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 Mousta in Malta, erected in the first half of the 19th century, which was built entirely without centring of any kind. Fig. 10 is a plan and section of the vault of Henry VII.'s chapel and fig. 11 a perspective view, in which it will be seen that the transverse rib thrown across the chapel carries the pendant, the weight of the latter probably preventing a rise in the haunches.

There are two other ribbed vaults in India which form no part of the development of European vaults, but are too remarkable to be passed over; one carries the central dome of the Jumma Musjid at Bijapur (a.d. 1559), and the other is the tomb of Mahommed ( 1626–1660) in the same town. The vault of the latter was constructed over a hall 135 ft. square, to carry a hemispherical dome. The ribs, instead of being carried across the angles only, thus giving an octagonal base for the dome, are carried across to the further pier of the octagon (fig. 12) and consequently intersect one another, reducing the central opening to 97 ft. in diameter, and, by the weight of the masonry they carry, serving as counterpoise to the thrust of the dome, which is set back so as to leave a passage about 12 ft. wide round the interior. The internal diameter of the dome is 124 ft., its height 175 ft. and the ribs struck from four centres have their springing 57 ft. from the floor of the hall. The Jumma Musjid dome was of smaller dimensions, on a square of 70 ft. with a diameter of 57 ft., and was carried on piers only instead of immensely thick the tomb; but any thrust which might exist was

. 12.—Plan of Bijapur Dome.

counteracted by its transmission across aisles to the outer wall. (R. P. S.)

VAUQUELIN, LOUIS NICOLAS (1763-1829), French chemist, was born at Saint-André-d'Hebertot in Normandy on the 16th of May 1763. His first acquaintance with chemistry was gained as laboratory boy to an apothecary in Rouen (1777-1779), and after various vicissitudes he obtained an introduction to A. F. Fourcroy, in whose laboratory he was an assistant from 1783-1791. At first his work appeared as that of his master and patron, then in their joint-names; but in 1790 he began to publish on his own authority, and between that year and 1833 his name is associated with 376 papers. Most of these were simple records of patient and laborious analytical operations, and it is perhaps surprising that among all the substances he analysed he only detected two new elements—beryllium (1798) in beryl and chromium (1797) in a red lead ore from Siberia. Either together or successively he held the offices of inspector of mines, professor at the School of Mines and at the Polytechnic School, assayer of gold and silver articles, professor of chemistry in the Collège de France and at the Jardin des Plantes, member of the Council of Industry and Commerce, commissioner on the pharmacy laws, and finally professor of chemistry to the Medical Faculty, to which he succeeded on Fourcroy's death in 1809. His lectures, which were supplemented with practical laboratory teaching, were attended by many chemists who subsequently attained distinction. He died at his birthplace on the 14th of November 1829.

VAUQUELIN DE LA FRESNAYE, JEAN (1536–1608), French poet, was born at the chateau of La Fresnaye, near Falaise in Normandy, in 1536. He studied the humanities at Paris and law at Poitiers and Bourges. He fought in the civil wars under Marshal Matignon and was wounded at the siege of Saint-Lô (1574). Most of his life was spent at Caen, where he was president, and he died there in 1608. La Fresnaye was a disciple of Ronsard, but, while praising the reforms of the Pléiade, he laid stress on the continuity of French literary history. He was a student of the trouvères and the old chroniclers, and desired to see French poetry set on a national basis. These views he expounded in an Art poétique, begun at the desire of Henry III. in 1574, but not published until 1605.

VAUVENARGUES, LUC DE CLAPIERS, (1715–1747), French moralist and miscellaneous writer, was born at Aix in Provence on the 6th of August 1715. His family was poor though noble; he was educated at the college of Aix, where he learned little—neither Latin nor Greek—but by means of a translation acquired a great admiration for Plutarch." He entered the army as sub-lieutenant in the king's regiment, and served for more than ten years, taking part in the Italian campaign of Marshal Villars in 1733, and in the disastrous expedition to Bohemia in support of Frederick the Great's designs on Silesia, in which the French were abandoned by their ally. Vauvenargues took part in Marshal Belle-Isle's winter retreat from Prague. On this occasion his legs were frozen, and though he spent a long time in hospital at Nancy he never completely recovered. He was present at the battle of Dettingen, and on his return to France was garrisoned at Arras. His military career was now at an end. He had long been desired by the marquis of Mirabeau, author of L'Ami des hommes, and father of the statesman, to turn to literature, but poverty prevented him from going to Paris as his friend wished. He wished to enter the diplomatic service, and made applications to the ministers and to the king himself. These efforts were unsuccessful, but Vauvenargues was on the point of securing his appointment through the interveption of Voltaire when an attack of smallpox completed the ruin of his health and rendered diplomatic employment out of the question. Voltaire then asked him to submit to him his ideas of the difference between Racine and Corneille. The acquaintance thus begun ripened into real and lasting friendship. Vauvenargues removed to Paris in 1745, and lived there in the closest retirement, seeing but few friends, of whom Marmontel and Voltaire were the chief. Among his correspondents was the archaeologist Fauris de Saint-Vincens. Vauvenargues published in 1746 an Introduction à la connaissance de l'esprit humain, with certain Reflexions and Maximes appended. He died in Paris on the 28th of May 1747.

The bulk of Vauvenargues's work is very small, but its interest is very considerable. In the Introduction, in the Reflexions and in the minor fragments, it consists, in fact, of detached and somewhat desultory thoughts on questions of moral philosophy and of literary criticism. Sainte-Beuve has mildly said that as a literary critic Vauvenargues "shows inexperience." His literary criticism is indeed limited to a repetition in crude form of the stock ideas of his time. Thus he exaggerates immensely the value of Racine and Boileau, but depreciates Corneille and even Moliere. As a writer he stands far higher. His style is indeed, according to strict academic judgment, somewhat incorrect, and his few excursions into rhetoric have the artificial and affected character which mars so much 18th-century work. His strength, however, is not really in any way that of a man of letters, but that of a moralist. He did not adopt the complete philosophe attitude; in his letters, at any rate, he poses as "neutral" between the religious and the anti-religious school. In some of his maxims about politics there is also traceable the hollow and confused jargon about tyrants and liberty which did So much to bring about the struggles of the Revolution. It is in morals proper, in the discussion and application of general principles of conduct, that Vauvenargues shines. He is not an exact psychologist, much less a rigorous metaphysician. His terminology is popular and loose, and he hardly attempts the co-ordination of his ideas into any system. His real strength is in a department which the French have always cultivated with greater success than any other modern people—the expression in more or less epigrammatic language of the results of acute observation of human conduct and motives, for which he had found ample leisure in his campaigns. The chief distinction between Vauvenargues