remembered among the most useful scholars of his time, and among the benefactors to learning on its revival.1 DESPEISSES (ANTHONY), an eminent French lawyer, and a protestant, was born at Montpelier, in 1594. Being admitted to the bar, he pleaded in the parliament of Paris. Having communicated his ideas on the subject to his friend and countryman Charles de Bouques, they resolved to labour conjointly in the explanation and illustration of the civil law, and the first fruits of their labours was a "Traité des successions testamentaires et ab intestat," Paris, 1623, fol. dedicated to the son of the chancellor de Sillery, who patronized both authors, and encouraged them in the prosecution of their work. De Bouques was removed by death, and the undertaking would have been discontinued, had not Despeisses taken the whole upon himself, and made it the employment of nearly forty years of his life. He was about to have sent it to press, when he died almost suddenly, in 1658. The work, however, appeared under the title, "Les Euvres d'Antoine Despeisses, ou toutes les matieres les plus importantes du droit Romain sont expliquées et accommodées au droit Francois," 4 vols. fol. The last edition was printed in 1750, 3 vols. fol. It is a work of vast labour, but according to Bretonnier, not exact in the quotations. It is recorded of Despeisses, that at one time of his life he returned to Montpellier, with a view to practice at the bar, but was diverted from it by an incident very trifling in itself. As he was addressing the court, with many digressions from the main subject, which was then the fashion, he happened to say something of Ethiopia, on which an attorney, loud enough to be heard, said, "He is now got to Ethiopia, and he will never come back." Despeisses was so mucli hurt at this, and probably at the laugh which it occasioned, as to confine himself afterwards to chamber-practice, and the compilation of his great work. 2 DESPIERRES (JOHN), a learned Benedictine, was a native of Flanders, born in 1597. In 1640 he took his degree of D. D. at Douay, where he was prefect and superior of the college belonging to his monastery, and lastly, grand prior and official of the spiritual court of Anchin. He was most celebrated for mathematical know, 1 Moreri.-Foppen Bibl. Belg.-Clement Bibl. Curieuse.-Baillet Juge mens.-Fabric. Bibl. Med. Lat. vol. II. Moreri. ledge, and on this account was requested by his majesty to teach that science at Douay, where he died March 28, 1664. He was not only a good author, but an ingenious instrument maker, and constructed an iron sphere, with curious clock-work, to shew the motions of the heavenly bodies. His principal works are, 1. "Gloria sanctissimi monachorum patriarchæ Benedicti." 2. "Calendarium novum ad legendas horas canonicas, secundum ritum breviarii Romani." 3. "Vindicia Trithemianæ, sive specimen steganographiæ Joannis Trithemii, quo auctoris ingenuitas demonstratur, et opus superstitione absolvitur," Doway, 1641, 4to. 4. "Auctoritas Scripturæ sacræ Hebraicæ, Græcæ, et Latinæ, hoc est textus Hebraici, versionis septuaginta interpretum, et versionis vulgatæ," ibid. 1651, 4to. 5. "Commentarius in psalterium Davidicum, quo sensus litteralis tam textus Hebraici quam vulgatæ breviter exponitur." 6. "Calendarium Romanum novum, et Astronomia Aquicinetina (Anchin)," ibid. 1657, fol.1 DESPORTES (FRANCIS), an eminent painter, was born at the village of Champigneul, in Champagne, in 1661; and being a disciple of Nicasius, a Flemish painter, imitated his manner of painting. The subjects he selected were flowers, insects, animals, and representations of the chace, which he designed and coloured with much truth; his local colours being very good, and the aërial perspective well managed. He was chiefly employed in the service of Lewis XIV.; and accompanied the French ambassader, the duke d'Aumont, to London, where he was much encouraged, particularly by the duke of Richmond and lord Bolingbroke. The hotels of Paris, and the palaces of Versailles, Marli, &c. contain many specimens by this artist, who died at a very advanced age, in 1743. The present Imperial Museum has his portrait, which was engraved by Poullain, and three pictures by him, of great merit. 2 DESPORTES (JOHN BAPTIST RENE POUPPE'E), physician to the king of France, and corresponding member of the royal academy of sciences at Paris, was a native of Vitre, a town in Bretagne, where he was born Sept. 28, 1704, and was the fifth of his family who had distinguished themselves in the medical art. After practising with great 1 Moreri.-Foppen Bibl. Belg. Argenville.-Pilkington.-Dict. Hist. reputation for some years at Paris, he was appointed phy sician to the island of Domingo, where he died, after a residence of about ten years, in 1748. He left an interesting and curious work, "Histoire des Maladies de Saint Domingue," which was printed in 1770, 3 vols. 12mo. Besides an account of the diseases common in Domingo, it contains descriptions of all the plants which the author found in the island. In this he has corrected several errors in the accounts left by Plumier and Barrere, and has added, where he could obtain them, the names by which they were known by the native Caribbées; also a pharmacopoeia, giving the qualities or virtues of the plants.1 DESPORTES (PHILIP), a poet to whom much of the improvement of the French language is attributed, was born at Chartres in 1546, whence he went to Paris. Attaching himself there to a bishop who was going to Rome, he gained an opportunity of visiting that city, and acquiring a perfect knowledge of the Italian language. When he returned to France, he applied himself entirely to French poetry, and was one of the few poets who have enjoyed great affluence, which he owed in part to the great liberality of the princes by whom he was protected. Henry III. of France gave him 10,000 crowns, to enable him to publish his first works. Charles IX. presented him with 800 crowns of gold for his poem of Rodomont. The admiral de Joyeuse gave him an abbey for a sonnet. Besides which, he enjoyed benefices to the amount altogether of 10,000 crowns a year. Henry III. even honoured him with a place in his council, and consulted him on the most important affairs. It is said that he refused several bishoprics; but he loved solitude and retirement, which he sought as often as he could. He was very liberal to other men of letters, and formed a large library, to which he gave them the utmost freedom of access. Some, who were envious of his reputation, reproached him with having borrowed freely from the Italian poets, which he was far from denying; and when a book appeared upon the subject, entitled "Rencontre des Muses de France et d'Italie," he said, "If I had known the author's design, I could have furnished him with many more instances than he has collected." After the death of Henry III. he joined himself for a time to the party of the League, but afterwards repented, and 1 Dict. Hist.-Rees's Cyclopædia. laboured zealously to serve the interests of Henry IV. in Normandy, and succeeded in obtaining the friendship and esteem of that liberal monarch. He died in 1606. Desportes is acknowledged to have been one of the chief improvers of the French language. His works consist of sonnets, stanzas, elegies, songs, epigrams, imitations, and other poems; some of which were first published in 4to, by Robert Stephens, in 1573. A translation of the Psalms was one of his latest works, and one of the most feeble. A delightful simplicity is the characteristic of his poetry, which is therefore more perfect when applied to amorous and gallant, than to noble subjects. He often imitated and almost translated Tibullus, Ovid, and other classics. A few sacred poems are published in some editions of his Psalms, which have little more merit than the Psalms to which they are subjoined.' DESROCHERS (ANDIER STEPHEN JOHN), engraver to the French king, was born at Lyons, and settled at Paris, where he died in 1741, at a very advanced age. He engraved subjects from the ancient mythology, especially after the paintings of Correggio. But the greatest of all his performances is a long series of portraits in busts, of persons signalized by their birth, in war, in the ministry, in the magistracy, in the sciences, and in the arts. This series amounts to upwards of seven hundred portraits, with verses at bottom, the greater part of them by Gacou. The emperor Charles VI. recompensed des Rochers with a fine golden medal for some impressions of the portrait of his imperial majesty, which this engraver had sent him. * Moreri in Portes.-Dict. Hist. 2 Diet. Hist. in Andier. |