120 



PIIILOLOGY A1\D LINGUISTS. 



perfectly, the Chinese, Russian, 

 Runic, Syriac, Ethiopia, Coptic, 

 Dutch, Swedish, and Welsh. 



MITHRIDATES AND CLEOPATRA. 



Mithridates, King of Pontus, 

 knew twenty-two languages, and 

 spoke them correctly. 



And Plutarch says that Cleopatra 

 knew almost all the languages 

 spoken by the people of the Levant. 



MADAME ANNA BISHOP. 



When Madame Anna Bishop was 

 giving concerts in Guanajuato, 

 Mexico, in the winter of 1849, her 

 placards announced that she would 

 sing in ten languages, viz., Spanish, 

 Italian, French, German, Russian, 

 Tartar, English, Irish, Scotch, and 

 Ethiopian ! 



THE TRAVELLING LIBRARY. 



Professor Person, the celebrated 

 Grecian, was once travelling in a 

 stage-coach, where a young Oxon- 

 ian, fresh from college, was amusing 

 the ladies with a variety of talk, 

 and, amongst other things, with a 

 quotation, as he said, from Sopho- 

 cles. A Greek quotation, and in a 

 coach too, roused the slumbering 

 professor from a kind of dog-sleep, 

 in a snug corner of the vehicle. 

 Shaking his ears and rubbing his 

 eyes, <k i think, young gentleman," 

 said he, " you favoured us just now 

 with a quotation from Sophocles ; 

 I do not happen to recollect it 

 there." " O, sir," replied the tyro, 

 " the quotation is word for word as 

 I have repeated it, and from Sopho- 

 cles, too ; but I suspect, sir, it is 

 some time since you were at college." 

 The professor, applying his hand to 

 his great-coat pocket, and taking 

 out a small pocket edition of Sopho- 

 cles, quietly asked him if he would 

 be kind enough to show him the 

 passage in question in that little 

 book. After rummaging the pages 

 for some time, he replied, " Upon 

 second thoughts, I now recollect 



that the passage is in Euripides." 

 " Then, perhaps, sir," said the pro- 

 fessor, putting his hand again into 

 his pocket, and handing him a simi- 

 lar edition of Euripides, " you will 

 be so good as to find it for me ia 

 that little book." The young Ox- 

 onian again returned to his task, 

 but with no better success, mutter- 

 ing, however, to himself, a vow 

 never again to quote Greek in a 

 stage-coach. The tittering of the 

 ladies informed him plainly that he 

 had got into a hobble. At last, 

 " Why, sir," said he, " how dull I 

 am! I recollect now; yes, now I 

 perfectly remember that the passage 

 is in JEschylus." The inexorable 

 professor returned to his inexhaus- 

 tible pocket, and was in the act of 

 handing him an ^Eschylus, when 

 our astonished freshman vocifera- 

 ted, " Coachman ! holloa, coachman ! 

 let me out ; I say instantly let me 

 out ! There's a fellow here has the, 

 whole Bodleian library in his 

 pocket." 



THE RETORT NOT COURTEOUS. 



"Dr. Person," said a gentleman 

 to the great " Greciau," with whom 

 he had been disputing " Dr. Por- 

 son, my opinion of you is most con- 

 temptible." " Sir," returned the 

 doctor, " I never knew an opinion of 

 yours that was not contemptible." 



DR. JOHNSON. 



Dr. Johnson had a veneration 

 for the voice of mankind beyond 

 what most people will own ; and, 

 as he liberally confessed that all 

 his own disappointments proceeded 

 from himself, he hated to hear 

 others complain of general injustice. 

 u I remember," says Mrs. Piozzi, 

 " when lamentation was made of 

 the neglect showed to a great philo- 

 logist, as some one ventured to 

 call him, ' He is a scholar, undoubt- 

 edly, sir,' replied Dr. Johnson ; ' but 

 remember that he would run from 

 the world, and that it is not the 



