837 



BOSCAWEN, EDWARD. 



BOSCOVICH, ROGER JOSEPH. 



the Castilian nobility, and to which many Spanish poets constantly 

 paid their homage. Boscan was for some time Ayo, or first governor, 

 to the young Don Fernando de Alba, who was afterwards the terror 

 of the enemies of the Spanish monarchy. He appears however to have 

 resisned this employment, in order to divide his time between study 

 and the society of literary friends. The year in which he died is not 

 exactly known ; it is only ascertained that his death happened prior 



Boscan s poetry is divided into three books. The first contains his 

 ' Mar de Amor' (the Sea of Love), and exhibits the fantastic flights of 

 the old Spanish muse. The second consists of his 'Sonetos' and 

 'Canciones,' which, although written in imitation of those of Petrarch, 

 still display the spirit of the old poetry, in which the mild disposition 

 of Boscan contrasts throughout with the enthusiastic vein of his model. 

 The third book is occupied chiefly by a paraphrastic translation of the 

 Greek poem of ' Hero and Leander,' the first of the kind which 

 appeared in the Spanish language. It is elegantly written, with a 

 pure diction and an easy versification. To this free translation succeeds 

 a love elegy, the ' Capitulo,' abounding in pleasing images, but too 

 much diluted in words, like most Italian poems of the same kind. In 

 the ' Answer to Don Diego Meudoza,' the best of Roseau's epistles, he 

 described with delicacy and taste the charms of domestic happiness 

 and rural life. A narrative poem in the Italian style, called ' Octava 

 Riina,' closes this third book. A festive meeting of Venus, Cupid, 

 and other mythological personages, forms the fable, rather carelessly 

 executed, of this last poem, which is otherwise full of grace and 

 animation. 



The eighth volume of the ' Parna.o Espaiiol,' by Sedano, contains a 

 supplement to the biographical notices which Nicolas Antonio collected 

 under the article ' Boscan.' 



BOSCAWEN, EDWARD, second son of Hugh. Lord Viscount 

 Falmouth, was born on the 19th of August, 1711. He was placed in 

 the navy early in youth, and at the age of twenty-one was lieutenant 

 of the ' Hector.' In 1740 he became captain of a twenty-gun ship, the 

 'Shoreham;' and in the following year, under Admiral Vernon, 

 acquired an honourable distinction for his intrepidity at the taking of 

 the fortified city of Puerto Bello, on the Isthmus of Darien. Shortly 

 after, at the niege of Carthagena, he led on a body of seamen, and 

 resolutely attacked and took possession of a fascine battery of fifteen 

 21-pounders, while exposed to the fire of five guns from an adjoining 

 fort On the death of Lord Beauclerk, in the attack upon Boca Chica, 

 BoBcaweu succeeded to the command of the ' Prince Frederick ' of 

 70 guns. In 1742 he returned to England, married the daughter of 

 William Glanville, Esq., of Kent, and in the same year was elected a 

 member of parliament for Truro, in Cornwall. After the declaration 

 of war with France, he took the command of the ' Dreadnought,' cap- 

 tured in April 1744 the French ship ' Medea,' and landed at Spithead 

 with 800 prisoners. As captain of the ' Namur' of 74 guns, he greatly 

 signalised himself under Admirals Anson and Warren, in the engage- 

 ment off Cape Finisterre, when a capture was made of ten large French 

 ships of war. In the commencement of the action he was struck in 

 the shoulder with a musket-ball. 



Boscawen was made in the same year rear-admiral of the blue, and 

 commander-in-chief cf the sea and land forces appointed for the war 

 in India ; and he sailed in November from St. Helen's Road, in the 

 Isle of Wight, with six ships of the line, five frigates, and 2000 soldiers. 

 In July 1748 his fleet appeared before the fort of St. David's, 16 miles 

 S. from Pondicherry. Having marched his army to Pondicherry, and 

 begun the siege, he was obliged, in consequence of the sickness of his 

 men and the approach of the monsoons, to return to his ships ; and is 

 said to have made the retreat with prudence and skill. He soon after- 

 wards obtained possession of Madras, which, in consequence of the 

 declaration of peace, was delivered up to him by the French. In 

 1750 he arrived in the ' Exeter' at St. Helen's, and found that in his 

 absence he had become rear-admiral of the white. In the course of 

 the following year he was made a lord of the board of admiralty, an 

 elder brother of the Trinity House, and again a representative for 

 Truro. In company with Admiral Mostyn, he sailed in April 1755 

 from Spithead with twenty-four ships, to intercept the French squadron 

 bound to America with supplies. Off the coast of Newfoundland he 

 fell in with them, and captured two 64-gun ships, with 1500 prisoners, 

 including the French commander Hoquart, who had twice before been 

 defeated and taken prisoner by Boscawen. On his return to Spithead 

 with his prizes, he received for this important service the thanks of 

 the House of Commons. 



The scene of war was now transferred to North America. A fleet 

 of 160 ships, with 14,000 men, was fitted out, and Boscawen, now 

 promoted to the rank of admiral of the blue, was appoiuted Com- 

 mander-in-chief of the expedition. In February 1758, accompanied 

 by General (afterwards Lord) Amherst and General Wolfe, he called 

 with these forces for Halifax, and on the 3rd of June arrived off the 

 fortress of Louisbourg, which was taken, with the islands of Cape 

 Breton and St. John, after gome severe engagements, by the English 

 admiral. In tbo following year, 1759, he was stationed with fourteen 

 ships of the line and several frigates in the Med iterraneau, and pursued 

 the French fleet of Toulon, consisting of twelve large ships of war, 

 through the .Straits of Gibraltar to the Hay of I>agoi, where ho over- 

 took them and fought a furious battle, which terminated in the 



burning of two of the enemy's ships and the taking of three others, 

 with 2000 prisoners. The French admiral, De la Clue, was carried on 

 shore and died, in consequence of being struck by a cannon-ball, which 

 carried off both his legs. Upon the return of Boscawen to England, 

 the thanks of parliament were agiin conferred, with a pension of 3000k 

 a year, and he was sworn a member of the privy council, and made a 

 general of the Marines. Admiral Boscawen died January 10th 1761, 

 in his 50th year, at his residence, Hatchland Park, near Guildford, and 

 was interred in the church of St. Michael Penkevel in Cornwall, where 

 a handsome monument by Rysbrach was erected to his memory. The 

 mind of Boscawen appears to have been wholly intent upon hia pro- 

 fessional pursuits. His ability and courage as a naval and even as a 

 military officer were highly appreciated by Lord Chatham, who is said 

 to have often observed, that when he proposed expeditions to other 

 commanders he heard of nothing but difficulties ; but that when he 

 applied to Boscawen, expedients were immediately suggested. 



BOSCOVICH, ROGER JOSEPH, was born at Ragusa on the llth 

 of May, 1711 (May 18, 1701, according to Lalande), and entered the 

 order of Jesuits in 1725. He was appointed professor at the Collegio 

 Romano in 1740, and was employed in various scientific duties by 

 several popes. He was at Vienna on the part of the republic of Lucca 

 in a dispute between that state and Tuscany, and at London in a 

 similar character on behalf of his native place in 1762. He was recom- 

 mended by the Royal Society as a proper person to be appointed to 

 observe the transit of Venus at California, but the suppression of his 

 order prevented his acceptance of the appointment. After this event 

 he waa made professor at Pavia and subsequently at Milan. In 1773 

 he was invited to Paris, where the post of ' Directeur d'Optique pour 

 la Marine' was created for him. He left France in 1787, and settled 

 at Milan, where he was received with distinction, and was appointed 

 to measure a degree in Lombardy. He was seized with melancholy, 

 amounting almost to madness, and died February 13, 1787. 



Boscovich was a man of very varied attainments and considerable 

 mathematical power. The different accounts of him partake of the 

 bias of their several authors. His countryman, Fabroui, rates him as 

 a man to whom Greece would have raised statues, even had she been 

 obliged to throw down a hero or two to make room. Lalande, to whom 

 a voluminous and miscellaneous writer was a brother in arms, affirms 

 he had as much talent as D'Alembert, though not so much of the 

 integral calculus. The Jesuits were not in favour with the Encyclo- 

 pedists, so that probably there is some truth in the account of Lalande 

 with respect to D'Alembert. Delambre says, " in all his dissertations 

 we see a professor who loves to converse much better than to observe 

 or calculate," which seems to us perfectly true ; but at the same time 

 Boscovich was a man of talent, though not of first-rate power or 

 energy : exceedingly fertile in ideas of merit, but not of first-rate 

 merit. The excessive number and length of his dissertations has 

 rendered his name less known than it deserves to be, since there is not 

 among them any one point d'appui for the highest sort of renown. 



Boscovich was one of the earliest of the continental Newtonians, 

 and introduced the doctrine of gravitation at Rome. His first appear- 

 ance as a writer on this subject is in an explanatory tract published at 

 Rome in 1743 ; but in his ' Philosophise Naturalis Theoria,' &c., Venico , 

 1758, he endeavours to apply the same principle to the actions of mole- 

 cules on each other. It is remarkable that in spite of the prohibition 

 of the Copernican theory (and in consequence of the Newtonian) by 

 the superintendents of the ' Index Expurgatorius,' two Jesuits pub- 

 lished an edition of Newton in 1739, and a third began to teach it at 

 Rome in 1740. But previously to this (1736), Boscovich had distin- 

 guished himself by a solution of the problem of finding the sun's 

 equator and rotation by observation of the spots, which Delambre 

 calls one of the most elegant which had been given. It was the first 

 of its kind. 



In 1750 he began to measure an arc of the meridian from Rome to 

 Rimini, by order of the pope ; and the account of this celebrated and 

 useful operation (which was carried on in conjunction with Christopher 

 Jlaire, another Jesuit), was published in 1755. But Boscovich informs 

 us, that while he was riding about or waiting for his observations, he 

 was engaged in composing Latin verses on tlie eclipses of the suu and 

 moon. These verses were published at London in 1760 by Millar and 

 Dodsley, in six books, entitled ' De Solis et Lunse defectibuf.' It is 

 lucky for the fame of Boscovich that the degree he measured was not 

 as poetical as his poem is long and minute : the first has always been 

 held a good observation, and the second is best described by Delambre's 

 remark, that it is uninstructive to an astronomer and unintelligible to 

 anybody else. The- notes, which are often more poetical than the 

 text, contain a large collection of his opinions. 



Among his more important labours may be mentioned the admeasure- 

 ment of the degree of the meridian above mentioned, his theory of 

 comets, application of mathematics to the theory of the telescope, and 

 to the perturbations of Saturn and Jupiter (of which Lagrange said 

 that the motto ' Ira olim, nuiic turbat amor natumque patremque ' 

 was the only good thing in it), the discussion relative to the invention 

 of the double-refraction micrometer, the application of the differential 

 calculus to problems of spherical trigonometry. Of hia publications 

 we will merely notice the ' Elementa Universes Mutheseos,' &c., 

 ttome, 1754, a course of mathematics for Ms pupils ; the collection of 

 works alluded to above, ' Opera pertineutia ad Opticam et Astrono- 



