Voltaire's ignorance of antiquity is laughable. In his Essay on Tragedy, prefixed to Brutus, he actually boasts of having introduced the Roman senate on the stage in red mantles. “The Greeks,” as he asserts, “font paraitre ses acteurs (tragic) sur des especes d'echasses, le visage couvert d'un masque qui exprime la douleur d'un coté et la joye de l'autre!” The only circumstance upon which he could possibly have founded such an accusation is, that in the _new comedy_ masks were worn with one eyebrow drawn up and the other down, to denote a busy-body or inquisitive medler. * * * * * Several ancient tragedies, viz: Eumenides, Philoctetes, and Ædipus et Colonos, besides many pieces of Euripides, have a happy and enlivening termination. * * * * * The only historical tragedies by Grecian authors {580} were The Capture of Miletus by Phrynicus and the Persians of Æschylus. * * * * * The foundation of all the erroneous opinions on the subject of the old Greek comedy (Voltaire's opinion particularly) may be found in the comparison between Aristophanes and Menander, in Plutarch. * * * * * Schlegel says justly, that Harlequin and Pulcinello descend in a direct line from the buffoons of the ancient Romans. On Greek vases are seen also dresses like theirs—long breeches and waistcoats with arms, articles worn by neither Greeks nor Romans except upon the stage. At present Zanni is one of the names of Harlequin, and Sannio in the Latin farces was a buffoon who had a shaven head, and a dress patched together of all colors. * * * * * In Racine's _Berenice_ Antiochus says to the queen ——Je me suis tû cinq ans Madame, et vais encore me taire plus long tems, and to give a direct proof of his intention, recites immediately no less than fifty verses in a breath. * * * * * In Voltaire's scruples about unity of place he has committed a thousand blunders. In the Mort de Cæsar the scene is in the Capitol, but the people seem not to know their precise situation. On one occasion Cæsar exclaims, “Courons au Capitole!” * * * * * Denis de Sallo's “Journal des Sçavans,” in 1665 may be considered as the origin of Literary Journals or Reviews. * * * * * Sous ce tombeau git Le Sage abattu Par le ciseau de la Parque importune, S'il ne fut pas ami de la fortune Il fut toujours ami de la vertu, was Le Sage's epitaph. * * * * * These lines although extremely French are forcible, Et comme un jeune cœur est bientot enflammé Il me vit, il m'aima, je le vis, je l'aimai. * * * * * On Cardinal Richelieu, Benserade made the following epitaph: