415 



AUSONIUS, DECIMUS MAGNUS. 



AUTOLYCUS. 



446 



known in Europe on the publication of the ' History of India ' by the 

 Honourable Mountstuart Elphinstone, in which the author, an accom- 

 plished Oriental scholar, has availed himself of Khafi Khan's history, 

 and the result is a complete narrative of the reign of Aurungzebe and 

 his immediate successors. An excellent account of the commence- 

 ment of this monarch's reign will be found in Bernier's ' Travels in the 

 Mogul Empire.' The author, a well-educated Frenchman brought up 

 to the medical profession, passed twelve years in India, during eight of 

 which he acted as physician to Aurungzebe. 



(Abridged from the Biographical Dictionary of the Society for the 

 Diffiuion of Useful Knowledge.) 



AUSO'NIUS, DECIMUS MAGNUS, was born at Burdigala, Bour- 

 deaux, some time early in the 4th century. His father Julius Ausonius 

 was a distinguished physician, eminent also for his acquaintance with 

 Grecian literature. The son was brought up with great care by his 

 maternal uncle. When about thirty Ausonius was employed to teach 

 grammar in the schools of Bourdeauz, and soon after was appointed 

 professor of rhetoric. He was naturally attached to that city ; and 

 has celebrated in a book of poems (' Commemoratio Professorum 

 Burdigalensium ') all those who had taught in the schools of Bour- 

 deaux, and those natives of the place who had filled professorships 

 elsewhere. In A.D. 309 his reputation caused him to be selected by 

 the emperor Valentinian as tutor to hia son Gratian. This connection 

 naturally led to his promotion ; and he was appointed praetorian prefect 

 ly in 377, and of the Gauls in the following year, and made 

 by Gratian in 379. After the death of Gratian he withdrew 

 from public life : and appears to have spent his last years in a rural 

 retreat near his native place. The date of his death is not known. 

 That he was alive in 388 is shown by hjs mention of the victory of 

 Tbeodosius over Maxiinus. He in believed to have died about 394. 

 His son Hesperus rose to the highest dignities of the empire : his 

 daughter was successively the wife of two men of rank. 



The poetical talents of Ausonius were highly esteemed during his 

 life : and the emperor Theodosius wished to obtain the same return 

 of flattery from him which Augustus received from Horace and Virgil. 

 But his style is vicious and full of conceits, and his subjects generally 

 too trifling to retain any interest He wrote ' Epiffratna,' which con- 

 tain more indecency than originality; 'Ordo Nobilium Urbium," a 

 series of short poems on eminent cities : ' Idyllia.' of which the 

 best are 'Cupid Crucified,' and the 'Moselle,' perhaps the oldest 

 specimen of a descriptive poem extant; 'Epistolse;' ' Gratiarum 

 Actio,' an address of thanks, in prose, to Gratian, which contains 

 many of the particulars of his life. Ausonius appears to have 

 been a Christian, though many critics have thought otherwise, but 

 some of his writings do little credit to his profession. Of the 

 numerous editions of this author, the Delphin, by Father Souchay, is 

 recommended as the best. The Variorum, 1671, and Bipont, 1785, 

 may also be recommended. 



AUSTEN, JANE, was born December 16, 1775, at Steventon in 

 Hampshire, of which place her father was rector. Mr. Austen was 

 himself a man of more than average literary acquirements, and he 

 bestowed upon Jane an education superior to what was then general 

 among females of her rank in society; though she was perhaps deficient 

 in what are termed the accomplishments, which usually constitute so 

 large a portion of female education. She was possessed of considerable 

 beauty, both of features and person, with sweetness of disposition, 

 good sense, ami a remarkably engaging manner. During the latter 

 years of Mr. Austen's life she resided chiefly at Bath, but after his 

 decease his widow and her two daughters retired to Southampton, 

 where they continued till May 1817, and afterwards to the village of 

 Chawton, where Jane wrote her novels. There they remained until 

 her declining health rendered it desirable that they should remove to 

 Winchester for the sake of better medical advice. She died July 24 

 of that year, and was buried in the cathedral. 



Miss Austen's novels were published anonymously, but soon 

 attracted the attention which their great merits deserved. ' Sense 

 and Sensibilty ' appeared in 1811, and soon after the authoress was 

 agreeably surprised at receiving ISO/, from its profits. ' Pride and 

 Prejudice,' ' Mansfield Park," and ' Emma,' succeeded at regular inter- 

 valsthe last in 1816. Her name was first affixed to 'Northanger 

 Abbey ' ami ' Persuasion,' which were published together, after her 

 death, in 1818. 'Northanger Abbey' was her earliest and feeblest 

 production. 'Persuasion' was her latest composition, and, in many 

 respects, her best The whole series was reprinted in 1833 in Bentley's 

 ' Standard Novels.' 



The novels of Miss Austen are all of the domestic class, and consist 

 of delineations of every-day English life and actual society in the 

 middle ranks, and chiefly iu the country or in provincial towns. The 

 truth of her dialogue, the thorough preservation of character in every 

 action and in every speech of her dramatis personoo, would almost 

 induce a belief that her scenes were transcripts from actual life, but 

 for the art with which it is finally found that they are made to 

 conduce to the working out of a plot, which in all her novels, but 

 her earliest, appears to have been fully constructed in the author's 

 mind before the first page was written. Her characters are 

 never of an extraordinary kind, either morally or intellectually ; her 

 pages are equally free from the very witty and the very absurd ; she 

 shown no power of delineating external nature ; she has no broad 



humour, and (except perhaps in ' Persuasion ') no deep pathos. In a 

 letter to a friend, she herself compares her productions to " a little 

 bit of ivory, two inches wide," on which, according to her own 

 account, " she worked with a brush so fine as to produce little effect 

 after much labour." Her works are in fact exquisite miniatures, and 

 Miss Austen the most lady-like of artists. 



The whole of Miss Austen's works have been translated into French. 

 The ' Quarterly Review ' (vol. xxiv.) contains an elaborate criticism on 

 Miss Austen, written by Dr. (now Archbishop) Whately. 



(Abridged from the Biographical Dictionary of the Society for the 

 Di/uiion of Uteftd Knowledge.) 



AUSTEN, WILLIAM, an English metal-founder of the 15th cen- 

 tury. A very interesting document respecting Austen and other artists 

 has been preserved by Sir William Dugdale in his ' Warwickshire.' 

 Austen had a great share in the construction of the celebrated tomb 

 in St Mary's church, Warwick, of Richard de Beauchamp, earl of War- 

 wick, who died in 1439. This document, which is the covenant 

 between the earl's executors and the artists to be employed in the 

 construction of the tomb, states that " Will. Austen, citizen and 

 founder of London, xiv. Martii 30 H 6, covenanteth, &c. to cast, work, 

 and perfectly to make, of the finest latten [brass] to be gilded that 

 may be found, xiv. images embossed, of lords and ladies in divers 

 vestures, called weepers, to stand in housings made about the tombe, 

 those images to be made in breadth, length, and thickness, &c. to xiv. 

 patterns made of timber. Also he shall make xviiL lesse images of 

 angells, to stand in other housings, as shall be appointed by patterns, 

 whereof ix. after one side, and ix. after another. Also he must make 

 an hearse to stand on the tombe above and about the principal image 

 that shall lye in the tombe according to a pattern ; the stuffe and 

 workmanship to the repairing to be at the charge of the said Will. 

 Austen. And the executors shall pay for every image that shall lie 

 on the tombe, of the weepers so made in latten, xiii.. iv.rf. And for 

 every image of angells so made v.. And for every pound of latten 

 that shall be in the hearse x.(i. And shall pay and bear the costs of 

 the said Austen for setting the said images and hearse. 



" The said William Austen, xi. Feb. 28 H. 6, doth covenant to cast 

 and make an image of a man armed, of fine latten, garnished with 

 certain ornaments, viz. with sword and dagger ; with a garter ; with a 

 belme and crest under his head, and at his feet a bear musted 

 [muzzled], and a griffon perfectly made of the finest latten, according 

 to patterns ; all of which to be brought to Warwick aud layd ou tho 

 tombe, at the perill [risk] of the said Austen; the executors paying 

 for the image, perfectly mayd aud layd, and all the ornaments iu good 

 order, besides the cost of the said workmen to Warwick, aud working 

 there to lay the image, and besides the cost of the carriages, all which 

 are to be born by the said executors, in total xljt." 



In the opinion of Flaxman, these works of Austen are equal to what 

 was done in Italy at the same time, although Donatello aud Ghiberti 

 were then living ; and though Austen is mentioned in the covenant 

 only as the founder, he was not improbably also the designer of the 

 figures, as the patterns spoken of in the covenant may have been made 

 in relation to size and costume, and general design the models, in fact, 

 prepared with the estimates, to be submitted to the parties at whose 

 cost the tomb was constructed. The pay of 13s. id., for making a 

 brass figure appears small, but it was at that, time the price of an ox. 

 The tomb itself cost 125/., the figure of the earl 401., and there was an 

 additional expense of 13J. for gilding. The whole expense of the tomb 

 and the chapel in which it is placed, called Beauchamp Chapel, was 

 2458J. 4. Td. The other artists employed in this monument were 

 John Essex, marbler ; Thomas Stevyens, coppersmith ; John Bourde, 

 of Corffe Castle, marbler ; Bartholomew Lambspring, Dutch goldsmith, 

 of London; John Prudde, of Westminster, glazier and painter on 

 glass ; John Brentwood, citizen and steyner, of London ; and Kristian 

 Coleburne, also a painter or steyner of London. The monument, one 

 of thd earliest and best in England, is still in a state of preservation, 

 and is of brass ; the meaning therefore of the word ' latten,' which 

 has been disputed, is evidently brass. A cast of the monument is in 

 the Crystal Palace at Sydeuham. 



(Dugdale, Antiquities of Warwickshire, p. 446.) 



AUTO'LYCUS, the mathematician, as Diogenes Laertius (who 

 mentions him incidentally us one of the teachers of Arcesilaus) calls 

 him, was a native of Pitane in jEolis, and lived somewhat before B.C. 

 300. Two extant works of his, ' On the Moving Sphere,' and ' On the 

 Risings and Settings,' are the earliest Greek writings on astronomy, 

 and the earliest remaining specimen of their mathematics. In the 

 first of these works the simplest propositions of the doctrine of the 

 sphere are enunciated and demonstrated ; in the second (which is in 

 two books) the risings and settings of the stars with respect to the 

 sun are discussed. There is nothing, as Delambre remarks, which 

 can serve as a basis for any calculation, much less any notion of 

 trigonometry. 



The only Greek text of Autolycus is that of Dasypodius, in his 

 ' Sphericsa Doctrinso Propositiones,' Strassburg, 1572, which contains 

 several other writers, but gives (as was very common) only the enun- 

 ciations of the propositions in Greek. There is an anoujmous Latin 

 version of the second work, Home, 1568, 4to ; a Latin version of both 

 (of the first, 1587, of the second, 1588, Rome, 4to.) by Giuseppe 

 Auria, from a Greek manuscript with notes by Maurolycus ; a reprint 



