1775 Raspe in Scotland 1 3 3 



languages of Europe passed through innumerable editions. 

 The name of the writer whose little volume had attained 

 such world-wide popularity was never known in his life- 

 time. Only in 1824 was its authorship by Raspe divulged 

 by Karl von Reinhard, the friend of Burger and editor of his 

 works, who doubtless had his information from Burger himself. 



From Cornwall Raspe migrated to Scotland. He spent 

 several years at Edinburgh, where he was engaged to write 

 a detailed Catalogue of James Tassie's extensive collection 

 of pastes and impressions from ancient and modern engraved 

 gems. 1 This elaborate work, filling two quarto volumes with 

 57 plates, was published in 1791, and is by far the most 

 important of Raspe's writings. The introduction, written in 

 English and French on opposite pages, is a learned treatise, 

 showing a remarkably wide knowledge of the history of 

 the subject, and valuable for its bibliographical references. 

 One cannot but regret that a writer who was capable of 

 such an effort should have lost the opportunity of devoting 

 his life to steady research. He concludes with a modest 

 estimate of the worth of his performance : " It is a work 

 rather of labour and good eyes than of genius. I propose 

 no reputation by it and I hope I shall lose none." That 

 he had some to lose is shown by the occurrence of his name 

 as that of " a foreigner of merit and reputation " in a " Cata- 

 logue of 500 celebrated authors of Great Britain. London, 

 1788," and by his inclusion in the list, of people of note 

 whose portraits Tassie had modelled and cast in " his beauti- 

 ful hard white enamel paste." 



During his sojourn in Edinburgh Raspe was able to make 

 excursions into the Highlands, where he had the opportunity 

 of turning his knowledge of mineralogy to account. He 

 detected traces of various ores and useful minerals, and 

 in the Scots Magazine for October 1789 (p. 576) there is 



1 The title-page may be quoted here : " A descriptive Catalogue of 

 a General Collection of Ancient and Modern engraved Gems, Cameos, as 

 well as Intaglios, taken from the most celebrated Cabinets in Europe, and 

 cast in coloured Pastes, white enamel and Sulphur by James Tassie, 

 Modeller : Arranged and Described by R. E. Raspe and illustrated with 

 copper-plates. Unde prius multis velarunt tempora Musae. London 1791." 



