[Manuscript:] [Extracts from l'Encyclopédie, &c].

(Dictionary-cum-commonplace book. French.) HINARD (Constantien)

[Manuscript:] [Extracts from l'Encyclopédie, &c].

Description: French manuscript in ink on paper, several 'cahiers', lettered A-L (but not in date order), followed by a number of leaves with pencil drawings, a few leaves excised, altogether approx 250 leaves, folio, contemporary vellum over boards, using an old MS, splits in upper joint, about half the vellum torn off lower cover

Publication Details: [Fougerolles: 1806-19]

Notes: It is not clear whether this intriguing manuscript is a school exercise book, or the work of an autodidact: the period of time taken to write the various parts suggests the latter. The hand, typical of its time, though not the tidiest, is sometimes hard to read, but generally it yields.The first 3 'cahiers' comprise extracts from l'Encyclopédie, with a few interpolations from other sources, e.g. Voltaire. This accounts for getting on for half of the text contents of the volume. Cahier D is on Freemasons, E contains 'phrases détachées' from 'Déisme réfuté' and other related works, F-J co...moreIt is not clear whether this intriguing manuscript is a school exercise book, or the work of an autodidact: the period of time taken to write the various parts suggests the latter. The hand, typical of its time, though not the tidiest, is sometimes hard to read, but generally it yields.The first 3 'cahiers' comprise extracts from l'Encyclopédie, with a few interpolations from other sources, e.g. Voltaire. This accounts for getting on for half of the text contents of the volume. Cahier D is on Freemasons, E contains 'phrases détachées' from 'Déisme réfuté' and other related works, F-J comprises mathematical subjects, including dialling (these with diagrams). K, entitled 'Cahier de lettres', has numerous examples of epistolary style, mostly official. Lastly, L is a 'Manuel de santé', definitions and cures.The final section is a series of pencil drawings (on a different sort of paper). These are fairly naive, but they have charm, and Hinard took the pains to sign some of them, these ones being character studies and caricatures - in the latter category 'Un anglais à Paris', a stout man, apparently oblivious to his surroundings, with a huge umbrella tucked under his left arm. Other subjects include French historical figures (from statues, &c) including a sketch of Napoleon at St. Cyr. The last several represent characters and scenes from French classical drama (Molière, Racine), with appropriate quotations from the plays. Perhaps the most interesting, and as it happens best executed, is 'Turner peintre de marine': 'mort 1851' seems to have been added later. It is a Turner somewhat advanced in years that is depicted, the Turner of Edward Bird's portrait of him in the British Museum (drawn before Bird's death in 1819). Bird's portrait is a bust; here, he is standing by an easel, brush and palette in hand. HIDE