230 Pungency of Onions-Artificial Stone, &c. why bread removes the pungent power of onions, I beg to observe, that he has considered the matter in a wrong light, as the effect is not produced by any particular virtue in the bread, further than that of purifying the air he inhales from the effluvia of the onion. Bread is generally the nearest substance at hand, but any thing else would answer the same purpose, particularly vinegar. It is the inhaling of a pure atmosphere alone that produces the effect, as your correspondent will find, it he will take the trouble, the next time he feels the effect of an onion, to go a short distance from it, when the air, if free from the effluvia, will have the full effect, without the application of any thing. C. A.' C. A. would be glad to be informed where he may find an account of the Blomberg vision, alluded to by a correspondent in No. 13, p. 4. MR. EDITOR, [April 1, UNDER the head of Foreign Intelligence, in your last magazine, you mention M. Fleuret's having discovered a method of preparing an artificial stone, of which he had published an account in 1807. It would, I think, be highly interesting to many of your readers if you, or one of your correspondents, would inform them of some particulars of his process. You also mention that a fifth of the books published in Denmark, in 1815, related to the controversy respecting the Jews. The British public are not, I think, at all acquainted with the nature of this controversy, and would doubt. less be gratified by soine account of it. Feb. 2, 1815. J. R. ** The articles referred to were extracted from foreign periodical publications. We shall feel obliged to any of our correspondents who will enable us to answer the inquiries of J. R.-EDITOR. MEMOIRS OF EMINENT PERSONS. MEMOIRS OF CHRISTIAN GOTTLOB HEYNE, With Notices of the most Eminent of his Contemporaries. TO all those who devote themselves to study, without any other dependence than the exercise of their talents, the life of this eminent scholar must afford a lesson highly instructive and encouraging. Extremne poverty was the portion of his early youth, and till mature manhood the hand of adversity pressed heavily upon him. Born in the lowest class of society, he had to struggle with all those privations which are peculiar to it, and which to him were doubly painful, as Nature had bestowed on him the most dangerous gift for such a situation,--a hea that felt with equal in tenseness and delicacy. When he had at length raised himself, by infinite exertion, above his original sphere, so that he was justified in forming hopes for the future, he was doomed to suffer most severely from the public calamities which befel his native country. Stripped of every thing, narrowly escaping froin imminent death, often not knowing where to lay his head, or how to satisfy the cravings of hunger, he wandered about, till various circumstances at length opened to him a haven, where he certainly found a secure, but by no means a commodious situation. Fortunately, however, he now became acquainted with persons who knew his value; nothing more was required to develope fully the innate energies of his mind; and thus he gradually elevated himself to that height on which he continued till his death. Of his juvenile years Heyne himself has left the following account: "My good father, George Heyne, was a native of the village of Gravenschütz, in the principality of Glogau, in Silesis. His youth had fallen in those times when the Protestants in that country were exposed to the oppressions and persecu tions of the Romish Church. His family also, which enjoyed the blessing of content in a low but independent station, was disturbed by the zeal of the Catho lics to make proselytes, and some of them went over to the Popish faith. My father forsook his paternal abode, and strove to support himself in Saxony by the labour of his hands. What profiteth it a man, if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul!' was the idea which the scenes of his youth had most profoundly impressed upon his mind. No favourable accident ever promoted his plans and his efforts to improve he 1815.] Memoirs of Professor Heyne, of Göttingen. circumstances. A series of misfortunes gradually reduced him so low that his old age was embittered by the pressure of indigence. Just at that time the manufactures of Saxony declined much; and the distress became very great in those places where the linen manufactures were established. Scarcely could a workman by his labour maintain himself, and much less his family. That has always appeared to me to be the most afflicting sight which the decay of civil society can present, when honest industry, in spite of strenuous exertions, cannot procure necessaries; or when the labourer is unable to obtain work, and with folded arms deplores the want of employment, and the consequent sufferings of his famishing family. "I was born and educated in the greatest indigence. The earliest companion of my infancy was want, and the first impressions were those made by the tears of my mother, who knew not where to find bread for her children. How often did I see her, on a Saturday, with streaming eyes, wringing her hands, when she had been endeavouring to dispose of the produce of the incessant labour of her husband, who sometimes even sat up the whole night at work, and was obliged to return without having found a purchaser. Sometimes another trial was made by my sister or myself. There are in those parts merchants, as they are called, who merely buy up linen of the poor manufacturer at as low a price as they can, and endeavour to sell it again abroad at as high a rate as possible. Often have I seen one of these petty tyrants refuse the work offered to him with all the haughtiness of a satrap, or deduct a trifle from the sum demanded. Necessity compelled the poor wretches to agree to this reduction, and to pinch themselves in order to make up for it. Such were the scenes that kindled the first sparks of sensibility in my infant heart. Instead of being dazzled by the wealth of these men, amassed by means of the pittances wrung from so many hundreds, or feeling any fear or timidity on that account, I was filled with indignation against them. When I first heard at school of the murder of tyrants, I felt a strong desire to be a Brutus towards all the oppressors of the poor, who had so often caused my family to languish in want; and for the first time I had occasion to make a remark which has often occurred to me since that if the child of misfortune, endued with sensibility and a certain strength of 231 mind, does not proceed to extremities and render himself criminal, it is merely owing to the circumstances in which he is placed by Providence, who thus fetters his energies, and prevents him from committing dangerous excesses. To ensure the safety of the oppressing part of the species was a very important object in the plan of an inscrutable Providence in the arrangement of the present system. "My good parents did what they could, and sent me to a school in the suburbs. I acquired the character of comprehending every thing very quickly, and took great pleasure in learning. My master had two sons who had returned from Leipzig, depraved youths, who spared no pains to make me as bad as themselves; and, when I would not be corrupted by them, rendered me for years together extremely miserable—at first by terror, and afterwards by all sorts of ill usage. So early as my tenth year, I had, in order to raise money to pay for my own schooling, instructed a neighbour's child (a girl) in reading and writing. I had learned all that could be acquired in the ordinary routine of the school; and Latin was taught only in private lessons, for which a whole groschen (about 1d. English) would have been required weekly, and that sum my parents were unable to afford. For some time I endured this mortification in silence. I had a godfather, a baker, in good circumstances, who was also half-brother to my mother. One Saturday, being sent to him for a loaf, I entered the house with streaming eyes. My godfather inquired what I cried for; and I tried to explain the reason, but a torrent of tears interrupted me, and I had the greatest difficulty to make him understand the cause of my affliction. The good man promised to pay the weekly groschen for me, on condition that I should come every Sunday and repeat all that I had learned by heart out of the Bible. This circumstance was of benefit to me, inasmuch as it made me exercise my memory, and gave me a certain degree of boldness in recitation. "Intoxicated with joy, I ran away with my loaf, which I kept tossing up into the air, at the same time leaping up, barefoot as I was. No wonder my loaf tumbled into a puddle. This mishap recalled me to my senses. My mother rejoiced at the good news which I brought; but my father was not so well pleased. Thus two years passed away, and my schoolmaster declared, what I 232 Memoirs of Professor Heyne, of Göttingen, had long known, that he could teach me nothing more. "The time was now come for me to leave school, and to be initiated into the profession of my forefathers. Were not the handicraftsman deprived by oppressions of various kinds of the fruits of his hard labour, and many privileges which belong to the useful citizen, I would still say Would to Heaven that I had continued in the condition of my ancestors! To what manifold mortifications I should still have been a stranger! It was natural that my father should wish to have an assistant in his laborious occupation, and that my aversion to it should give him great displeasure. I was as anxious, on the other hand, to prosecute my studies at the grammar school: but the means of doing so were totally wanting. My second god-father was a minister in the suburbs, to whom my schoolmaster, who belonged to his congregation, had often spoken concerning me. He sent for me, and after some examination he told me that I should go to the grammar-school at his expense, Who can conceive the transports which I felt! I was referred to the head-master, examined, and placed with commendation in the second class. Of a weakly constitution, oppressed with want and misery, cut off from the sports and enjoy ments of childhood and early youth, I was very small for my age. My school fellows, judging from appearances, formed a very mean opinion of me; and it was only the proofs of my diligence, and the praises which I received, that reconciled them to the idea of my being placed On an equality with them. And in truth, no small obstacles were thrown in the way of my assiduity. My clerical godfather, to be sure, paid for my instruction, and furnished me with some useless books that he had by him; but could not prevail upon himself to procure me such as I wanted. I was accordingly necessitated to borrow the books of my school-fellows, and to traupcribe from them daily a portion sufficient for the next lesson. The good * Hene was admitted into the Lyceum of Chemnitz on the 25th of June, 1741, by the then rector, Hager, known by a bad edition (or rather reprint) of Homer, He continued there seven years, till his removal to Leipzig in 1748. His early instruction in Latin, which cost, as he says, " a whole groschen per week," was given him by a student who had returned from Leipzig, and, if I am not mistaken, by one of the sons of his schoolmaster. [April 1, man resolved, however, to have a hand in my education, and from time to time gave me lessons in Latinity. He had learned in his youth to make Latin verses; scarcely had I gone through Erasmus de Civilitate Morum, when I was set to work to make Latin verses before I had read any of the classics, or had laid up a stock of words. At the same time he was severe, violent in his temper, and in every respect repulsive. In the receipt of a moderate income, he was charged with avarice: he had the stiffness and obstinacy of an old bache lor, as well as the vanity of passing for a good Latin scholar, and what is still more, a maker of Latin verses. These qualities of his contributed, in my early youth, to nip in the bud all enjoyment of its pleasures. He had himself no`relish for any pleasure but what his money or his vanity afforded: indulgence, kindness, love, commendation, were things I had no reason to expect, even when I had scanned a verse correctly. If he bad but taken up a classic for the pur pose, some benefit might have accrued : but he had none,--nothing but an Owen, Fabricius, a couple of Collectiones Epigrammatum, and some religious poets, out of which he dictated verses for me to alter, paraphrase, and turn into a different metre. The taste and understanding gained very little by all this. It was still worse, when, some time afterwards, he fancied himself inspired by Apollo, and composed verses from which I was to learn prosody, for with him that was synonimous with poetry. These temptations of the demon of versification originated in the celebration of the birthday of the head-master of the Latin school. It was customary on such occasions for the cleverest boys to express their good wishes in German or Latin verses, which were written out fair in a book, My godfather thought to shine, and made Latin verses, which were to pass for my composition. My distress was the greater, as every one knew that I had not made them. These mortifications, hows ever, stimulated me to take all possible could make verses myself. Of this I gave a pains to convince my godfather that I proof on his birthday, and for the first time I beheld his rigid muscles relax into a smile. Unfortunately, I had now furnished a pretext for the most irksome requisitions; for now I was expected to produce, on every extraordinary occasion, congratulatory poems, not of ten or twenty lines; no-the shortest extended to some hundreds, and in all kinds of 1815.] Memoirs of Professor Heyne, of Göttingen. metres, Compositions on all subjects, such as no man had ever yet attempted in verse, were required of me; and at length I brought it so far that I was left to write the congratulations for the teachers myself; only it was necessary to submit them to a strict revision and correction, which sometimes left them rather lame, and often injured the sense, though they were perhaps before not overburdened with that quality. "The instruction in the school was not much superior, and thus I might have sunk into confirmed stupidity, had I not, by an extraordinary accident, been roused from my lethargy by an anagram, At an examination, at which the superintendent, Dr, Theodore Krüger, was present, he suddenly interrupted the rector, and asked which of the scholars could tell what anagram might be made out of Austria. The idea was suggested by an anagram which had appeared in one of the newspapers, on occasion of the first Silesian war which had just then broken out. None of them knew what an anagram was, and the rector himself looked quite embarrassed. As no answer was given, the rector began to describe the nature of an anagram, and after a little reflection I produced the word Vastari. This was not the same that had been given in the newspapers: so much the greater was the surprise of the superintendent, especially as he saw before him a little urchin on the lowest form of the second class. He loudly commended me, but at the same time set all my schoolfellows upon my back, as he was not sparing of his reproaches of them for suffering themselves to be surpassed by an infimus. "This pedantic adventure, however, gave the first impulse to the development of my powers. I began to gain confidence in myself, and to raise my head in spite of all the contempt and hardship under which I languished. These first aspirings, feeble as they were, soon caused me to be accused of pride and arrogance, and drew upon me a thousand mortifications, They nevertheless stimulated me to continued application, which, though ill-directed, kept me from associating with my schoolfellows, among whom,-as indeed it cannot well be otherwise among youth of low extraction and neglected education, the grossest * It will be recollected that in this war Saxony was against Austria. Some years later, when she was the ally of the latter, this anagram might have been productive of very different consequences. 238 rudeness, and every kind of immorality, "Our Latin lessons were almost en- "It was only during the last year of my being at the school that I obtained a foretaste of something better. Krebs, afterwards rector of the school at Grim ma, came to Chemnitz as assistant-mas ter. As he was a disciple of Ernesti, he certainly brought with him attainments such as we had never heard of. He thought me worthy of his notice; I found means to receive from him private lessons in Greek, in which the Ajax of Sophocles was explained. I had at least now acquired a better guide to the defi nition of words and what is properly termed philology. Had I been in favour able circumstances, and had it in my power to avail myself more of his private instruction, I should have gained a better found myself too introduction to the reading of the classics. "Unfortunately, closely circumscribed on every side. The perverse manner in which I was treated by the old ecclesiastic, at home the moroseness and dissatisfaction of my parents, especially of my father, who could not improve his condition by his labour, and still entertained the idea that if I had learned his trade I might 234 Memoirs of Professor Heyne, of Göttingen. have been able by this time to render him material assistance; the pressure of want; the consciousness of being beneath others, suffered no soothing idea, no feeling of my own value, to spring up in my mind. A reserved, shy, and awkward behaviour, removed me still farther from all exterior recommendations. Where was I to acquire politeness, a right way of thinking, or any means of improving either my heart or my understanding? "Nevertheless, a sense of honour, a wish for something better, an anxiety to raise myself above my low condition, incessantly accompanied me: but these feelings, unguided as they were, led me rather into arrogance, misanthropy, and clownishness. [April 1, the principles of asthetics, the following instances will serve to demonstrate. Comedies were annually performed at school; for which purpose one of Christian Weisse's plays was generally chosen. At last, a Latin piece by some old writer was given. The dramatis persona being very few, in order to make parts for several more of my school-fellows, I added, with the permission of the rector, a sixth act, in which twice as many persons (among the rest a number of robbers, who were all banged) made their appearance, as had before been introduced in the whole piece. The play itself was in iambics, and my addition in prose. On another occasion I performed the character of Fame, with a trumpet in my hand, while the trumpeter was to blow in good earnest between the scenes. When he left off, I took my trumpet from my mouth too, and held it quietly in my hand till he began to blow again. Nobody found fault with any of these absurdities. During a thunder-storin the church-steeple was set on fire by the lightning: when it was rebuilt I had the honour of being appointed by the magistracy, on the recommendation of the master, to compose a Latin inscription for the purpose of being deposited in the ball. It began with the words, Sta viator! and was placed without remark in the ball, to be handed down to posterity. "At length, a situation presented itself in which I had opportunities of improve ment. One of the senators took his mother-in-law to live with him; she had two other children, a son and daughter, about my age. Inquiry was made for a person to give lessons to the son, and fortunately I was proposed for that office. As these lessons produced me a gulden (about two shillings) per month, I now began to have less fear of the anger of my parents. Hitherto, I had often been obliged to turn my hand to labour, that I might not be reproached with eating my bread at their cost: oil for the lamp, and clothes, I earned by private lessons; now I was enabled to "The time approached for me to go give them something, and thus my situa- to the university of Leipzig: but where tion became rather less irksome. On was I to find the means? All my hopes the other hand, I was now more fre- reposed on the old clergyman. He made quently in the company of persons who me promises enough; but one day passed had been well brought up. I gained the after another; the hour of departure itgood-will of the family, so that I was self arrived, and nothing could I obtain taken to live in the house. This society from him. He gave me indeed in charge gave my manners a degree of polish, and to his curate, who was just going to Leipenlarged the sphere of my conceptions zig, and this was all that he did for me. and ideas. It was not long before I With what a heavy heart did I leave my conceived a tender passion for my pupil's native town and the house in which I sister. I then felt most keenly the hard- had received a greater benefit than ship of fate which had introduced me merely that of a wretched existence ! into the world amid penury and misery. And how disconsolate did I feel when 1 sunk not, however, into despondence. my guide left me, saying, that my old Fond dreams of the possibility of godfather had given him nothing for me! some day possessing the beloved object, All the money I had in the world made me overlook the present impracti- amounted to about two gulden (four cability of producing an impression upon shillings.) I was, moreover, but badly her heart and yet I won her friendship equipped, and was totally destitute of and that of her mother. I was guilty of books. Enfeebled already by corroding abundance of lover's follies,, and among care, I fell sick: nature triumphed, but the rest I turned poet. But as I had no I was still oppressed with profound meguide, no judgment, and had never read lancholy. any but bad poets, it was impossible for me to be any other than a wretched rhymester myself. "How ignorant we then were of all "I was the room-companion of the brother of Krebs, my former teacher, He too was a disciple of Ernesti; by him I was taken to the lectures of that pro |