often all the Words, and the very Manner of fpelling them, if there was any thing peculiar of that kind in any Author.

His extraordinary Application, and Talents, soon recommended him to Ermini [d], and Marimi [e], the Great Duke's Librarian. He was by them introduced into the Conversations of the learned, and made known at Court: And began to be looked upon every where as a Prodigy [f], particularly for his vaft and unbounded Memory,

It is faid, that there was a Trial made of the Force of his Memory, which if true, is very amazing. A Gentleman at Florence, who had written a Piece which was to be printed, lent the Manufcript to Magliabechi; and, fome Time after it had been returned with Thanks, came to him. again with a melancholy Face, and told him of fome invented Accident, by which, he said, he had loft his Manufcript: The Author feemed almost inconfolable for the Lofs of his Work, and intreated Magliabechi, whofe Character for remembring what he read was already very great, to try to recollect

[d] Librarian to the Cardinal of Medicis.

[e] Father Niceron names these two as his great Friends; and it may probably be of the latter that Salvini fays, " Un nobile, letterato, e generofo fpirito della citta noftro dal fuo impiego il levo;

e nelle letterarie converfazioni lo introduffe: e ella Real Corte di Toscana il fe conofcere." Or. Fun. p. 8.

[f]"

«Fu egli amirato fin da principio, come un prodigio, di quella parte principalmente dell' Anima che Memoria s' appella,” Ik. - p. 8,

as much of it as he poffibly could, and write it down for him, against his next Vifit. Magliabechi affured him he would, and, on fetting about it, wrote down the whole Manuscript [g], without miffing a Word; or even varying any where from the Spelling.

By treafuring up every thing he read in fo ftrange a Manner, or at leaft the Subject, and all the principal Parts of all the Books he ran over ; his Head became at laft, as one of his Acquaintance expreffed it to me, "An univerfal Index both of

Titles and Matter."

By this Time Magliabechi was grown fo famous for the vaft Extent of his Reading and his amazing Retention of what he had read, that it began to grow common amongst the Learned to confult him, when they were writing on any Subject. Thus, for Inftance, if a Prieft was going to compofe a Panegyric on fuch a Saint, and came to communicate his Defign to Magliabechi, he would immediately tell him, who had faid any thing of that Saint, and in what Part of their Works, and that fometimes, to the Number of above a hundred Authors.

[g] There is, I believe, at least as much Difference in the English and Florentine ways of speaking, when we praife or extol any thing, as there may be between the Florentine and the Oriental. A Florentine will call a good tolerable Houfe, for Inftance, a Palace; and a little fnug Flower Garden a Paradife. This, and all the other Anecdotes in this Account are from Florentines, as I have faid before, and certainly, in most of them, fome Allowance fhould be made for the Florentine Way of Speaking; I having generally expreffed what I had from them in their Language, litterally in our own.

He would tell them not only who had treated of their Subject defignedly, but of fuch also as had touched upon it only accidently, in writing on other Subjects; both which he did with the greatest Exactness, naming the Author, the Book, the Words, and often the very Number of the Page [b] in which they were inferted. He did this so often, fo readily and fo exactly, that he came at last to be looked upon almost as an Oracle [i], for the ready and full Answers that he gave to all Questions, that were proposed to him in any Faculty or Science whatever.

It was his great Eminence this way, and his vast, I had almost faid, inconceivable Knowledge of Books, that induced the Great Duke, Cofmo the Third, to do him the Honour of making him his Librarian; and what a Happiness must it have been to Magliabechi, who delighted in nothing fo much as in Reading, to have the fupreme Command and Ufe of fuch a Collection of Books as that in the Great Duke's Palace! He was alfo very converfant with the Books in the Lorenzo Library []; and had

[b] Salvini expreffes this yet more strongly : « Et non che il libro; «ma la pagina, la colonna, il verfo, ne additava." Or. Fun. p. 15. [i] "Il Magliabechi fu tanto rinomato per la fua Biblioteca, e per il vafto fuo fapere, che fembiava quafi un oracolo, per le pronte "e faggie fue rifpofte, in qualunque facoltà foffe ricercato." Mancurti, in his Life of Crefcembeni. See the Latter's Hiftory of Italian Poetry, T. vi. p. 233.

[k] Salvini, Or. Fun. p. 10, and 17.

the

the keeping of thofe of Leopoldo, and Francefco Maria, the two Cardinals of Tuscany.

66

And yet even all this did not fatisfy his extensive Appetite; for one who knew him well told me, "One may fay, that he had read almost all Books :" By which, as he explained himself, he meaned the greatest Part of those printed before his Time [1], and all in it: For it was latterly a general Custom, not only among the Authors, but the Printers too of thofe Times, to make him a Present of a Copy of whatever they published; which, by the way, must have been a confiderable Help towards the very large Collection of Books, which he himself made.

To read such vaft Numbers as he did, he latterly made ufe of a Method as extraordinary, as any Thing I have hitherto mentioned of him. When a Book first came into his Hands, he would look the Title Page all over, then dip here and there in the Preface, Dedication, and Advertisements; if there were any; and then caft his Eyes on each of the Divifions, the different Sections, or Chapters, and then he would be able for ever to know what that Book contained: For he remembered as fteadily, as he conceived rapidly.

[] Salvini goes farther, for he fays, "Non vi era minimo libretio chi' egli non conofceffe." Or. Fun. p. 15. And Crefcembeni, Speaking of a Dispute whether a certain Poem had ever been printed or not, concludes it not, "Because Magliabecbi had never seen "it." Iftoria della Volg. Poef. T. vi. p. 23.

It was after he had taken to this way of fore-shortening his reading, if I may be allowed fo odd an Expreffion; and I think, I rather may, because he conceived the Matter almost as compleatly in this fhort way, as if he had read it at full Length; that a Priest, who had composed a Panegyric on one of his favorite Saints, brought it to Magliabechi, as a Prefent. He read it over the very Way above mentioned; only the Title Page, and the Heads of the Chapters; and then thanked him very kindly, "For his excellent Treatife." The Author, in fome Pain, afked him, "Whether that was all that 66 he intended to read of his Book ?" Magliabechi cooly answered, "Yes; for I know very well every "thing that is in it." My Author for this Anecdote endeavoured to account for it in the following Manner: Magliabechi, fays he, knew all that the Writers before had faid of this Saint; he knew! this particular Father's Turn and Character; and from thence judged, what he would chufe out of them, and what he would omit. If this way of accounting for fo extraordinary a Thing may not feem fatisfactory to fome, it must at least be allowed to be ingenious by all,

Malgiabechi had a local Memory too of the Places where every Book ftood; as in his Master's Shop at firft, and in the Pitti, and several other Libraries afterwards: And feems to have carried this farther, than only in Relation to the Collections of Books with which he was perfonally acquainted