[267] [Probably Lady Charlemont. See "Journal," November 22, 1813.]
[268] {216}[The cyanometer, an instrument for ascertaining the intensity of the blue colour of the sky, was invented by Horace Bénédict de Saussure (1740-1799); see his Essai sur l'Hygrométrie. F.H. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) "made great use of his instrument on his voyages, and ascertained by the colour the degree of blueness, the accumulation and the nature of the non-transparent exhalations of the air."—Alexander von Humboldt, by Professor Klencke, translated by Juliette Bauer, 1852, pp. 45, 46.]
I'll back a London "Bas" against Peru.
or, I'll bet some pair of stocking beat Peru.
or, And so, old Sotheby, we'll measure you.—[MS.]
[269] ["The slave-market is a quadrangle, surrounded by a covered gallery, and ranges of small and separate apartments." Here the poor wretches sit in a melancholy posture. "Before they cheapen 'em, they turn 'em about from this side to that, survey 'em from top to bottom.... Such of 'em, both men and women, to whom Dame Nature has been niggardly of her charms, are set apart for the vilest services: but such girls as have youth and beauty pass their time well enough.... The retailers of this human ware are the Jews, who take good care of their slaves' education, that they may sell the better: their choicest they keep at home, and there you must go, if you would have better than ordinary; for 'tis here, as 'tis in markets for horses, the handsomest don't always appear, but are kept within doors."—A Voyage into the Levant, by M. Tournefort, 1741, ii. 198, 199. See, too, for the description of the sale of two Circassians and one Georgian, Voyage de Vienne à Belgrade, ... par N.E. Kleeman, 1780, pp. 141, 142. The "lowest offer for the prize Circassian was 4000 piastres.">[
The females stood, till chosen each as victim
To the soft oath of "Ana seing Siktum!"[*]—[MS.]