r of the _Philosophoumena_ of Hippolytus, came upon a
MS. of Babrius in the convent of St Laura on Mount Athos, now in the
British Museum. This MS. contained 123 fables out of the supposed original
number, 160. They are arranged alphabetically, but break off at the letter
O. The fables are written in choliambic, _i.e._ limping or imperfect iambic
verse, having a spondee as the last foot, a metre originally appropriated
to satire. The style is extremely good, the expression being terse and
pointed, the versification correct and elegant, and the construction of the
stories is fully equal to that in the prose versions. The genuineness of
this collection of the fables was generally admitted by scholars. In 1857
Minas professed to have discovered at Mount Athos another MS. containing 94
fables and a preface. As the monks refused to sell this MS., he made a copy
of it, which was sold to the British Museum, and was published in 1859 by
Sir G. Cornewall Lewis. This, however, was soon proved to be a forgery. Six
more fables were brought to light by P. Knoell from a Vatican MS. (edited
by A. Eberhard, _Analecta Babriana_, 1879).

EDITIONS.--Boissonade (1844); Lachmann (1845); Schneider (1853); Eberhard
(1876); Gitlbauer (1882); Rutherford (1883); Knoell, _Fabularum Babrianarum
Paraphrasis Bodleiana_ (1877); Feuillet (1890); Desrousseaux (1890);
Passerat (1892); Croiset (1892); Crusius (1897). See also Mantels, _Ueber
die Fabeln des B._ (1840); Crusius, _De Babrii Aetate_ (1879); Ficus, _De
Babrii Vita_ (1889); J. Weiner, _Quaestiones Babrianae_ (1891); Conington,
_Miscellaneous Writings_, ii. 460-491; Marchiano, _Babrio_ (1899); Fusci,
_Babrio_ (1901); Christoffersson, _Studia de Fabulis Babrianis_ (1901).
There are translations in English by Davies (1860) and in French by Leveque
(1890), and in many other languages.

BABU, a native Indian clerk. The word is really a term of respect attached
to a proper name, like "master" or "Mr," and _Babu-ji_ is still used in
many parts of India, meaning "sir"; but without the suffix the word itself
is now generally used contemptuously as signifying a semi-literate native,
with a mere veneer of modern education.

BABY-FARMING,[1] a term meaning generally the taking in of infants to nurse
for payment, but usually with an implication of improper treatment.
Previous to the year 1871 the abuse of the practice of baby-farming in
England had grown to an alarming extent, while the trials of Margaret