It has so little confidence, however, in it's principal, that when the shark turns to catch any fish, it invariably starts away. The Dutch assign another motive for it's following vessels, and call it The Dung-fish. It may be considered as a parallel to the Wryneck among birds, and the Jackall among quadrupeds. May shine above your brother-fish, Who wipe their noses on their sleeves.'* C. S. So much then for the long-expected edition of this noble volume; of which while Saumaise (as you inform us) was projecting an impres sion,' you, More, were polluting his house by, a villainous compression of his maid. And Saumaise does, indeed, appear to have anxiously laid himself out in the completion of this prodigious work for, being questioned a few days before his death through some one sent on purpose by a learned man, who himself told me the story, When he intended to give the world the second part of his Remarks on the * Cubito mungentium was a cant appellation among the Romans for fishmongers, and on that account was sarcastically applied to Horace's father. (SUET. Vit. Horat.') W. This destination of the sheets of Saumaise's new book seems a favourite figure with Milton. It recurs in the Pro Se Defensio,' and also in the Apology for Smectymnuus,' § 8., where he speaks of "folios predestined to no better purpose, than to make winding-sheets in Lent for pilchards." This may help us to the intended meaning of Scombri, though not accurately with reference to the Linnean System. See Warton's note, p. 483. The noble volume,' mentioned below, has an obvious reference to the Salmasius eques, and the Claudii insignia, &c. of the preceding epigram. Saumaise's family, however, was really ancient and noble, as appears from his correspondence and his biographers. The term impression,' which follows, is one of the infelicities of translation. he Pope's Supremacy?' he replied, that should not resume that publication, until he had finished the Answer to Milton,' in which he was then engaged.' So that I am to be refuted, even before the Pope! and that primacy,* which Saumaise refuses to him in the church, he willingly allows to me in his hostility! Thus have I proved the protector of His Holiness' tottering Supremacy; and turned aside this modern Catiline, not like Tully of old in my robes, nor indeed at all dreaming of the matter, but quite differently occupied, from the walls of Rome. Surely I have a claim upon more than one red hat in return, and perhaps may have cause to apprehend that the Pope will transfer to me the title of our late kings, as Defender of the Faith!' You see then, in what an invidious situation he has placed me: but be the responsibility on him, who shamefully deserting his honourable post, and intruding himself into disputes with which he had no concern, has passed over from the cause of the church to that of a foreign state (to him totally foreign), entered into a truce with the Pope, and disgracefully patched up a peace with the prelacy, t * De Primatu Papæ, it will be recollected, was one of Saumaise's celebrated works. + This inconsistency was objected to him, even by his friend Sarrau. Miratus sum, et proculdubiò mecum erunt multi in eádem sententiâ, ubi legi in Præfatione Necessarios tibi videri Episcopos in regimine eeclesiæ Anglicana: tibi, inquam, qui with which he had previously waged a most determined warfare. in Wallone Messalino adeò acriter eos insectatus es, ut forsan inde arrepta sit, si non nata occasio eos penitùs amovendi. (See Clement's Life of Saumaise, p. xlix.; who, however, attempts to repel the charge of inconsistency here alleged against his hero.) Hoo sanè dicent esse ro xaipa derever potiùs, quàm ry œandrige weidio dui. Dicetur, as he adds in a subsequent letter, calidum te et frigidum eodem ex ore efflare. This honest adviser had previously pointed out to him the delicacy of the undertaking, as coupled with his obligations to the Republic of the United States: Periculosa plenum opus alea aggrederis, Defensionem dico nuper occisi Britanniarum Regis; maximè cùm Vestri ordines mediam viam secent. Laudo tamen animi tui generosum propositum, quo nefandum scelus apertè damnare sustines. Hác tamen te cautione uti opus est, ne ita Majestatem Regiam extollas, ut erga subditos amorem videantur illi gratis largiri. Debent enim illi suis populis præsertim prodesse, quorum causâ constituti sunt.-A large concession for a Parisian Senator in the midst of the seventeenth century!-Satis sciunt hoc nostro ævo Reges, quæ et quanta sit sua potestas; omnibus qui illos accedunt aulicis certatim eorum auribus insusurrantibus, eos uno Deo minores posse quodcunque libuerit, nec ulli mortalium debere administrationis suæ reddere rationem. Sed istius potestatis verum, legitimum, et moderatum usum pauci eos docent, duabus de causis: Prior est, quia Reges non amant cogi in ordinem, nec volunt ullas quamvis liberas pati habenas; altera est, quia eorum qui illos accedunt unum studium est illis placere et assentari, unde fit ut in immensum eos extollere tantùm laborent. Hos si effugeris scopulos, ad quos plurimi impegerunt, magnum feceris operæ pretium. ** But it was not the character of Saumaise to be guided--except by his wife: and he is, in consequence, frequently reproached by his respectable correspondent for his fatal untractableness. De tuo pro infelice Rege Apologetico solens facis, qui facis quod libet, et amicorum consilia spernis. Quod |