274 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2"d ri. X. Oct. 6. '60. 



and there is no reason to suppose it otherwise at 

 St. Petersburg, he was in the habit of writing 

 memoir after memoir ; and placing each, when 

 finished, at the top of the pile of manuscript. 

 The secretaries of the Academy helped themselves 

 from time to time, by taking papers from the top 

 of the pile, according to their estimate of the bulk 

 of matter likely to be wanted. The consequence 

 was that, as the pile often increased more rapidly 

 than the demands upon it, the memoirs which 

 happened to be at the bottom remained there for 

 a long time ; and, in some cases, until their sub- 

 jects had been thought upon and written upon 

 afresh. 



rive of Euler's children carried on the race, 

 and twenty-six grandchildren were living at his 

 death. I believe there is no other instance of a 

 savant of his fame having so many descendants. 

 One of his sons gained some reputation in mathe- 

 matics, which is kept alive by that of the father. 

 Euler died in 1783, September 7, aged seventy-six 

 years and a half. 



Euler settled at St. Petersburg, at the invitation 

 of the Empress Catherine, in 1727 or 1728. In 

 1741 he removed to Berlin, at the invitation of 

 the Government of Frederic II. A Prussian 

 princess asked him why he was so silent ; he re- 

 plied, " Madam, I have lived in a country where 

 men who speak are hanged." But he was not 

 afraid, even after this epigram, to return to St. 

 Petersburg, which he did at the invitation of Ca- 

 therine II., in 1766 ; and he remained there till 

 his death. 



The earliest, and I think the best life of Euler 

 is the eloge pronounced by his pupil, Nicholas 

 Fuss, before the Petersburg Academy, six weeks 

 after his death. The finish of this production, 

 and the long list of works, as complete as could be 

 made, by which it was accompanied, show that it 

 was in preparation during Euler's life. There is 

 a curiosity in the printing of it, the only one of 

 the kind I remember. The pronunciation of 

 French, which throws the terminal consonant of a 

 word upon the next, when the next begins with 

 a vowel, must sometimes have led foreigners to 

 write the consonant as part of the coming word : 

 but it would seem hardly possible that the mis- 

 take should ever have passed through the press. 

 It did so, nevertheless, in the eloge of which I 

 now speak: witness (p. 31.), — "les memoires des 

 Sciences et des beaux Sarts du mois d'Avril." 



A. De Mobgan. 



SAYERS THE CARICATURIST. 



(2'"i S. X. 228.) 



As Mr. Dawson Turner's Sepulchral Reminis- 

 cences may be unknown to many of the readers of 

 " N. & Q.," I am induced to give some extracts 



from that book relating to Mr. James Sayers. 

 On p. 72., note (a), it is said : — 



" Of the latter" (Mr. James Sayers) "I can find no 

 posthumous notice, save the few lines in Taylor's Biogra- 

 phical Memoir of Dr. Sayers (p. 25.), and in Chambers' 

 Norfolk (i. p. 311.) The following circumstances may, 

 therefore, be worth recording. He was baptized at Yar- 

 mouth, August 31st, 1748. His parents were William 

 and Sarah Sayers ; the former, master of a trading vessel. 

 At Yarmouth, too, he was brought up and educated for 

 the law, and served his clerkship with Mr. Eamey, by 

 whom he thought himself ill used. He then practised 

 here " (Yarmouth) " as an attorne}-, in partnership with 

 Mr. William Taylor, and was elected into the Common 

 Council. His pen and his pencil, however, involved him 

 sadly in disputes ; for, from early life, he had been an 

 unsparing satirist with both. On this account, therefore, 

 but probably also in consequence of an unreturned attach- 

 ment to Miss Ferrier, who married Mr. Purvis, of Beccles, 

 he quitted Yarmouth for London about the year 1780. 

 He there entered into a fresh partnership, but soon re- 

 tired from his profession, and devoted himself to politics, 

 in which he had alwa3's taken an active part, as what is 

 commonly called a ' red-hot Tory.' He was probably in- 

 fluenced to this step by some of his Caricatures (of which 

 he published many on the leading topics of the daj' — Mr. 

 Fox's India Bill ; Hastings' Trial ; the Regency Bill of 

 1789, &c.) having attracted the notice of Mr. Pitt, who 

 consequently appointed him Marshal of Exits. The place 

 was a small one, worth but 200/. per annum ; but small also 

 were the duties annexed, requiring him only to walk 

 once a year before the Chancellor of the Exchequer when 

 he goes to the Court. Lord Eldon subsequently gave 

 him another small appointment as a Cursitor. Of his 

 Caricatures, which are numerous, and deservedly ranked 

 him among the first artists of that line in his day, if 

 not as the very first, none perhaps was equally popular 

 as his Carlo Khan's Triumphant Entry into Leadenhall 

 Street. As a political song-writer, Mr. Sayers was like- 

 wise excellent ; indeed, as far as I have known, unrivalled. 

 But it were unfair to judge him by these. His talents 

 were unusually great in whatever direction they were 

 applied ; and it was only to be lamented that such a man, 



♦ Tho' born for the universe, narrow'd his mind, 



And to part}- gave up what was meant for mankind.' 



A stronger proof of the estimation in which these talents 

 were held could scarcely be given, than that his Elijah's 

 Mantle, the most important of his poems, has not unfre- 

 quently been ascribed to Mr. Canning. In London, Mr. 

 Sa3'ers resided, first with his mother and sister in Great 

 Ormond Street; and, subsequently, with the latter in 

 Curzon Street. And there he died, on the 20th of April, 

 1823, and was buried in the vaults under St. Andrew's 

 Church, Holborn. He kept up to the last his attachment 

 to Yarmouth, and his connection with his old friends 

 there . •. . ." 



(Here follow the names of some of them. ) 

 From p. 68. note (a) of the same book, it ap- 

 pears that Sayers introduced the Mr. Ramey, to 

 whom he was clerk, " in the first part of his once 

 much-read poem of Mundungus ; and, in the se- 

 cond, makes him end a speech with : 



* My well-known character and station high 

 Bid me Mundungus' pointed shafts defj'. 

 To gain that station merit pav'd the road ; 

 And what I blush'd to ask my friends bestow'd. 

 I never offered incense to a peer, 



Or talk'd of places in a courtier's ear. 



