Foulis, Robert And Andrew

, two learned printers of Scotland, were, it is supposed, natives of Glasgow, and passed their early days in obscurity. Ingenuity and perseverance, however, enabled them to establish a press from which have issued some of the finest specimens of correct and elegant printing which the eighteenth century has produced. Even Bodoni of Parma, or Barbou of Paris, have not gone beyond some of the productions from the press of Robert and Andrew Foulis. It would b highly agreeable to trace the progress of these ingenious men, but their history has been neglected by their | countrymen, and at this distance little can be recovered. Robert Foulis began printing about 1740, and one of his first essays was a good edition of Demetrius Phalereus, in 4to. In 1744 he brought out his celebrated immaculate edition, of Horace, 12mo, and soon afterwards was in partnership with his brother Andrew. Of this edition of Horace, the sheets, as they were printed, were hung up in the college of Glasgow, and a reward was offered to those who should discover an inaccuracy. It has been several times reprrnted at Glasgow, but not probably with the same fidelity. The two brothers then proceeded in producing, for thirty years, a series of correct and well printed books, particularly classics, which, either in Greek or Latin, are as remarkable for their beauty and exactness as any in the Aldine series. Among those classics we may enumerate J. “Homer,” 4 vols. fol. Gr. 2. “Herodotus,” 9 vols. J2mo. 3. “Thucydides,” 8 vols. 12mo. 4. “Xenophon,” 8 vols. 12mo. 5. “Epictetus,” 12mo. 6. “Longiniis,” 12mo. 7. “Ciceronis Opera,” 20 vols. 12mo. %. “Horace,” 12mo and 4to. 9. “Virgil,” I3mo. 10. ' Tibullus and Propertius,“12mo. 11.” Cornelius Nepos,“3 vols. 12mo. 12.” Tacitus,“4 vols. 12mo. 13. 11 Juvenal and Persius,” 12mo. 14. “Lucretius,” 12mo. To these may be added a beautiful edition of the Greek Testament, small 4to; Gray’s Poems; Pope’s Works; Hales of Eton, &c. &c. &c.

It is a melancholy reflection that the taste of these worthy men for the fine arts at last brought about their ruin; for having engaged in the establishment of an academy for the instruction of youth in painting and sculpture in Scotland, the enormous expence of sending pupiLs to Italy, to study and copy the ancients, gradually brought on their decline in the printing business; and they found the city of Glasgow no fit soil to transplant the imitative arts into, although the literary genius of Greece and Rome had already produced them ample fortunes. Unsuccessful as they were, however, in this project, it ought not to be forgot that Robert Foulis, with whom it originated, was the first who endeavoured to establish a school of the liberal arts in Great Britain. Andrew Foulis died in 1774 and Robert in 1776 exhibited andsold at Christie’s in. Pall Mall, the remainder of his paintings. The catalogue forms 3 vols.; and the result of the sale was, that after all the concomitant cxpences were defrayed, the balance in | his favour amounted only to the sum of fifteen shillings, He died the same year, on his return to Scotland. ¹