Gallia viderim Atticottos, gentem Britannicam, humanis vesci carnibus; et quum per silvas porcorum greges et armentorum pecudumque reperiant, pastorum nates et feminarum papillas solere abscindere, et has solas ciborum delicias arbitrari?-S. Hieron, t. iv., p. 201; advers. Jovin., lib. 2.'

These Atticotti-as M. de Chateaubriand thinks proper to call the Attacotti-have been badly treated in history. "Ifsack and sugar be a sin,' says Falstaff, 'heaven help the righteous.' If to masticate these pastorum nates be a sin, heaven help, say we, the good repute of beef-eating England. The individual Attacotti whom Jerome saw eating human flesh, in Gaul, were, or at least were said to be, cannibals (we confess that our own notion is they were poor creatures exhibited as a show, and Jerome was but a boy when he went to stare at them)-but the remainder of his sentence throws no such imputation on the tribe. The real meaning of St. Jerome is this, When the Attacotti, wandering in the woods, meet with flocks and herds of black cattle, sheep, and pigs, they are in the custom of cutting off the rumps of the fat beasts'-(pastorum-scilicet, boum, &c., nates. M. de Chateaubriand did not dare braver dans les mots l'honnêteté,' by translating such a terrible word as this)-and the udders of the cows, swine, ewes,' &c., (feminarum, i. e., vaccarum, suum, &c.) considering these as the only delicate parts of the animals.' Gibbon had made the same quotation-otherwise M. de Chateaubriand would never have exhibited this specimen of his concern for the just reputation of auteurs originaux'-and the same mistake; and the Viscount, who wishes to give to authors what belongs to them, and therefore honestly omits the name of Gibbon, whom he pilfers, to quote the name of Jerome, whom he had never consulted, is properly rewarded for his fidelity by falling into a blunder. Had he, indeed, known anything of the history of the passage in Gibbon, he would have escaped. But he, who has not read Tacitus, can scarcely in fairness be expected to have heard of Parr, or Gaches, or Gough *.

'Ici,'

As the history of the passage is somewhat amusing, we may give it in a note. Gibbon, in his own periphrastic style, thus translates it, in his Decline and Fall,' Vol. ii. p. 531, 4to. They curiously selected the most delicate and brawny parts of both males and females, which they prepared for their horrid repasts.' On which Doctor Parr, in his celebrated review of Combe's 'Variorum Horace,' in 'The British Critic,' of 1794(which has been reprinted in the Classical Journal.' See its number for December 1812,)-remarks, Mr. Gibbon has fallen into a great error about this passage. The first who noticed Gibbon's mistranslation was Mr. Gaches, a fellow of King's College, Cambridge. Parr then goes on to say, that, after consulting the original, he agrees with Gaches: The general proposition,' says the Doctor, that Jerome lays down is this, Quis ignoret unamquamque gentem non communi lege naturæ, sed iis quorum apud se copia

6

Ici,' continues M. de Chateaubriand, les Arabes boiront le sang de l'ennemi blessé de leurs flèches.' What is the authority for this? Wonderful to say, Crinitus quidam, nudus omnia præter pubem, subraucum et lugubre strepens. Ammian Marcell.!! Somebody must have been quizzing the Viscount, and passed off this scrap of Latin on him as the original of his French. Nothing, however, is new under the sun, and we find a prototype of this sort of translation in the Taming of the Shrew.'

'Hic steterat, that Lacentio that comes a wooing—Priami, is my man Tranio-Regia, bearing my port-celsa senis, that we might beguile the old Pantaloon.'

In like manner our Parisian Clarissimus does into that vernacular tongue of which he condescends to be a master-Crinitus quidam, Ici les Arabes;' nudus omnia, 'boiront le sang;' præter pubem, de leurs ennemis;' subraucum et lugubre strepens, blessé de leurs flèches.'

ters.

Alaric, he informs us, asserted that he was not a free agent in his work of destruction, for there was something which was drawing him under the walls of Rome. We are referred for this to Sozomen, c. 61, lib. 19. Poor stupid old Sozomen is chargeable only with nine books, the largest of which has but forty chapBut let us allow the Viscount the benefit of a double misprint, little creditable as such a circumstance is to the imprimerie of M. Didot, and read cap. 6, lib. 9. Here we shall find that the scene took place by Rome itself, and that Alaric told the monk who came to supplicate for the city, that there was some beingsome deity, (quendam, not quelque chose,) which, with resistless force, drove him forward to the destruction of Rome. Sozomen never could have invented the vivid phrase which is employed, and which, therefore, we may safely attribute to the barbarian warrior himself. Here is the original:-Fertur itaque probus aliquis monachus ex his qui in Italia erant, Romam cum festina

copia est, vesci solitam.' If our readers will be pleased to look at the illustrations of this position, in cap. vi. lib. ii., advers. Jovinianum, they will probably accede to the position of Mr. Gaches, when they find that Jerome mentions, incidentally, the eating of human flesh; and that he was led, by his subject, more immediately to speak of the food which was 'found in abundance by the Attacotti in uncultivated forests.' It certainly, we must add, could never have been St. Jerome's intention to assert, that rumps of shepherds and breasts of shepherdesses were the food of which there was the greatest abundance in the West of Scotland in his days.

Gough, in his translation of Camden (who quotes the passage, but as he wrote in Latin we cannot tell what interpretation to put upon it,) thus renders it: And, when they met with herds of swine, cattle, or sheep, in the woods, cut slices out of the buttocks of the fat ones, and dugs of the females, reckoning them dainty meat.'-Gough's Camden, Vol. i. p. xcix. It seems to have been something like the Abyssinian custom mentioned by Bruce, and since confirmed by the report of later travellers.

tione profectus, Alaricho consuluisse, ut urbi parceret, nec se tantorum malorum authorem constitueret; cui et Alarichus respondisse dicitur Se non volentem hoc tentare, sed esse quendam qui se OBTUNDENDO URGEAT et præcipiat ut Romam evertat.'-Let the reader compare this with the emasculate version of M. de Chateaubriand, and believe, if possible, that Sozomen was consulted. Perhaps the Viscount might have had a misty recollection of the slovenly translation of Cousin.

Minute errors abound, such as confounding the Attacotti with the Picts, though Ammianus Marcellinus carefully distinguishes between them, &c. These things, of little importance in themselves, mark inaccuracy of reading, which is fatal to historical pretensions; but we need not break a butterfly upon the wheel, and refrain, therefore, from further exposure of blundering.

In short, M. de Chateaubriand wants every requisite for such a task as he has dared to undertake. His style, loaded with false ornament, and glittering with antithesis and epigram, may be suited for a declamation. Even if it conveyed knowledge, it would be out of place, and liable to suspicion in a history. His mind is incapable of taking a general view of great events, or of discriminating the truth among rival or partial historians; it is even incapable of fixing on the great facts of any given case, and invariably selects, not that which is of historical importance, but that which, according to his notions of effect, gaudy colouring may invest with a dramatic air. And lastly, he has not read his originals-we firmly believe, is incapable of reading them, with critical attention. Of the three characters in which we have exhibited him he is far worst as an historian.

We do not know whether his greater historical work is ever destined to appear, but if it does, we promise him faithfully that we shall direct our attention to it. If the Discours, which we have just now analyzed, be a fair sample of the whole, we may promise our readers a rich harvest of amusement.

The errors and omissions, which strike us so forcibly in the short sketch will, in all probability, be more abundant in the full grown history, while the greater extent and variety of matter will afford ampler room for the display of his peculiar frivolities. We desire, indeed, that a Christian history of the Decline and Fall of Rome were written, but we should regret to see that task committed to the hands of M. de Chateaubriand. He would be but a sorry antagonist to Gibbon.

ART.

ART. VII.-1. Storia d'Italia dal 1789 al 1814, scritta da Carlo Botta. 8 vols. 12mo. 1824

2. Histoire d'Italie de 1789 à 1814. Par Charles Botta. Paris. Dufart. 1824. 5 vols. 8vo.

3. Storia della Guerra Americana. 7 vols. 8vo. Firenze. 1822.

THE name of Carlo Botta has been long known as an historian. While yet a member of the legislative body, during the reign of Napoleon, he published, at Paris, a History of American Independence.' Whether it so happened that his notions on liberty have been since wonderfully revolutionized, or his bitter vituperation of England, and laudatory tropes in favour of America, propitiated the then rancorous hatred of the French towards this nation, we know not; but his work was eminently successful. Besides, the Italian liberals were glad to circulate a book, which pointed out the road to independence. With them the question of historical veracity was of secondary consequence, the matter was never mooted-for Carlo Botta appeared to be a staunch republican. These lenient judges looked also with a kind consideration on his antiquated and musty style, and his fabrication of speeches; for the former was extrinsic to the historian's veracity-the latter a venial offence, justified by illustrious precedent.* A grand defect,

We have, however, seen an eulogium on either President Jefferson or Adams, where this speech-making of Botta is justly pointed out as a great historical fault. Lee, it is said, is made to pronounce, through Botta, a speech, to prevail upon the Congress to proclaim themselves independent, when, in fact, it is affirmed it was either Jefferson or Adams, (we forget which,) who spoke so powerfully, as to carry the motion of Declaration of Independence; and Lee did not speak at all on the occasion. It is then clear, that Botta, by his putting the speech into Lee's mouth, has praised him for what he did not do, and has unfairly deprived the real speaker of his deserts. This logomania of our historian is not much relished in America, as we may perceive from the following observations of the Attorney-general of the United States. From this we may observe that this speech-making may be of great historical consequence, by depriving a man of his deserts, or praising another unjustly at his expense. 'Botta, the Italian historian of our revolution, has made Mr. Dickinson and Mr. Lee the principal speakers on the opposite sides of this question, (the Declaration of Independence,) and availing himself of the dramatic license of ancient historians, which the fidelity of modern history has exploded, he has drawn, from his own fancy, two orations, which he has put into the mouths of those distinguished men. With no disposition to touch, with a hostile hand, one leaf of the well-earned laurels of Mr. Lee, (which every American would feel far more pleasure in contributing to brighten and to cherish,) and with no feelings but those of reverence and gratitude for the memory of those other great patriots who assisted in that debate, may we not say, and are we not bound in justice to say, that Botta is mistaken in the relative prominency of one, at least, of his prolocutors? Mr. Jefferson has told us, that "that the colossus of that Congress-the great pillar of support to the Declaration of Independence, and its ablest advocate and champion on the floor of the House, was John Adams." -A Discourse on the Lives and Characters of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.' By W. Watt, Attorney-general of the United States, &c. Washington by Gates and Seaton. 1826. p. 38.

however,

however, was discovered in his total neglect of references; but then this defect touched only the critics-and the critics were too good, too gentle, too humane, to convict their favourite of errors; and so the matter was passed sub silentio-Carlo Botta was praised as the phoenix of historians;-and editions multiplied, to rejoice and make merry the republican's heart.*

No wonder, then, that his History of Italy' should have excited mighty expectations. The Italian governments dreaded its appearance; and this circumstance, with its prohibition in Lombardy, Piedmont, Romagna, and Naples, whetted public curiosity. The book had an astonishing sale, and was universally read. It was believed that the spirit which had prompted the story of American Independence had dictated the Italian history; but the Prussian minister, Marquis Lucchesini, impugned its impartiality; and Count Paradisi, president of the senate, during the existence of the Italian kingdom, flatly called Signor Botta a romancer-each proving, by substantial evidence, that the work not only overstepped clandestinely the boundaries of truth, but openly and impudently transgressed the limits of probability. To these noblemen succeeded many other honourable Italians, participators in the transactions professed to be recorded by Signor Botta; but the circumstance of its permission for circulation in the very states, which had at first strictly prohibited the work, was of itself a convincing proof of its being written in terms suited to their prurient love for adulation, and consequently of its excessive partiality. We, therefore, think that we shall be conferring an obligation on the public, by canvassing the merits of this right excellent historian. We wish not to criticise minutely Signor Botta's style; and, for the satisfaction of those of our readers who are not sufficiently conversant with the Italian language,-and lest it should be said that we have misinterpreted the writer's meaning, we will throughout this article give our extracts in the original French. The Italian edition, however, we have read, and, save only schoolboy themes, and college exercises, more coldness, stiffness, and affectation, is scarcely to be found. We take, for instance, his description of the sacking of Pavia, in the seventh book; and in the twenty-first, that of the yellow fever at Leghorn. There will be found servile imitations of Thucydides and Boccaccio, in their narrative of the plagues at Athens and Florence; and of Guicciardini, (if, however, that pamphlet was written by him,) when he relates the sacking of Rome. Exclamations, in the mouth of Thucydides and Boccaccio, who

We are proud of having been the first to make it generally known in Italy, and of having suggested to Mr. Blanchon, a bookseller at Parma, the thought of reprinting this work of Botta's, for whom we then entertained the highest respect.

personally