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A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith
Letters 1827
Sydney Smith to Philip Howard, [17 November] 1827
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
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Author's Preface
Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Index
Editor’s Preface
Letters 1801
Letters 1802
Letters 1803
Letters 1804
Letters 1805
Letters 1806
Letters 1807
Letters 1808
Letters 1809
Letters 1810
Letters 1811
Letters 1812
Letters 1813
Letters 1814
Letters 1815
Letters 1816
Letters 1817
Letters 1818
Letters 1819
Letters 1820
Letters 1821
Letters 1822
Letters 1823
Letters 1824
Letters 1825
Letters 1826
Letters 1827
Letters 1828
Letters 1829
Letters 1830
Letters 1831
Letters 1832
Letters 1833
Letters 1834
Letters 1835
Letters 1836
Letters 1837
Letters 1838
Letters 1839
Letters 1840
Letters 1841
Letters 1842
Letters 1843
Letters 1844
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Foston, Saturday.
My dear Sir,

My opposition to the Numidian Colony is, I assure you, not lurking, but salient and luminous, and founded upon a research, I must say, rather wider than your own. In the first place, I object to your geographical description of Mauritania, and rather suspect you have followed the geographers of the school of Ptolemy,—at least, so I should suspect, from your erroneous notions of the confines of Mauritania. Upon this subject let me beg you to consult the learned Barkius ‘De Rebus Mauritaniensibus,’ fol. Bat. 1672; Pluker’s ‘Africa,’ cap. 2, sec. 3; the ‘Mauritania’ of Viger, Paris, 1679, quarto; and the ‘Africa Vulgata’ of Scoppius.
282MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH.
Baden, the famous Dutch scholar, fell into the same error with yourself, but was properly chastised in the ‘Badius Flagellatus,’ now become a very scarce book, but which you may certainly borrow from Mr. Archdeacon Wrangham.

Are you acquainted with the dissertation of Professor la Manche, than which, Gibbon says, “nothing more copious and satisfactory ever issued from the French press”? The perusal of these works will, I think, give you new ideas upon the eastern division of the Syrtis. Abalaba can have nothing possibly to do with the Africans. —— has shown this word to come from Abal, the lord of the British chiefs. Blakarus, or Barkarus, cannot be African words; for Tonnericus ‘De Rebus Africanis,’ and Crakius ‘De Linguis Occidentalibus,’ have shown, in all the languages of that coast, the total absence of the vowels a and u, and have even produced great and reasonable doubts of e, i, and o. The Emperor Gordian could not have been crowned at Tidrus. Nobody could imagine that, who for an instant had inspected and studied the late discoveries brought to light in the Phelian marbles. The province of Byzacum proper does not lie to the south of Tunis; you are mistaking it for Fyzacum. The first signifies, in the ancient Coptic, head of fire, whereas Fyzacum signifies red with wheat.

I could go on for an hour, pointing out the mistakes into which a spirit of hypothesis has plunged your excellent understanding. I end with seriously advising you to read Galt and Porringer;* and, if you

* ‘Galt de Colon. Roman.,’ Venet. 1672; and Porringer’s celebrated treatise of ‘Mare nec liberum nec clausum;’ the London, not the Scotch edition.

MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH.283
are not then cured of this kind of theory, I must pronounce you, my dear Mr. Howard, to be incurable.

Ever yours very truly,
Sydney Smith.