gainst us: he has not only highly
distinguished the comic genius of our writers, and raised it above that
of our neighbours, but he has also advanced another discovery, which
ranks us still higher for original invention, and which, I am confident,
will be as new as it is extraordinary to the English reader.

Quadrio, who, among other erudite accessories to his work, has exhausted
the most copious researches on the origin of Punch and Harlequin, has
also written, with equal curiosity and value, the history of
Puppet-shows. But whom has he lauded? whom has he placed paramount,
above all other people, for their genius of invention in improving this
art!--The English! and the glory which has hitherto been universally
conceded to the Italian nation themselves, appears to belong to us! For
we, it appears, while others were dandling and pulling their little
representatives of human nature into such awkward and unnatural motions,
first invented pulleys, or wires, and gave a fine and natural action to
the artificial life of these gesticulating machines!

We seem to know little of ourselves as connected with the history of
puppet-shows; but in an article in the curious Dictionary of Trevoux, I
find that John Brioche, to whom had been attributed the invention of
_Marionnettes_, is only to be considered as an improver; in his time
(but the learned writers supply no date) _an Englishman_ discovered the
secret of moving them by springs, and without strings; but the
Marionnettes of Brioche were preferred for the pleasantries which he
made them deliver. The erudite Quadrio appears to have more successfully
substantiated our claims to the pulleys or wires, or springs of the
puppets, than any of our own antiquaries; and perhaps the uncommemorated
name of this Englishman was that Powell, whose Solomon and Sheba were
celebrated in the days of Addison and Steele; the former of whom has
composed a classical and sportive Latin poem on this very subject. But
Quadrio might well rest satisfied that the nation which could boast of
its _Fantoccini_, surpassed, and must ever surpass the puny efforts of a
doll-loving people!

FOOTNOTES:

[156] Even recently, il Cavaliere Onofrio Boni, in his Eloge of Lanzi,
in naming the three Augustan periods of modern literature, fixes
them, for the Italians, under Leo the Tenth; for the French, under
Louis the Fourteenth, or the Great; and for the English, under
Charles the Second!

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