Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1907-01-23

mistocles could call by name the 20
600 of Athens. From Cicero, too, We
learn something of the remarkable
memory of Sophocles, who in OLD
age when judicial proceedings had
been Instituted to determine his men
tai competency reeited to the judges
the "Oedipus'' at Colona to prove mis-
mind was not falling.
Plato makes Hippias boast that
he could repeat 500 words after hear
ing them once, but this is nothing
compared with the claims of Seneca.
In his declarations in speaking OF
the former tenacity or his memory
he says that he was able 70 repeat
1000 names in the order which they
had been given to him. He relates,
too, that on one occasion in his stu
dent days, after the different pupils
Of his preceptor had recited 200 IN
connected verses, he repeated them
! in a reverse order-that is, he began
with the last and proceeded TO the
first uttered. A still more remark
able instance is mentioned by sir
William Hamilton in his Lectures
on Metaphysics and Logics" He
makes the statement and cites Mure-
tus as authority thai young Corsican
could repeat in either direct or re-
verse order or begin at any point
and repeat both ways a list of $4,000
names.
1t is related that both Horace Yer
net and Gustav Dore could paint
portrait from memory There is also
a story that is more than tradition
that Wolfang Mozart set down the
whole of the Sistene Miserere from
memory, and that, too, from hearing
it but twice
Giovanni Pieo della Mirandola. Pas
cal, Ben Jonson, LeibniCz, Scaliger,
Neibuhr and MacauIay all were men
of marvellous memories. Almost
from childhood Mirandola was noted
for his extraordinary memory He
studied canon law at Bolonga and then
went Ferrara, where he master
ed theology and the different sys-
TENS of philosophy and became pro-
iicient in Latin Greek, Hebrew. Chal-
dee and Arabic. The wide range OF
his learning is bestill ustrated in The
theg' he proposed as subjects of
controversy at Rome in 1886. Pascal
says he never forgot anything he
read. Ben Jonson tells us that he
could repeat all he had ever written
and whole books" that he had read.
The same feat, too, is crdited to Mel
buhr, the historian. 1t is also told
of Neibuhr that in his youth while
employed in one of the public Offices
.of Denmark he was able through his
memory alone to completely restore
"a book of accounts that had been
partly destroyed Leibnitz, like
Euler, is said to have been able to
repeat the whole of the Aeneid."
The many stories told of Macaul-
avs almost portenous memory have
heen related too often to bear repetl-
ton. Not few of them are On
seemingly certain authority William
II. Prescott who met Macaulay about
1850, has told us some interesting
things of his memory | shall men,
ton but one. This was related TO
Prescott by Henry italian, who said
that Lord Jeffrey had once told him
that having tripped up Macaulay in
days after Macaulay came to him and
after Macaulay came to him and
said, You will not catch me again in
the Paradise at which Jeffery
opened the volume and took him I'D
in great many passages at random.
in ell of which he went on correctly
repeating the original. Was it not
a miraculous tour d'esprit? Macaulay
does not hesitate to say now that he
thinks he could restore the first six
or seven books of Inc Paradise in
case they were lost"
There can be no doubt of the truth
of this and many of the other stories
told of Macaulay's memory He was
a man of splendid talents. His
knowledge of English history was I'M
surpassed by his conte mporaries.-
John William Perrin in New York
Herald.