174 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[S"* S. NO 87., Aug. 29. '67. 



Tn 1791, the Memoirs of the Minority of Louis 

 XV. appeared as the work of Massillon, under the 

 editorship of Soulavie. The French critics are 

 unanimous in regarding this work as spurious, 

 and as the production of the supposed editor. 

 The author of the art. Massillon, in the same 

 excellent Dictionary, says of these Memoirs, tliat 

 they "passent generalement pour un ouvrage 

 suppose ; ils offrent des traits hasardes et des ex- 

 pressions inconvenantes, non moins indignes de 

 I'orateur que du prelat." In this censure the 

 writer of the life of Soulavie himself concurs : he 

 characterises these Memoirs as a " rhapsodic fa- 

 briquee par le pretendu editeur. Jamais le 

 brigandage litteraire ne fut pnusse plus loin. 

 Soulavie prete a I'auteur du Petit Careme des 

 phrases et des expressions que le valet de chambre 

 du Cardinal Dubois ne se fut pas permis d'ecrire." 



In May 1793, Soulavie was appointed President 

 of the French Republic at Geneva. From this 

 post he was dismissed in the December following, 

 but the execution of the decree was suspended 

 through the influence of Barere. He was recalled 

 after the fall of Robespierre (Aug. 1794), and 

 sent to prison, where he remained until 1796. 

 After the 18th Brumaire Sieyes and-Roger Ducos 

 placed his name on a list of persons sentenced to 

 transportation, but he was saved by Bonaparte. 



From this time he devoted himself exclusively 

 to literature. In 1799 he published spurious me- 

 moirs of the ex-director Barthelemy, and sold the 

 manuscript as genuine. In the latter part of his 

 life, he was reconciled to the church, and he pub- 

 lished an avowal of his religious errors. He died 

 in March, 1813. He had made a collection of 

 engravings relating to French history in 162 folio 

 volumes, which Napoleon seized after his death. 



The literary character of Soulavie is thus sum- 

 med up by the author of his life in the Biographic 

 Universelle : — 



" Quelque m^pris que meritent les falsifications his- 

 toriques de Soulavie, son style trivial et prolix, et sea 

 tableaux souvent obscbnes, toujoursde mauvaise soci^te; 

 on est quelquefois seduit par la grande facility de sa nar- 

 ration et par la hardiesse de ses aper^us. Ses ecrits seront 

 utiles a consulter pour ceux qui voudront ^crire avec 

 impartiality I'histoire de ros troubles; ils pourront y 

 trouver, au milieu d'une foule de mensonges, des docu- 

 mens authentiques, des revelations pre'cieuses, et des 

 aveux qu'on n'aurait pas obtenu sans la revolution. En 

 un mot, pour un historien judicieux et instruit, les indi- 

 gestes compilations de Soulavie peuvent devenir ce que 

 le fumier d'Ennius fut pour Virgile." 



Such is the literary character of Soulavie, and 

 such is the estimate of his works formed by well- 

 informed critics of his own nation. Now if Nie- 

 buhr had been simply deceived by a literary 

 forgery, he would have committed an error which 

 has been committed by many persons of perspi- 

 cacity and sound sense. But that he should dis- 

 cover surpassing excellences in the spurious work 



of such a writer, and that he should deliberately 

 put a production of the Abbe Soulavie at the 

 head of French historical literature, and on a level 

 with the greatest histories of'classical antiquity, 

 must be considered as an Indication of the pre- 

 dominance of fancy, uncontrolled by judgment 

 and discretion. L. 



GRAVESTONES AND CHURCH BEFAIRS. 



(2"'» S. iii. 366. 453. 494.; iv. 136.) 



The practice of removing tombstones, so justly 

 condemned by K., does not appear to be alto- 

 gether a modern invention. Mr. Raine tells us 

 that when St. Cuthbert's tomb, in Durham Cathe- 

 dral, was opened, May 17, 1827 — 



" The blue stone was found to rest upon soil eighteen or 

 twenty inches in thickness, beneath which was a large 

 slab of freestone of nearly a similar size, containing upon 

 its lower face the name of Eichakd Heswell, a monk 

 who is known to have died before the year 1446, and 

 which must have been removed, in 1542, from the ceme- 

 tery garth on the south side of the church, the only 

 burial place of the monks, to serve as a cover to the- vault 

 below it. Its surface was purposely turned downwards, 

 to show that it was converted to a use for which it was 

 not originally intended." — Brief Account of Durham 

 Cathedral, p. 58. 



Upon this subject, the Rev. C. Boutell says : — 



" It may be confidently asserted that incised slabs of 

 memorial were once ver}' common in our churches, particu- 

 larly in the churches of those districts which produce the 

 stone, though now they have generally been demolished 

 or removed.* This may, in most cases, have resulted 

 from the unsightly aspect of the slabs when worn away, 

 as they would be liable to be worn away by habitual 

 attrition ; they would accordinglj' be taken up when the 

 church was undergoing some repair or alteration, and, 

 being considered as altogether unfit to appear in the re- 

 newed structure, they would be built up in the walls of 

 the new portions; or, in some instances, they would be 

 again laid down in the pavement, but not until the ori- 

 ginal surface of the stone had been entirely cut away ; or 

 thej' would be' reversed, and worked to a smooth surface 

 on the other side. This sj'stera of demolishing the mo- 

 numental memorials of others, and indeed of appropriat- 

 ing them afresh (as was constantly done) in the capacity 

 of monuments, it is most difficult to account for, parti- 

 cularly in men who bestowed so much care and attention 

 upon what they designed to commemorate themselves." f 

 — Christian Monuments, p. 10. 



It is indeed difficult to account for this species 

 of sacrilege, — which, as has been shown, dates 

 back to a period when churchwardens were not, — 

 for the sanctity of the grave is respected even 



* In the ArchcBoIogical Journal, vol. iv. pp. 37. 58., is 

 an interesting account of the discovery of a vast number 

 of earlj' incised slabs, during the recent repairs in Bake- 

 well Church, Derbyshire. In many other churches similar 

 collections of monumental slabs have been observed. I 

 may add, that a very considerable number of slabs of this 

 character now form part of the pavement of the church 

 at Gorleston, in Suffolk. 



t Archaolo^, vol. xxx. p. 121, 



