The earliest allusion to this fable, that I know of, occurs in the Passionate Pilgrim, Sect. xix.
Ovid, in his version of the fable of Tereus, does not introduce the thorn; so probably the allusion is not classical.
Apollodorus also gives this myth, but I have him not to refer to.
H. E. H.
Carli the Economist (Vol. iv., p. 175.).
—ALPHA will find in a very excellent work, entitled Storia della Economia Pubblica in Italia, &c., di Giuseppe Pecchio, Lugano, 1829, 8vo., the information he requires regarding the first work on political economy, by an Italian writer, who seems to have been Gasparo Scaruffi; and also learn that Gian Rinaldo Carli died in 1795.
F. R. A.
Tale of a Tub (Vol. i., p. 326.; Vol. iii., p. 28.).
—It is no wonder that Henry VIII.'s chancellor Sir Thomas More should have heard of an extraordinary tale about a tub, since its earliest form—the model of so many copies—is in Apuleius, at the beginning of the 9th book. It forms likewise the argument of the second novel of Boccacio's Seventh Day, ove "Peronella mette un suo amante in un doglio." Girolamo Morlino told the same objectionable story in Latin; and Agnolo Firenzuola, the Italian translator of Apuleius, seems to have adopted the witty Florentine's imagery, forgetting the original which he professed to follow. See Manni, Istoria del Decamerone, Firenze, 1742, pp. 466. 472. "Tale of a tub," like Conte de peau d'âne, Conte de la Cigogne, Conte de la Mère Oie, denotes a marvellous or cock and bull story—Conte gras, Conte pour rire. There is no doubt that Jean-Jaques' miniature French opera, Le Tonnelier, was founded, though through certain strainers well refined, on the wicked Milesian fiction of the African jester:
"Un tonnelier vieux et jaloux