Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/202

 196

NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 a.m. MARCH 10,1917

Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia employs the term (' Dinwiddie Papers,' ii. 626, 636, 654). On the first of those dates he wrote to Washington as follows : " You shall re- ceive your usual Pay and Allowance for your Batmen (as the Committee have fixt it), and the additional Sum of two hundred Pounds per Annum for your Table and Expenses." Also, Washington himself used the term in the same year : see his ' Writings,' ed. Ford, i. 448-9.

ALBERT MATTHEWS. Boston, U.S.

SHELLEY'S COPY OF ABBE BARRTJEL'S WORK ON SECRET SOCIETIES (12 S. iii. 108). Some references to this work will be found in ' The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley,' edited by Roger Ingpen (London, Pitman, 1909). Shelley rather oddly calls the book ' Memoirs of Jacobitism.' On Feb. 27, 1812 (vol. i. p. 268), he wrote to Miss Kitchener :

" Did you ever read the Abb6 Barruel's ' Memoirs of Jacobitism ' ? Although it is half filled with the vilest and most unsupported false- hood, it is a book worth reading. To you, who know how to distinguish truth, I recommend it."

It is supposed to have suggested to him the idea of a society which he elaborated in his ' Proposals for an Association of those Philanthropists, who, convinced of the inadequacy of the moral and political state of Ireland to produce benefits which are nevertheless attainable, are willing to unite to accomplish its regeneration,' published March 2, 1812. See ' The Letters,' vol. i. pp. 50, 257, 267, 273, 287.

M. H. DODDS.

Home House, Low Fell, Gateshead.

It may be concluded, from the inscription and the date, that Shelley read the work when at Oxford. The book is an English translation of the Abbe's ' Memoires pour servir a 1'histoire du Jacobinisme,' which was published in London (1797-8) ; the trans- lation was made by the Hon. Robert Clifford in 1798 (4 vols.).

It is likely that Shelley left this copy at Horsham, for he visited that place shortly after he had left Oxford (see Dowden, ' Life of Shelley,' p. 124).

The influence of this work of Barruel's may be detected first in Shelley's letter to Leigh Hunt, written from University College, Oxford, March 2, 1811, in which he proposed to Hunt the foundation of a society to defend rational liberty after the manner of the Illuminati. Dowden, in his ' Life of Shelley,' conjectured that this letter had been influenced by Barruel (see vol. i.

pp. 112-13). The fact that Shelley is now definitely known to have had Barruel's work at Oxford tends to remove all doubt con- cerning the suggestion.

In his letters written during his Irish to his desire to found a Philanthropic Association ; and there is reason to believe that his lost novel ('Hubert Cauvin') was written with a view to advancing his ideas concerning that project. In his ' Proposals for an Association ' (Dublin, 1812) he set forth his purpose in a definite manner, and here the Abbe Barruel's influence is proved by the fact that Shelley refers not only to- the Abbe, but also to the ' Memoirs de- Jacobitisme ' (sic).
 * ampaign, Shelley makes frequent reference-

We get another definite reference to the- Abbe Barruel's ' Memoirs ' in a letter dated from 7 Lower Sackville Street, Dublin, on, Feb. 27, 1812, from which this is an ex- tract :

" Did you ever read the Abbe' Bar[r]uel's ' Memoirs of Jacobitism ' ? [ut supra.']

Some of the editors of Shelley's letters print Barruel's name wrong, with only one r,. as " Baruel " ; but whether the fault lies with Shelley or with his editors I do not know. However, all the editors of the- letters whose editions I am acquainted with refer to Barruel's work as ' Memoirs of Jacobitism,' thus indicating that Shelley made two mistakes in the above short sentence. In no edition of the letters of Shelley with which I am acquainted is there any attempt made to correct or even to call attention to Shelley's mistake.

Shelley's ' Queen Mab,' a work of his intellectual period, gives abundant proof of his interest in French works of a contro- versial nature ; but it would, I think, require a very subtle study of his earlier writing to ascertain how far Barruel's book influenced his thought.

The ' Memoires pour servir a 1'histoire du Jacobinisme ' is perhaps the Abbe's best- known work, whilst his ' Histoire du Clerg6 pendant la Revolution Frangaise ' (1793) is possibly his next most popular book. There was an edition of this printed at Dublin in 1794, by H. Fitzpatrick.

JOSEPH J. MACSWEENEY. Barrenhill House, Bailey, co. Dublin.

T. G. Hogg, in his ' Life of Shelley/ says :

" The Abb6 Barruel's ' History of Jacobinism ' was a favourite book at college ; he went through the four volumes again and again, swallowing with eager credulity the fictions and exaggerations of that readily believing, or readily inventing