1802.) 
beftow a great deal more, -if.ever I do. 
Your Lordfhip underftands cyphers fo 
well, as not to think it a bufinefs of one 
fitting (I fhould have faid of one day or 
week) to decypher a new cypher, fo in- 
tricate as this, without a key. I have 
been thinking, more than once, of giving 
it up, as infeafibie: but I fhall, with 
your Lordfhip’s leave; dpend a week or 
two more upon it before I give it up as 
defperate: and if, after all, I muf be 
obliged to leave it, your honour will at 
lealt pity me, for having beftowed fo 
much labour invain.’’ This letter, how- 
ever, the Doctor maftered by perfeverance,. 
though che decyphering of it, as we find 
him writing to Lord Nottingham foon 
after, was the refult of ten weeks’ hard 
ftudy. ** I hope (the Door continues) 
your Lordfhip will think this, with what 
- I have done, which every body could not 
do, of this kind, for two years laf paft, 
may deferve a better recompence than.a 
few good words: for, really my Lord, it 
is a hard fervice, requiring much labour 
as well as fill.” In another letter to 
Lord Nottingham, he fays, **I am not 
idle, though I cannot yet give fuch an ac- 
count of the papers fent as I could with. 
I have already employed above feven 
Retrofpect of the Fine Arts. $e 
weeks upon them, and have ftudied hard 
thereupon eight or ten hours in a day, or 
more than fo very often, which, in a bu~ 
finefs of this nature, is hard fervice for 
one of my years (the Doétor was then 
upwards of feventy) unlefs I would crack 
my brains at it. It was a faying of 
King Charles I. «that it was fome ikill, 
at leaft, to know when a game is loft’’,* 
and fo it is in decyphering, when it is 
not to be done, or not without more 
trouble than the thing is worth.—They 
do fo often change their cyphers (he 
fays, in {peaking of another letter) and 
their methods of cyphering, and make 
them now fo very intricate, (finding fo 
many of them have been difcovered) that 
even to myfelf it feems more ftrange that 
I can decypher any than that I mifs of fomey 
which I thought neceflary thus to fignify, 
that your Lordfhip may not impute the 
delay to want of attention to his Majefty’s 
fervice.”” 
* Mr. Hume, when he was informed that 
all New England, with the adjoinirg pro- 
vinces, was in arms, immediately faid of the 
conteft with America, ‘‘ The game is up!” 
‘That the game was loft, was not difcovered by 
the Britifh Miniftry till feven years after. | 
Fe 0PF, eee Te wy ign OE ae 
MONTHLY RETROSPECT OF THE FINE ARTS. 
(Communications and the Loan of allnew Prints are requeffed.) 
re EO 
WY TE learn with great pleafure, that 
the rage for the dotting ftyle of en- 
graving, which, to the exclufion of good 
ienfe and good tafte, bas fo long predomi- 
nated, is on the decline, and the line en- 
graving is now attaining its deferved pre- 
eminence. This revolution, and, we may 
add, reformation in the arts may have 
been ina degree accelerated by the impor- 
tation of Raphael Morghen’s exquifite en- 
graving of the Laft Supper, from Leo- 
nardo de Vinci—a print which we again 
recommend to the ftudy of all thofe young 
artifts who have the laudable ambition of 
holding a -high rank in their profeflion, 
and wifh to engrave for pofterity, as well 
as the day in which they live. 
This change of public opinion will form 
a kind of era in the fine arts, though it 
mutt at the fame time be recolle&ted, that 
when. the tafte for this fan-painting ftyle 
was at the higheft, and the greateft en- 
couragement given to this coloured furni- 
ture, the beft line-engraved prints pre- 
ferved their fuperiority, and, with thofe 
that could judge, increafed in their value. 
In the works of Mare Antonio, Bolfwert, 
Vofterman, Gerard Audran, fac. Freii, 
Hogarth, Strange, Woollett, Bartolozzi, 
&c. &c. there is a mafculine firmnefs 
aid vigour which is not to be attained by 
the dotted manner : for whatever they gain 
in polifh and delicacy, they lofe in force 
and {pirit.. A knife may be pelifaed. un- 
till its edge is loft. When nothing is at- 
tempted but prettineffes, the arts can ne- 
ver attain that elevation, of which the 
great artifts of other times have proved 
they are capable. 
N. Bonaparte. Froma Pifure painted from the 
life, by Appiana at Milan 3 engraved by F. 
Bartoloxzi, 
Bonaparte we never faw ; but, from the 
defcriptions of thefe who have, he has a 
thinking face, and as fucir it is here pour- 
trayed. The head is very fine'y drawn, 
and highly chara&terutic; and though the 
bedy 
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