wm WffliffffiffHMMflllllfrlllfMi' i_£ Pass P/J3 J17 Book ^L_3 A REPORT UPON THE erculaneum $tamt£crit>tsi, IN A SECOND LETTER, ADDRESSED, BY PERMISSION, TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE REGENT, BY THE REV. JOHN HAYTER, A.M. CHAPLAIN IN ORDINARY TO THE PRINCE, AND HIS SUPERINTENDENT OF THOSE MANUSCRIPTS. /7Z- praebetur Origo Per Cinerem. Claudian. Eontwm: PRINTED FOR RICHARD PHILLIPS, No. 7, BRIDGE STREET; BY GEORGE SIDNEY, NORTHUMBERLAND STREET, STRAND. 1811. i\ & ?*» / PREFATORY REMARK. Two or three references are necessarily made in this Second Letter to the First, which was ad- dressed to the same Illustrious Personage. For this reason a new and corrected Edition of that First Letter is subjoined to the present. - - - TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE REGENT. Sir, It must be regarded by every person, as a very distinguished honour to me, to have been selected by your Royal Highness for the arduous and important charge, and direction of restoring to light the contents of the celebrated Herculaneum Manuscripts. Before my departure from England, in 1 800, I was most graciously permitted to represent the whole scope of this literary mission, in a printed B 2 letter, addressed to your Royal Highness, as the great and illustrious Patron of the undertaking. Since my return, that letter has, with the same gracious permission, been reprinted, in order to correct some errors, which a want of local, as well as accurate, information had unavoidably occasioned. But of infinitely more consequence is the advantage, which I now enjoy, of addressing to your Royal Highness, in this letter, a faithful and detailed account of every circumstance, transaction, and occurrence, which, in any man- ner, are connected with the nature, the com- mencement, the prosecution, and the result of the undertaking, of which the successful, at least very promising, course was interrupted, most unfortunately, in the year 1806, by the French invasion of the Neapolitan territory. Hence it will clearly appear, I most confidently trust, that, notwithstanding that invasion, notwithstanding 3 all the weakness, the ignorance, the jealousy, and the treachery, which, from several quarters, vtfere conducive to the purpose of impeding, or counteracting, the progress of my labours, yet the Commands of your Royal Highness, in this most princely work, have been executed to a greater extent, than could have been reasonably presumed. In truth, the fac simile copies of ninety-four manuscripts, lately transferred, by your wise and munificent donation, through the hands of that most distinguished, both scholar and statesman, — that, upon every consideration, most respectable nobleman, Lord Grenville, — to the University of Oxford, will, unquestionably, serve to immortalize your name in every future generation, more especially of the learned world. Nor was your Royal interposition, in this instance, merely glorious ; it was, happily, too, most seasonable. In any court, where an indif- ference, to any degree, prevails against the pur- B 2 4 suits, and interests of knowledge, and erudition in general, treasures, inestimable treasures, of anci- ent literature, like these manuscripts of Hercula- neum, although composed in the two classical languages, could not engage a single thought, much less any regard, or attention whatsoever. Besides, the crisis itself, and, particularly, the ruinous expences of a war with the common enemy, rendered it nearly impracticable for the embarrassed sovereign of the two Sicilies, even if he had been so disposed, to promote the attain- ment of literary objects, by dedicating to them any part of his concern, or of his revenue. You, most illustrious Sir, are the only Royal Personage, at the present era, of those high and disinterested sentiments, which, renouncing every personal view, every selfish regard, excite a phi- lanthropic zeal, an humane ambition, to form and to advance any great design, which may tend to some laudable and beneficial end. To yourself alone these despondent relics of old Greece and Rome could have had recourse for the vindica- tion of their merits, and even for the protection of their existence. To the Prince of Wales alone could they, with any hope of success, offer their supplications in the language of a former and similar occasion, in these expressions of MaQrifJLCtgi vvv 7\eypouov Wo tov 7\or/ "■/.. ) ) TOlAeAO OJM ICCNieHeYTJOJ 0-M<6l>\A/ViC MJTOACeM OH ^ « ■ » ^ 1 :% ^ ^ K 0^ ' / / AO All M O P I TO .!/<./-, ^ f.„ /..■It, loll Publish,:! .l/>ri'l :•*' hill /;)■ /ll./i.il./ I'lu/lip.r .V.'j.A'rw liriii/f.S'lr. 31 were Greek, could not read them : he was obliged, therefore, to consult that eminent scho- lar, the Canon Mazzochi, about them. To the great joy of Mazzochi, who immediately repaired to the " Scavi," the labourers were still pro- curing more manuscripts from two different, but small, rooms in the same house.* The wood of the shelves, upon which they had been placed in small boxes, was, together with the wood of the boxes themselves, strongly charred, or re- duced to ashes. The manuscripts themselves, so providentially saved by the intervention of Mazzochi, and gradually and carefully excavated by the workmen, were not less than eighteen * This house is supposed, upon some foundation, to have been the residence of the great Piso family. Cicero, speaking of that residence, observes, that he could see it from his villa, near Puteoli. This circum- stance has been practically confirmed upon the spot where that villa stood, in directing the view towards that part of the volcanick mass, which is perpendicularly over the site of that residence. 32 hundred, some in a less, some in a more perfect state. It is curious, that these manuscripts, which are always called by the Italians " Papiri," because the substance of each volume, or roll, was formed from the plant Papyrus,* owe their preservation to the heat of those materials, which had buried them; without this, their vegetable texture must have been destroyed by putrefac- tion. But, although the greatest part of their bulk had thus resisted the effects of time, yet that bulk itself had been much injured. In many instances it was much impaired, some- times obliterated, or disfigured, or perforated, * Hence the modern word Paper. The ingenious Chevalier Lando- lini, of Syracuse, who favoured me with a visit at Portici, renewed, with successful experiment, the mode of forming this substance. It both receives and retains, extremely well, and most distinctly, each character of the pen and ink ; our best paper is not more serviceable ; I have often tried it. Landolini, in a manuscript essay, has ably corrected, and explained the corrupt text of Pliny upon this subject. 33 or mutilated, or broken, wholly, or in part, by that very heat, or by compression under the heavy volcanick materials, or by the forcible introduc- tion of very light dust, and some small stones, into its substance, especially in the more exterior folds of each volume, which, in every instance, have suffered some, or all of those various inju- ries. The interior folds, where the Greek and Latin characters (as the manuscripts are written in both those languages) are not totally annihi- lated by volcanick injuries, exhibit an high degree of preservation, and even a superficial lustre, both in their substance, and in the re- maining characters. The ancient ink had, luckily, a considerable quantity of gum, but no acid ; of this we had been informed by Pliny the Elder, who is invaluable, as in so many other respects, so for his extreme accuracy in every point, upon which his indefatigable researches could not be misled by others, or insuperably F 34 obstructed, or baffled. By royal command, at the suggestion of Mazzochi, the manuscripts were lodged in the Museum at Portici, and numbered; but, owing to the folly of the Spaniard, were not classed in two divisions, so as to denote the quan- tity found in each of the two respective rooms. To advance the developement, and inter- pretation of these volumes, Charles III. insti- tuted a society ; it consisted of members, the most celebrated in that country for their literary attainments, — the Marquis Tannucci, Mazzochi, the Prelate Baiardi,* and some few others. * To this extraordinary man all the antiquities of the Museum, ex- cept these manuscripts, were committed, whether from Herculaneum, Pom- peii, or Stabiae. In his History of Herculaneum he begins ab ovo : as he pro- ceeds, he does much : and would have done still more, had not the termina- tion of his life interfered with the completion of his design. In several printed volumes hitherto, he had only given, with genealogical minute- ness, the whole account of Hercules, and his children, man, woman, and child ; but, had he lived, he would have given the same account of all the subsequent generations of all the Heraclidse. 35 When Piaggi, the inventor of the process, which I have more circumstantially described in my former Letter, had, together with his scholar, Vincenzo Merli, unrolled a page, or any tolerable series of characters, in any fragment, they submitted, in either case, whatever they had gained, to Maz- zochi, who applied himself most successfully to the elucidation of it. The first manuscript they opened had the title of the work, and the name of the author, at the end,*" that is, upon the most interior part of the roll. The work, as the title imported, was upon musick, the name of the author Philodemus. * This title, and name, have been situated in the same part of all the manuscripts, hitherto opened, except in two instances : — one instance is that of the fac simile manuscript, or volume, which faces page 31 of this Letter : — the other is that of which I have made a memorandum at the bottom of the same fac simile. The import of the superscription in the fac simile is clear, as to the arithmetical cyphers, such as XXX (viz.) 3000, which, as they are stated to that effect in other manuscripts, most probably denote the number of lines only ; and, therefore, the other F 2 36 Perhaps it may not be thought totally unin- teresting, should I lay before your Royal High- ness a view of some specimens of titles, and names, and other final inscriptions from those " Papiri," which were opened under my direction. At the end of the manuscript, No. 1042, which Camillo Paderni began to unroll 23d January, 1802., and finished 22d March in the same year, there are* sUiKovYov TleVi OyCswC In Number 1423. O/AoAHMoy IIsP* PHToP*KIlC A TwN biC Avo To IIPoTgPoN part of the superscription may, not improbably, denote the subject. In the other manuscript, the characters AoAHMo . . x» .. 1 . . . « are the remains of OjAoJfljUOy Ylepl Yr\TOflKY\q, i- e. both the name of the writer, and title of his subjeet. 37 In Number 208. KooAooTov IlPoC ToN nA a 1 . i .* NoC A . C* . * In Number 336. f noA^CTPaToy IIsP* aAoTov KaTaOPoNH CswC O/A sILrPaOoy C/N IlPoC T QiAiCTol B AP*0 XXX HH AAA H CsA * These dots are inserted by me to shew, that there is a chasm. f This Number was only half of a manuscript, which had been broken into two pieces. Another Number, forming the other half, was fortunately unfolded and copied afterwards. The fac simile copy of this manuscript, which is one of the most perfect, is at Oxford. 38 In Number 1006. AHMHTFiov UsFi T/NojN CuZHTHGsNTwN A/a*TaN In Number 1479. E* . * . . . aP . . n . Pi . acswc KH TwN aPXa/wN In Number 1414. OiAoAHMov IIsP* AsiToy KoAAHMaTa CsA . ioH The above-mentioned Treatise upon Musick was by that Philodemus, whom his cotemporary, Cicero, calls " Optimum Virum," and " Doctis- simum Hominem." He was an Epicurean, and 39 was the author of that Greek Epigram, to which Horace alludes in " Gallis hanc, Philodemus ait." Upon the characters and title of this controver- sial Treatise, which is written against musick, and against its advocate, (one Diogenes, a learned Stoick) Winckelman has made remarks, much less interesting than might have been expected from his great talents, his experience, his know- ledge, and his taste ; nor could his remarks, if otherwise equal to his high reputation, have been very copious, and extensive. Every foreigner, before the mission, with which I was honoured by your Royal Highness, had, from the jealous vigilance, and restriction of the Neapolitan Go- vernment, much difficulty in obtaining access to any means of information, and very little exercise even of his sight, upon the Herculaneum manu- scripts. However, in this, as in every other case, every thing, which is written by Winckelman, 40 must undoubtedly possess some claim to our at- tention. Mazzochi prepared this Treatise of Phi- lodemus for publication, with much learning, yet with too redundant a display of quotation, of comment, and of criticism. Some supplements, which he has inserted, are inadmissible, because they are not commensurate with the vacant space ; but this publication was prevented by the state of total idiotism, which came upon him in a very advanced period of his life. At last, the death of this very respectable scholar, added to the previous relinquishment of the crown of the two Sicilies for that of Spain, by Charles III. served most effectually to deaden the efforts of, and by degrees to annihilate, the Herculaneum Society. The Marquis Caraccioli revived this Society in 1787, and appointed Charles Rosini, the pre- sent Bishop of Puzzuolo, to direct all the busi- ness of the " Papiri," which, during the idiotism 41 of Mazzochi, and still more after his death, were much neglected by Piaggi. Rosini had been under the patronage, and in the favour of Maz- zochi, from whom he obtained the possession of the Treatise upon Musick, most fully prepared for editing. This was superbly edited, in 1790, by Rosini himself, who, without the contribution of one solitary word, except his own name, assumed to himself the whole merit of his bene- factor. It may not be improper to mention, that General Acton, as Prime Minister, advised me not to have any intercourse with Rosini, because, in the first revolution of Naples, he had remained upon his Bishoprick of Puzzuolo, and had delivered a pastoral discourse in favour of the Jacobin Usurpation. In subjoining, that he has again served Joseph Buonaparte, and is still serving Murat, in the employment which I held there under your Royal Highness, I have no view whatever, but that of explaining, most G 42 satisfactorily, why, during all the time I was employed at Naples, this Bishop, instead of assisting me, did every thing in his power to thwart, and counteract all my proceedings. In fact, with such political notions, added to the prejudices of a bigoted Papist against a foreign Heretick, he could not well have supported towards me any other line of conduct, than what I invariably experienced. For the same reasons, Colonel La Vega, the Keeper of the Royal Museum, rivalling in every respect his prede- cessor, the Spaniard, never failed to observe the same deportment. The first, for the pur- pose of frustrating my intentions, although sanctioned by his Majesty's Minister, the Right Honourable Sir William Drummond, to publish the fragments of several books of Epicurus de Rerum Natura, which I had discovered, espe- cially as they seemed to excite much interest in the world, kept in his own hands the fac 43 simile copies, nearly all the time I remained at Naples, under various pretexts ; and at last, jointly with the brother of the Colonel, who was dead, and with the unexpected connivance of the Court, deprived your Royal Highness of the valuable engraved fac simile copies of three books and an half of that Philosopher. These engrav- ings, consequently, are now in possession of the existing Government at Naples. One circum- stance, in particular, ought not to be concealed from your Royal Highness ; — it is this : — I have already said, that Mazzochi had prepared for publication, as it is now printed, the Treatise, of Philodemus upon Musick, which the Bishop edited in his own name; I say more, the Bishop was not capable of publishing it in its present form. In a copy of a Treatise,* Ilsfi touvopenw * That copy is now at Oxford ; but it had been revised, and again corrected by me. G 2 44 mfjLSMrsM, which he undertook to correct, he left, or made, even thirty-two errors in a single column. Could such a corrector of a copy be the learned publisher of a book ? What I have here said, I persuade myself, will not be deemed either to be " extenuated, or set down in malice," or foreign to, or unconnected with, the nature and the interests of my Herculaneum mission ; more particularly, if it should be con- sidered, that these men were, nominally at least, associated with me in the prosecution of the objects of that mission. Besides these persons, the Neapolitan Court gave another companion, who really and sincerely assisted me. Your Royal Highness, I trust, will permit me to seize this occasion of expressing for this old man, who was a Basilian Abbot, and whose name was Foti, my sentiments of esteem and friendship. He was the best Greek scholar, with whom I ever met in Naples, or in Sicily. With the most unpreju- 45 diced candour he co-operated with me, as far as could be expected from heart-felt zeal, and much unaffected knowledge. Continually he paid the tribute of his warm encomiums to the disin- terested, munificent, and princely motives which influenced the Royal Patron of the undertaking. In a word, with truth I speak of him, as " Animam, qualem neque candidiorem Terra tulit, nee cui me sit devinctior alter." Before the commencement of my labours in 1802, there had been opened, during more than forty years, only eighteen manuscripts. Of what materials their substance was formed, I have already mentioned. The process, or mode of opening them, has been described in my first Letter. The points, at which the " papyrace- ous" sheets were fastened together by a cement or gum, are often visible. I should conceive, that the longest roll, composed of these cemented sheets, could not have exceeded, in any instance, 46 forty feet, and no sheet could have been longer than three feet, or thereabouts; the breadth of the sheet, as it must naturally suggest itself, must constitute the length of each roll, which, taking all the manuscripts one with another, is a varying measure from somewhat less than a palm to something, but very little, more than a foot. In writing, the ancients placed the length of the roll horizontally, and the breadth was perpendicularly divided into columns, as they are called, or pages, with a varying interval between each, sometimes of more, sometimes of less, than an inch. When the whole mass was folded into a volume, or roll, (of which there is &fac simile at page 31) they began to fold it at the end. Hence, as I have observed before, the name of the writer and title of the work have hitherto, except in two instances, been found in the innermost part of the manuscript. Very incon- siderable pieces of the stick with " umbilici/' or 47 rollers, round which the folds were made, and of its heads, have been found in very rare instances ; but in each instance they are either pulverized, or reduced to a black, and friable coal. The colour of the volumes is extremely different, one from the other, in shades of a tawny, a deep or dark brown, and black, to that of the darkest charcoal. Of the latter are those of Philodemus, already unrolled; and all the Greek manuscripts, indeed, are of a blacker shade than the Latin, which are of the first. The inference from this respective state of colour in the different manu- scripts, must naturally be, that they were found in two different rooms ; one of these rooms must have been less affected than the other, by the heat of the volcanick matter. But the less any manuscript has been affected by that heat, the more difficulty has been always encountered in opening it, for the reason which I have assigned in my first Letter. It is remarkable, that all the 48 Latin manuscripts, which I have attempted to unroll, have been of a tawny, or brown colour; and, therefore, one of them (which is the fragment of a Latin poem before-mentioned) was opened with great difficulty. Another produced only unconnected scraps of broken pages, or columns, in a state the more to be lamented, as, from some common words, as well as Roman proper names, it might be concluded to be something historical. Of others, it was found totally im- practicable to separate the substance, even in the smallest portions. All these, consequently, must have been lodged in one of the two rooms, dif- ferent from that in which those of Philodemus and the Greek writers were kept. The only mode of selecting a manuscript from the Royal Museum for developement, was very simple, but not always effectual ; yet, at the same time, whenever the small brush, which they wetted and applied, in this case, to the 49 outside surface of a manuscript, caused the exterior fold to raise itself singly in a detached state from the next under it, that manuscript, most completely justified the experiment, how- ever simple, by a more entire separation of each fold in the volume, especially from the middle part, even to the end, and by a more entire preservation of letters, both in form and in colour. So many persons of erudition, and good sense, Russians, Germans, Swedes, Greeks, Spa- niards, French, Italians, and even English, said so much of chymical experiments, as likely to contribute to the greater and more productive facility of unfolding the most conglutinated masses of these manuscripts,, that I yielded, con- trary to my own sentiments, to their representa- tions. These sentiments were founded upon hourly observation of the variously affected sub- stance of several manuscripts. That observation H 50 was directed to the nature of their substance, and to the nature of those materials, which had brought them to their present state ; but as it was my duty not even to appear to neglect any means by which, it was so generally supposed, the undertaking might be forwarded, I thought, non tarn Turpe fuit vinci, quam contendisse decorum. Mr. Poli, one of those who were employed in the tuition of the Hereditary Prince, a man well known in the philosophical world, and Pre- sident of the Military Academy, recommended to me one Gaetano la Pira, as an excellent chy- mist, both in theory, and in experiment. This gentleman wrote his Proposal, together with his data. Broken pieces of several of the more impaired manuscripts, classed according to their respective defects, were set apart by my order for his inspection. After considering, during some time, and in detail, their defects, after 51 having been permitted by me to make other various unsuccessful attempts, at last, without convincing me by any single argument, which he adduced, he was permitted to try vegetable gas. The greatest part of each mass flew, under this trial, into useless atoms; besides, not a character was to be discovered upon any single piece. The dreadful odour drove us all from the Museum. This, in fact, is a part of the royal palace, which, if the court had been there, must, also, have been precipitately abandoned. After these experiments, I had the satisfac- tion of continuing, with a safer conscience, the process, which I have described in my first Letter. — This, in a second corrected edition, is subjoined to the present Letter. — Piaggi, the Inventor, was no more. Vincenzo Merli was justly discarded for certain revolutionary practises. There were, luckily for me, three other men, Malesci, Casanova, and Lentari, who had been h 2 52 employed with Piaggi, and Vincenso Merli, in unfolding the " Papiri." These men were en- gaged by me, not only themselves to unfold, but also to teach and to direct ten others, whom I, at different intervals, additionally took into this service. Two of these men, Giuseppe Casanova, and Carlo Orazj, both of them skilled in the art of design, were exclusively confined to the occu-^ pation of copying, in fac simile, the characters of each fragment, or column, which I consigned to them for that purpose. Each of these men received from me a sum of monthly salary, quite inadequate to their respective support. The compensation for this deficiency depended upon their own exertions, because, both the unfolder and copyist of any fragment, or column, received from me a pre- mium of one carlini for each line, after it had been copied in fac simile, with approved exact- ness. It will, I hope, appear to your Royal 53 Highness, that such an arrangement of pay was not ill calculated to secure the utmost diligence, and most attentive carefulness, both in the un- folder, and in the transcriber. The unfold er was obliged, for his own interest, to keep perpetually in view the necessity of unfolding for the fac simile transcriber as many, and as perfect lines, as he could, in order that he might receive a greater share of reward. For the same reason, the transcriber became an usef ill spy for me upon the unfolder, of whose ignorance, or inattention, or prejudicial violence in unfolding, he would, for his own sake, inform me ; at the same time that his zeal, and his accuracy in transcribing, were objects of jealous scrutiny to the unfolder, and were stimulated thereto by the future acqui- sition of correspondent recompence. In a word, he who unfolded, and he who copied, while each, for his own sake, took all possible pains, most advantageously checked, and animated each other. 54 This mode of payment, which I adopted, I would humbly beg permission to exhibit in the following specimens. These are extracted from the uninterrupted Journal, which I used to keep, of every proceeding, whether my own, or that of others under my direction, as well as of every oc- currence relative to the manuscripts in the Royal Museum at Portici. " ExPENCES. " Saturday, April 30th, 1803. " Io qui sotto dichiaro di aver rice vu to questo trentesimo di di Avrile, 1803, la somma di cinque ducati quarent' otto grana per le spese di pelle di battiloro, di carta per disegnare, di gom- ma, di Lapis, e di galesse, dico " Gio. Batta Malesci." " Monthly Pay. " Saturday, April 30th, 1803. " Noi qui sotto dichiriamo di aver ricevuto questo trentesimo di di Avrile, 1803, i nostri 55 soldi rispettivi per tutto questo mese spirante, diciamo. V Gio. Batta MalescL* " Gennaro Casanova. fl Antonio Lentari, Camillo Paderni, Giuseppe Casanova, Carlo Orazj, Gio. Batta Casanova, Giuseppe Paderni, Francesco Casanova, Gennaro Braibanti, Francesco Paderni, Luigi Corazza, Luigi Catalano,t Alessandro Paderni, Vincenzo Catalano, Saverio Galassi, Giachino Marinaro." * This man, the oldest, the most experienced, and most expert, in unfolding and copying, had twenty-two ducats monthly salary ; the next, Gennaro Casanova, eighteen ditto. The others in proportion, some ten ducats, others, at first, six only. Alessandro Paderni, the Under-keeper of the Museum, was necessarily in constant attendance, upon account of this very work. As he could have no premium, he received the monthly sum of fifteen ducats. The three Porters, much smaller sums, in respective gradation, f These thirteen persons were Unfolders, or Transcribers, and the •remaining names are those of the Under-keeper of the Museum, and of three Porters. 56 " Premiums. " Friday, May 27th, 1303. " Noi sotto dichiriamo d'aver ricevuto dall' lllmo Sigr. D. Giovanni Hayter, per lo svolgi- mento, assistenza, e trascrizione de' Papiri le somme qui appresso notate, il di 27 Maggio, 1803. " lo Geo. Batta Malesci per assistenza alio svolgimento de' Papiri, No. 207, 218, 1385, du- cati 22, grana 40. " lo Gennaro Casanova per Y assistenza alio svolgimento de' Papiri 994, 1056, 1428, ducati 17. 30. *' lo Antonio Lentari ho ricevuto per lo svolgimento del Papiro 1056, ducati ondici 11. 00, 66 lo Guiseppe Casanova per la trascrizione de' Papiri 994, 1056, e 1428, e per cinque Alfa- beti,* ducati 35. 90. * Forty well- executed fac simile alphabets of different Greek ma- nuscripts, and one of the fragment of a Latin poem, were finished, when 57 u Io Carlo Orazj per trascrizioni de Papiri 207, 218, 1385, e per tre alfabeti, ducati venti tre 23. 00. " Io Camillo Paderni per lo svolgimento del Papiro, No. 994, ho ricevuto, ducati trenta, 30. 00. " Io Gio. Batta Casanova per lo svolgimento del Papiro, 218, ducati 7. 30. " Io Francesco Casanova ho ricevuto per lo svolgimento de Papiri, 207, 1385, ducati 9. 10. " Io Giuseppe Paderni per lo svolgimento del Papiro, 1428, ho ricevuto, ducati 1. 30/' In this extract, relative to premiums, there are not the names of some unfolders, which the approach of the French made it necessary for me to leave Naples, in February, 1806. Of these the copper-plate engravings are at Oxford. It gave me infinite satisfaction to hear Lord Grenville observe, that these alphabets are extremely valuable. I 58 appear in the extract of monthly pay. All, consequently, had not merited them. From the most rigorous distribution of them I never, in one instance, deviated. The following are extracts relative to the " Papiri" themselves. " Tuesday, 22d October, 1805. " The " Papiro," No. 300, which had been consigned to Don Gennaro Braibanti, was finished without title or name. " The same day, the " Papiro," No. 985, which had been consigned to Don Antonio Len- tari, was relinquished, as impracticable. " The same day, two other u Papiri" were chosen. No. 1001 was consigned to Don Anto- nio Lentari ; No. 816 to Don Gennaro Braibanti. u The same day, the " Papiro," No. 1057, which had been consigned to Don Francesco Paderni, was finished without name or title. " The same day, another " Papiro," No. 59 988, was chosen, and consigned to the said Don Francesco Paderni." " Monday, November 29th, 1805. " The u Papiro/"* No. 817, which had been consigned to Don Camillo Paderni, was finished. There was no name, or title, at the end. It was the fragment of a Latin poem. Many entire verses in series were found. The poem appears to be historical. It speaks of Alexandria, iEgypt, Csesar, the Battle of Ac- tium, a Siege, the Queen, &c* " The same day, another ff Papiro," No. * The copper- plate fac simile copy of this " Papiro" is now at Oxford. What an immense price, indeed, the Pere Montfaucon, whose grand aim in his itinerant researches, was to find in some book a specimen of ancient Latin orthography, would have set upon this fragment! In fact, the Chevalier Seratti, then Secretary of State for " Case Reali," when I communicated to him the discovery of this Latin fragment, exclaimed, with much rapture, that this discovery was worth all my pains, and all the expence of our Government. 12 (50 831, was chosen, and consigned to the same Don Cainillo Paderni." With the pecuniary disbursements in this undertaking, as my employment was literary, I was totally unconnected. Yet, as his Majesty's Minister, who was then the Right Honourable Sir William Drummond, thought the payment of the persons employed would be, on account of my local advantage, more convenient to me than to himself, or any one attached to his mis- sion, he directed me to undertake that payment. With his directions I more readily complied, because I was justly prompted to do it by the most grateful esteem, and respect for him, as a most sincere friend, as a gentleman of distin- guished birth, manners, talents, erudition, and taste, as an amiable and most excellent man, who, with the sense, and the expression of most 61 loyal duty to the Royal Patron of my employ- ment, promoted it invariably, and effectually, with all the influence of his official situation, and all the warmth of personal concern, and zeal. These motives, I trust, will justify me to your Royal Highness for having added to my super- intendency of the Herculaneum manuscripts, that of the payment of money, issued by Go- vernment to his Majesty's Minister, as far as it was assigned to the persons placed by him under my direction. Hence it was, that, in order not to appear disobliging, or disrespectful, to his Majesty's Charge d' Affaires, William A'Court, Esq. before the arrival of Hugh Elliot, Esq. the successor of Sir William Drummond, nor afterwards to Mr. Elliot himself, I continued to superintend those payments at the Royal Mu- seum at Portici. Thus, what I little foresaw, I became a sub-accountant to the Lords Commis- sioners of his Majesty's Treasury, who have 62 lately, through George Harrison, Esq. examined all my accounts of Government money, as em- ployed ahout these manuscripts. These accounts were, in a manner very honourable to me, ap- proved by that gentleman, and afterwards allowed, and sanctioned, by the Lords Commis- sioners of his Majesty's Treasury. When, in the unrolling any manuscript, a piece reached the top of the machine, from which it was suspended,* such part was then cut off from the manuscript, and placed, and fas- tened by pins, upon a frame of adequate size. If the contents of this piece, which most gene- rally consisted of four columns, appeared to have a series of characters worth the pains, and the expence of copying, I consigned it to one of the two copyists, as soon as he was disengaged from transcribing any other manuscript, or any piece of the same manuscript. * I must again refer to the first Letter. 63 At the time I consigned any piece, and, again, after it was copied, I examined the surface of the respective columns with the utmost care. The copyist, and the unfolder, examined it with me, and after me. The fact was, that frequently, but particularly in the outward folds of each ma- nuscript more than in the innermost, but some- times in both, some particles, or even consider- able parts, of the preceding column, or columns, adhered to the subsequent. This circumstance was occasioned by the various injuries, which, as before stated, the manuscript might have re- ceived, or by the nature of its substance, so liable to conglutination in its several folds. Nor was this examination always successful ; each fold, or part, of a manuscript, was at times so un- substantially subtle, that the eye, with the assistance of the best glasses, which were alwavs employed in this case, could not discern, with the closest attention, whether the surface of the 64 fold, or piece, were identically single, or whether it had combined in itself, and received from any other preceding, and sometimes subsequent, pieces, some letters, or even words, or lines : Noil bene junctarum discordia semina rerim. If I might be permitted, I would here exem- plify to your Royal Highness this most trouble- some part of my employment. The first piece of the eleventh book of Epicurus, which, to repeated view, and minute observation, exhibited the appearance of a tolerably entire, and individual column, was copied, as such. As in every other instance, where any part of a manuscript had been copied, so in this, I first collated the copy with the dark original, letter for letter. Then I began, with all possible attention, mixed* however, with extreme distrust, both of myself, and of the thing itself, to attempt the interpretation. In the different columns of every manuscript, the 65 most perfectly unrolled, there have been always found wanting many letters, often a word, or, more rarely, a whole sentence, or whole sen- tences, respectively.* For the just interpre- tation, it was impossible, it would at least have been unjustifiable, to have proceeded otherwise, than I invariably used to do in the case of each " Lacuna." Its dimensions I exactly ascertained by an accurate, often retraced, mensuration. This rigid mensuration was then applied by me in the same manner, and agreeably to the form, under which that same manuscript presented every given character, to as many characters as, * A gentleman of distinction, to whom I was shewing the fragment of an exterior fold of the Latin Poem, before- mentioned, saw one single word, which was " nihil" This circumstance, which was naturally mentioned by him in society, gained a wide circulation; and thus, as I informed the learned Editor of the Classical Journal, reached the ingenious writer of an article in a late Number of that Journal* " Nihil" seems applied by him to my whole undertaking. K 66 conjecturally, and consistently with the supposed sense of the context, I wished to replace in that " Lacuna." When I was entirely satisfied, that these mensurations were accurate, and that the conjectural letters, thus supplied, expressed the very sense of the author, or, at least, some not inapplicable sense, the copyist was ordered by me to make a partial fac simile of that " Lacuna," and of the letter, which immediately came before it, and, also, of the letter, which immediately came after it, and, then, make in the " Lacuna" itself a fac simile transcript of each character, which had been supplied, in strict conformity to the usual distances between the respective letters in the same manuscript. When this whole process, admitted, " modulo, ac pede," and in aptest cor- respondence, my substituted, or supplied, cha- racters, I wrote them, in my own interpreted copy of that manuscript with red ink, in order to distinguish them from the actually existing 67 characters of the original. After having gone through this process in the quoted instance of the first piece of the above-mentioned eleventh book of Epicurus, after having repeated several times this process, in consequence of the altera- tion which, the surface, by the detachment and loss of several of its particles, repeatedly exhi- bited, I found, that after this repeated process, and the laboured, tormenting, and most unsatis- factory supplemental conjectures of a month, both in the Museum and at home, as well for the vacant letters, as for the sense, my whole inter- pretation was necessarily wrong. This piece, which was supposed to form one column, was at last discovered to consist of two halves, one of which really belonged to the situation, which it occupied, the other, to a preceding column. Of the violent transposition of characters by the same transposition of particles, in the same K 2 68 column, an example is afforded in the following extract from my Journal : u Wednesday, 6th February, 1805. u The " Papiro," No. 26, which had been consigned to Don Antonio Lentari, was finished, and at the end were the characters, " • Aj in the frequent visits he made me at Portici, would always come to my own house, to the Museum never. A man of that country, now high in office at Palermo, asked me, whether the text of those famosi papiri were not Arabick. More than two hundred " Papiri" had been opened wholly, or in part, during my stay at Naples. The experience of every day had added infinite facility, and skill, with accurate, and secure, but rapid dexterity, to each unfolder, and copyist. Hence, with these increasing 103 advantages, every one of the remaining fifteen hundred, or as many of them as could be opened, would be opened, and copied, it was reasonably, and universally calculated, within the space of six years at the most. The enemy can, therefore, in addition to the original manu- scripts themselves, enjoy the advantage of this improved skill in the persons, whom I employed about them. When I retired with the fac simile copies alone, in February, 1806, from Naples to Paler- mo, there I remained, as it was my duty to remain, until I should be honoured with your Royal commands* for my return to England. Besides, as it was thus incumbent upon me to stay, so, while I stayed, I was continually flat- * An exact copy of the letter, in which those commands were communicated to me at Alcamo, by Lord Amherst, his Majesty's Minister at that time, is inserted as follows : 104 tered with the hopes of resuming my superiu- tendency of the manuscripts at Portici. For some time the Court, as it was generally said, was in expectation of a counter-revolution in its favour at Naples. During my residence at Palermo, I com- posed and printed a Latin Poem, entitled Her- culaneum, humbly addressed to your Royal Highness. This Poem will not be published " Palermo, " 16th July, 1809. Sir, " The bearer of this letter, Mr. Hunter, jun. a King's Messenger, is sent to you by his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, with instructions respecting your return to England. I doubt not that you will pay due obedience to his Royal Highness's commands. " I am, Sir, " Your obedient, humble Servant, " AMHERST. " The Reverend " John Hayter." 105 here for the present, because the subject for the Prize Exercises this year in the University of Oxford is the very same with that of my Poem. This point of requisite delicacy was suggested to me by Mr. Tyrwhitt, a gentleman, who, as he is high in the service, and is, in every respect,