Ripperda (died 1737) a Dutch adventurer, became Prime Minister of Spain
under Philip V., and after his fall turned Mohammedan. Alberoni
(1664-1752) was an Italian adventurer, who became Prime Minister of
Spain in 1714. Hayreddin (died 1547) and Horuc Barbarossa (died 1518)
were Algerine pirates. Edward Wortley Montague (1713-1776), son of Lady
Mary, saw the inside of several prisons, served at Fontenoy, sat in the
British Parliament, was received into the Roman Catholic Church at
Jerusalem (1764), lived at Rosetta as a Mohammedan with his mistress,
Caroline Dormer, till 1772, and died at Padua, from swallowing a
fish-bone.]
[Footnote 5: 'Vicar of Wakefield' (chap. xx.). The Vicar's eldest son,
George,
"resolved to write a book that should be wholly new. I therefore
dressed up three paradoxes with some ingenuity.... 'Well,' asks the
Vicar, 'and what did the learned world say to your paradoxes?' 'Sir,'
replied my son, 'the learned world said nothing to my paradoxes,
nothing at all.... I found that no genius in another could please me.
My unfortunate paradoxes had entirely dried up that source of comfort.
I could neither read nor write with satisfaction; for excellence in
another was my aversion, and writing was my trade.'"]
[Footnote 6: From Boileau ('Imitations, etc.', by J.C. Hobhouse):
"With what delight rhymes on the scribbling dunce.
He's ne'er perplex'd to choose, but right at once;
With rapture hails each work as soon as done,
And wonders so much wit was all his own.
Pages:
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441
442
443
444
445
446
447
448
449
450
451
452
453
454