Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/881

Rh this work, he felt the want of a thorough musical train ing, and voluntarily descended from the position of a successful maestro to that of a humble pupil. He took lessons from Cherabini, and the influence of that great master is distinctly discernible in the higher artistic finish of Boieldieu s later compositions. In IS 02 Boieldieu, for the second time in his life, took to sudden flight, on this occasion in order to escape the domestic troubles caused by his marriage with a celebrated ballet-dancer of the Paris Opera. The frightened husband went to Russia, where he was received with open arms by the Emperor Alexander. During his prolonged stay at St Petersburg he composed a number of operas which it is unnecessary to name. He also set to music the choruses of Racine s Athalie, one of his few attempts at the tragic style of dramatic writing. In 1811 he returned to his own country, where the following year witnessed the production of one of his finest works, Jean de Paris. The charming coquetry of the queen of Xavarre, the chivalrous verve of the king, the officious pedantry of the seneschal, and the amorous tenderness of the page all this rendered in the finest touches that music, and only French music, is capable of, will not soon be forgotten. We pass over a number of other operas of lesser value, partly written in collaboration with other com posers, and turn at once to the second and greatest master piece of Boieldieu s genius, his Dame Blanche (1825). The libretto, written by Scribe, was partly suggested by Walter Scott s Monastery, and several original Scotch tunes cleverly introduced by the composer add not a little to the melodious charm and local colour of the work. La Dame Blanche marks the highest development of the French school of comic opera. Gre&quot;try stood at the head of this school ; Cherubini with his Deux Journees followed in his wake ; Boieldieu, greater than both (in this particular branch of art), reached a perfection which was to some extent sustained by the works of Auber. Boieldieu s pupil, Adam, has in his Derniers Souvenirs d un Musicien left a charming sketch of the genesis of Boieldieu s masterpiece. The chief characteristics of his style are an easy flow of graceful melodies, a refined though occasionally somewhat meagre instrumentation, admirable phrasing, and a most distinct enunciation of the words. The outer events of Boieldieu s career may be summed up in few words. For a long time he occupied the position of professor of composition and pianoforte at the Conservatoire; in 1817 he was made a member of the Institute. The Dame Blanche was his last opera but one. Soon after its production he was seized with a violent attack of pulmonary disease. To stop the rapid progress of the illness he travelled in Italy and the South of France, but fell a victim to it on October 8, 1834.  BOII, a Celtic people, who at an early date crossed the Alps and established themselves between the Po and the Apennines to the south of the Insubres and Cenomani. On the defeat of their neighbours the Senones by the Romans they joined the Etruscans against the. conquerors, and were involved in the disastrous results of the battle at the Vadimonian Lake in 283 B.C. Equally unsuccessful in the following year, they formed a treaty of peace with the Romans, which they kept for a considerable time, till the encroachments of their conquerors led them to engage in the Great Gallic war of 225 B.C. From that period they continued to indulge their hostility on all occasions, and on the outbreak of the Punic wars gave valuable aid to the Carthaginians from time to time. At length their strength was broken by Scipio Nasica in 191 B.C. ; a large proportion of their territory was appropriated and secured by the colonies of Bononia, Parma, and Mutina ; and before long the whole race seems to have been constrained to recross the Alps. They betook themselves to that district of country which is still called &quot;in consequence Bohemia ; but before many centuries they were expelled by other hostile tribes and their separate existence as a people was lost.  BOILEAU-DESPREAUX,, was born at Paris on the 1st November 1636. Crone, not far from the capital, has been frequently stated to be his birthplace, but the matter seems to be pretty nearly settled by the researches of M. Labat (Recherches historiques sur VHotel de la Prefecture de Police}, who has discovered the very house in the Rue de Jerusalem where the poet was born. He was educated at the College of Beauvais, and was at first destined for the legal profession. From this, however, after a short trial, he recoiled in disgust, complaining bitterly of the amount of chicanery which passed under the name of law and justice. To escape such a course of life he began to study for the church, and actually received a priory of a small annual value, but his wishes soon turned in another direction. He gave up his clerical profession, and, his father having left him a small provision suffi cient for his wants, thenceforward devoted himself to letters. Such of his early poems as have been pre served hardly contain the promise of what he ultimately became. The first piece in which his peculiar powers were displayed was a satirical poem, Adieus of a Poet to the City of Paris, published in 1660. This was quickly followed by eight others, and the number was at a later period increased to twelve. A twofold in terest attaches to the satires. In the first place the author skilfully parodies and attacks writers who at the time were placed in the very first rank, such as Chapelain, Cotin, Quiuault, and Scuderi ; he openly raised the stand ard of revolt against the older poets. But in the second place he showed, both by precept and practice, what were the poetical capabilities of the French language. Prose, in the hands of such writers as Descartes and Pascal, had proved itself a flexible and powerful instrument of expres sion, with a distinct mechanism and form. But except with Malherbe, there had been no attempt to fashion French versification according to rule or method. In Boileau for the first time appeared terseness and vigour of expression, with perfect regularity of verse structure. His fame was quickly established ; he received a pension, and was made historiographer along with his friend Racine. In 1664 he composed his prose Dialogue des heros de roman, which is a refined satire on the elaborate romances of the time. It may be said to have once for all abolished them. From 1669 onwards appeared the Epistles, graver in tone than the satires, maturer in thought, more exquisite and polished in style. In 1674 his two master-pieces, L Art Poetique and Le Lutrin, were published. The first, in imitation of the Ars Poetica of Horace, lays down the code for all future French verse, and may be said to fill in French literature a parallel place to that held by its proto type in Latin. On our own literature the maxims of Boileau, through the translation revised by Dryden, and through the magnificent imitation of them in Pope s Art of Criticism, have exercised no slight influence. Boileau does not merely lay down rules for the language of poetry, but analyses carefully the various kinds of verse composition, and enunciates the principles peculiar to each. Of the four books of the Art Poetiqiie, the first and last consist of general precepts, inculcating mainly the great rule of Ion sens; the second treats of .the pastoral, the elegy, the ode, the epigram, and satire ; and the third of tragic and epic poetry. Though the rules laid down are of value, their tendency is rather to hamper and render too mechanical the efforts of poetry. Boileau himself, though a great critic in verse, cannot be considered a great poet. The Lutrin, a mock heroic poem, of which four cantos appeared in 1674 