i 32 Presidentship of Sir John Pringle 1775 



the thirteenth century which he had unearthed at Cam- 

 bridge. It is a learned treatise and shows a remarkable 

 range of acquaintance with the literature of the subject. 

 The general scope of the volume may be gathered from 

 the title-page, which is given below. 1 



We learn no more from Walpole of the learned and in- 

 dustrious but unfortunate author. He probably obtained 

 little or nothing for the copyright of his manuscript. Liter- 

 ature proving an unremunerative occupation, he seems now 

 to have bethought him of turning his mineralogical skill 

 and experience to some account as a means of livelihood. 

 He wandered down to Cornwall, and eventually obtained 

 there a situation as store-keeper and assay-master at the 

 mines of Dolcoath. How long he remained there is not 

 known, but he appears during his Cornish time to have 

 taken up his pen once more and to have struck off the most 

 successful of all his writings, one which under more favour- 

 able circumstances would have yielded him fame and a 

 competence for life. He wrote in English a little jeu d' esprit, 

 embodying and expanding the extravagant boastings of a 

 certain Baron Munchausen of Bodenwerder, near Hanover, 

 on the Weser, of whom he had doubtless heard much in his 

 younger days in Germany. With the title of " Baron Mun- 

 chausen's Narrative of his Marvellous Travels and Campaigns 

 in Russia," it was published in London in 1785, without the 

 author's name. In three years no fewer than five editions 

 were issued in this country, a considerable addition of inferior 

 merit being added to Raspe's original text. We can hardly 

 suppose that in those days he would receive more than 

 a modest sum from the booksellers who disposed of the 

 book in such numbers. In 1787 it was translated into 

 German and published under the auspices of the poet 

 Burger. This and other translations into the various 



1 " A critical Essay or Oil-Painting, proving that the art of painting in 

 Oil was known before the pretended discovery of John and Hubert Van 

 Eyck ; to which are added Theophilus de Arte Pingendi, Eraclius de 

 Artibus Romanorum, and a re/iew of Farinator's Lumen Animae, by 

 R. E. Raspe, London : printed for the Author, by H. Goldney and sold 

 by T. Cadell in the Strand. MDCC.LXXXI." 



