Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/107

 * S. I. JAK. 29, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

99

pi Dnetics will enable any one to reject as in possible. WALTER W. SKEAT.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

T,,e Assistant Genies and Irreconcilable Gnomes; >r, Continuation to the Comte de Gabalis. Trans- ated by John Yarker. (Bath, Fryar.) \\ E dealt at some length (see 8 th S. xi. 499) with th 3 second part of Mr. Yarker's translation of the ' ( 'omte de Gabalis ' of the Abbe" de Montf aucon de V liars, showing the conditions under which this curious product of satire and mysticism saw the lij.;ht. We then announced that a third part, con- cerning which we were without information, was piomised, in an edition limited, like the preceding, to one hundred copies. This third part now appears. It proves to be a translation of ' Les Genies assist- ants et Gnomes irreconciliables ' of Pere Antoine Androl, celestin, published at Amsterdam in 1715 and La Haye in 1718, and reprinted, with the ' Comte de Gabalis, 5 in 1732, a work to which mystics attach less importance than to the ' Nouveaux Entretiens sur les Sciences secretes,' otherwise ' Le Comte de Gabalis.' The scene in this case is laid in Ireland, whither the relater has accompanied the Duke of Schomberg. After the death of his pro- tector and friend, he accepts the hospitality of an Irishman who is devoted to the occult sciences, and by whom he is enlightened as to the superstitions connected with St. Patrick's Purgatory. These things have now, he is told, fallen into contempt, having been turned by the monks to fraudulent account. He is, however, introduced to a veritable illumine named Macnamara, who recognizing in him a kindred spirit, enlightens him as to the relation- ship to human beings of the genies and the gnomes. Each man has, it appears, one or two genies attend- ant upon him, who, if not discouraged by neglect or addiction to evil courses, will supply premonitions of approaching danger, and lead the spirit along delectable ways to a higher life. More dubious is the attitude of the gnomes, who are in fact, as the title of the book indicates, irreconcilable. The gnomes, in the first instance, were those who, after Adam and Eve (seeing by the birth of Cain to what a progeny their unblessed union was giving rise] had agreed to a divorce, begot upon Eve a progeny as admirable in physical as in moral respects. Beguiled by the serpent, however, Eve returned to her original mate. Disgusted with the wickedness of the race so begotten, the gnomes withdrew from intercourse with humanity. Vainly did the nar- rator, in an interview with the Prince of the Gnomes, seek to secure an amnesty and a resump- tion of relations. Mankind was too base, he was told, for " spirits of another sort" to have anything further to do with them. In addition to the reve lations of .genies and gnomes we have a series o: stories most of them familiar to the student o: the manner in which, in history, attendant genies have protected men of mark. What the reader will think concerning these matters depends upon his point of view and his powers of belief. The volume may, at least, be read with amusement or interest. We wish the translation were in some respects better executed. The contraction o Messieurs or MM. into " M rs " as " M re the Games' is puzzling to English readers. Accents are flung

bout in French words almost at haphazard. We _ave " disclaim " where declaim is meant, and we have a reference to the " Deipnosophistae of Athenseous" (sic).

The embodied ' Children of the Elements,' with a glossary of euphemisms, is promised as a supplement

,o the first part to be reissued of the ' Comte de Gabalis.' Other works to be given in the same series consist of a digest of portions of ' The Master- pieces ' of L. A. Cahagnet, F.T.S., and 'The Book

>f John Trithemius, Abbot of Spain ' (qy. of Span-

leim ?), from the original Latin, published 1522.

George Thomson, the Friend of Sums: his Life and Correspondence. By J. Cuthbert Hadden. (Nimmo.)

OF Thomas Da vies, bookseller, actor, and author of The Life of Garrick' and the 'Dramatic Mis- cellanies,' Churchill said, in well - remembered ines,

With him came mighty Davies. On my life. That Davies hath a very pretty wife : a reference which though it involves no rebuke, since Mrs. Davies, born Miss Yarrow, Was as virtuous as she was pretty has been quoted as implying contempt. A similar feeling is originated when, on the title-page of what is, in fact, a man's biography, he is announced as "the friend of Burns." Most surely to have been the friend of Burns was an honour of which Thomson had every right to be proud. Many men with less claims than he upon attention survive, in a way, as the friends of Keats, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, Milton. As a rule, their lives do not extend beyond dictionaries m

friendship with Burns, Thomson enjoyed a certain amount of intimacy with many of the most dis- tinguished men of his day, and his correspondents included Sir Walter, Byron, Campbell, Rogers, Allan Cunningham, Beethoven, and many others concerning whom -the world is not soon tired of hearing. Lives, indeed, of friends of poets and great men, could we obtain them, would have a value of their own. Trelawny's life gives us precious particulars concerning Shelley. The few facts concerning Tudor dramatists recorded by Drummond of Hawthornden make us long for more ; and who would not welcome the recollections concerning Milton of Cyriack Skinner, or those of Manning of the unbleached hands concerning Lamb ? Not a very inspiring personality is Thomson, and he suggests now and then the desirability of a new 'Baviad' devoted to him. His biographer even accepts him as a representative of Mrs. Grundy. He helps us, however, to a knowledge of Edinburgh in a profoundly interesting period, and his life and correspondence may, as we can vouch, be read with contentment and approval. A purpose of rescuing Thomson from the charge of stinginess brought against him by, among others, Allan Cunningham seems to be carried out. In compiling his col- lections of songs, Scottisn, Welsh, and other, Thomson was prudent, but not stingy. No prose words of Burns are better known than those in which he refused any further honorarium for his con- tributions. Joanna Baillie and others seem to have regarded Thomson as needlessly liberal, and Beet- hoven got from him terms that were prohibitive of any chance of the venture, so far as he was con-