the then generally prevalent opinion that the Egyptians never were a maritime or trading nation; a question on which much uncertainty has been introduced from the indiscriminate application of the epithet "Egyptians" to the aboriginal natives and to the Greek settlers under the Ptolemies. Raynal states in his great work that on this question he implicitly followed the memoir of Ameilhon. In the same year in which the History of Egyptian Commerce under the Ptolemies was published, the author was elected a member of the Académie des Inscriptions.

66

He was now recognised as a literary man, and employment flowed in upon him. In 1770 he was appointed editor of the Journal de Verdun, and continued in its management till it ceased to be published in 1776. In 1771 he was, upon the death of Bonami, promoted to be librarian to the city of Paris; an office which he continued to fill till the library was presented by the city to the Institute. His appointment of historiographer to the city of Paris appears to have taken place about the same time that he was made chief librarian. In 1779 he established, in conjunction with Roubaud, the Journal d'Agriculture, Commerce, Arts, et Finances," and he took an active part in conducting it till its close in 1783. From 1790 to 1792 he was one of the principal editors of the "Journal des Savans." Le Beau, at his death in 1781, had left unfinished his history of the Lower Empire. At the request of his friends in the Académie, Ameilhon, whom the dying man had pointed out as the most proper person to continue the work, undertook to complete it. He finished and published the twenty-second volume in 1781; and in 1786 he gave to the world the twenty-third and twenty-fourth volumes, containing the history of the elder Andronicus, his wife, and his three sons. In these volumes he was the first French author who gave an account of the remarkable Oriental expedition of the Catalans: the materials for this part of his narrative he drew chiefly from the Spanish historian, Muntaner, who served in the ranks of the Catalans, and was an eye-witness of the actions he describes.

The revolution interrupted Ameilhon's contributions to periodical literature and his academical labours, and gave a new and unprecedented character to his employment of librarian. Here we must first notice the account given of Ameilhon's proceedings by M. Villenave in the Supplement to the Biographie Universelle.

In 1793 Ameilhon was one of the commission on monuments, and a commissioner for the examination of the titles of the nobility. The object of the commission on monuments, appointed by the Convention on the 4th of July, 1793, was to efface or change "all objects sculptured or painted on public monuments, whether civil or religious, which presented any of the attributes of royalty." Among

VOL. II.

other tasks it was enjoined to "examine the medals of the kings of France deposited in the National Museum and in the other public collections of Paris, in order to separate and preserve such as were of consequence to the arts and history, and to send the rest to the crucible." M. Villenave says that Ameilhon was one of the most active members of this commission, but mentions no specific act of participation in its transactions. Ameilhon's conduct as a commissioner for examining the titles of the nobility appears from his autograph letters in the possession of M. Villenave. In one of these (dated January 24. 1793) he informs the syndic of the department of Paris that he is "instructed to inform him that the commissioners of examination are ready to transmit to the commissioners of the district about two hundred and seventy volumes which remain to be destroyed." On the 14th of February he sends a list of articles found in the repository of the Orders of the late king, "which ought to be matter for a final burning :" they are one hundred and twenty-eight volumes and thirty-four boxes of loose papers, containing the titles, &c. of the ci-devant Order of the Holy Ghost; two volumes of blazonry for the Orders of the king; thirty-four volumes of papers and original titles used in compiling the Armorial Général de France; one hundred and sixty-six volumes of Le Laboureur's collections; two volumes of lettres de noblesse; fifteen volumes of proofs of eligibility to the orders of St. Lazarus and the military school. Upon these data Mr. Villenave declares that Ameilhon was seized with the contagion of the revolutionary spirit to a lamentable ex

tent.

It would be rather bold, with no further evidence before us, to say that he was not. There was a drunkenness of democracy in the atmosphere of France at the time that intoxicated even the most torpid natures. Ameilhon's two volumes of the " History of the Lower Empire," in continuation of Le Beau, had been looked upon as in a great measure a covert satire on the court of Versailles. Philosophical democracy was the fashion among the Parisian literary men of the day. Still it must be observed, in.justice to Ameilhon, that in his share in the incremation of the books mentioned, -a travestie of the History of Don Quixote, in which the persons who burned the books were crack-brained, he appears as no more than the passive instrument of others. Ameilhon had, in 1789, been elected "député suppléant à l'Hotel de Ville par le district de Saint Louis la Culture;" and for one holding such an office to have declined acting upon any committee would have been death. M. Villenave himself has done justice to the exertions of M. Ameilhon at that frenzied period to save important collections in literature and science. He was charged to

GG

collect in central depôts the libraries of all the suppressed religious houses. Pache allowed only three hours for carrying off the library of St. Victor; at the end of that period the books were to be tossed out of the windows. Ameilhon by his representations obtained with difficulty three days; he immediately placed all kinds of vehicles in requisition, and transported the books to a neighbouring hospital. He transformed several churches into book magazines, and deposited all the confiscated libraries in them. He was thus happy enough to save the libraries of Malesherbes and Lavoisier, and several others, which, when tranquillity was re-established, were restored to their rightful owners. Six or seven years of his life were devoted to the assorting and classification of the books intrusted to his care. He saved the triumphal arch at the gate of St. Denis from destruction; and he had the courage to oppose the mob when it sought to enter the church of the Jesuits, where his books were deposited, under pretext of destroying the fleurs-de-lys. These facts are beyond dispute, and they appear to entitle Ameilhon to have his conduct in taking part in the commissions mentioned above, attributed to his desire, by seeming to swim with the tide, to gain an opportunity of saving as much as possible of France's treasures of art, literature, and science.

When the Institute was organized in 1797, the city of Paris presented its library to that body. Ameilhon was immediately elected librarian to the Arsenal, an appointment which he held till his death. He was nominated a member of the second class of the Institute, in fact a revival of the Académie des Inscriptions, and immediately resumed the investigations which the revolution had interrupted. He also resumed the history of the Lower Empire, which he concluded in

three volumes a short time before his death.

The History of the Navigation and Commerce of Egypt under the Ptolemies, and the last five volumes of the History of the Lower Empire begun by Le Beau, are the only books published by Ameilhon. But his contributions to the periodical literature and the academical memoirs of his country were numerous and valuable. The most important are-1. “ Remarques critiques sur l'Espèce d'E'preuve judiciaire appelée vulgairement l'E'preuve de l'Eau froide;" in the 37th volume of the Transactions of the Académie des Inscriptions. 2. "Recherches sur l'Exercise du Nageur chez les Anciens, et sur les Avantages qu'ils en rétiraient ;" in the 38th volume of the same collection. 3. "L'Art du Plongeur chez les Anciens ;" in the 40th volume. 4." Sur le Télescope" - an answer to Dutens' attempt to prove that the ancients had invented the telescope- in the 42d volume. 5. Sur la Métallurgie, ou l'Art d'exploiter les Mines chez les An

ciens." 6. "Sur les Couleurs connues des Anciens, et sur les Arts qui peuvent y avoir Rapport;" in the first volume of the " Transactions of the Institute: class of literature and the fine arts." 7. “L'Art du Foulon chez les Anciens ;" in the same volume. 8. "Sur différentes Espèces de Spartes ;" in the second volume. 9. " Projets sur quelques Changemens qu'on pourrait faire à nos Catalogues de Bibliothèque pour les rendres plus constitutionnels;" same collection. 10. Several articles on Greek MSS. in the notices and extracts from MSS. in the king's library published by the Académie des Belles Lettres. 11.E'claircissements sur l'Inscription Grecque du Monument trouvé à Rosette;" published in 1803 by order of the Institute. The third volume of the memoirs of ancient chivalry published under the name of Du Palaye has also been attributed to Ameilhon.

All this author's writings have a character of pains-taking research and deliberate unprejudiced inquiry. As a librarian his industry and obliging disposition rendered him invaluable. He was married for thirty years, and lost his wife a short time before his death. He was of a reserved and distrustful temper, yet full of benevolence. "Nobody," says M. Dacier, "had more philanthrophy and sensibility, nobody was less accessible to feelings of hatred, and nobody was less disposed to be the friend of all the world." (Dacier, Notice Historique sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de M. Ameilhon, in Mémoires de l'Institut de France, tom. v. ; Silvestre, Notice Biographique de Hubert Pascal Ameilhon, in Mémoires publiés par la Société d'Agriculture du Département de la Seine, tom. xvi.; Villenave, in the Supplément à la Biographie Universelle, v. " Ameilhon.") W. W.

AMEI NOCLES ('Aμeivokλns), a Corinthian who, according to Thucydides, lived about the year B. c. 700. His countrymen were the first among the Greeks who built triremes or ships with three ranks of rowers. Ameinocles, who had gained some celebrity in the art of ship-building, went to Samos and built four triremes for the Samians; thus, next to the Corinthians, the Samians were the first who used triremes. (Thucydides, i. 13.) L. S.

AMEINOCLES ('Αμεινοκλῆς), a wealthy citizen of Magnesia in Thessaly. In the year B. c. 480, when the greater part of the Persian fleet had been destroyed by a storm near Cape Sepias, he derived great advantages from this calamity, for he possessed a great extent of land about Cape Sepias, and thus came into possession of all the Persian treasures that had been thrown upon the coast. This man, says Herodotus, thus got very rich; but he was in other respects not happy, for by some unfortunate accident he had become the murderer of his own child. (Herodotus, vii. 190.; Plutarch,