vidence, from the use of the word Piraeus in
describing the harbour of Athens, a name which was not given till two
hundred years after Aesop, and from the introduction of other modern
words, that many of these fables must have been at least committed to
writing posterior to the time of Aesop, and more boldly suggests Babrias
as their author or collector.[16] These various references to Babrias
induced Dr. Plichard Bentley, at the close of the seventeenth century,
to examine more minutely the existing versions of Aesop's Fables, and
he maintained that many of them could, with a slight change of words,
be resolved into the Scazonic[17] iambics, in which Babrias is known
to have written: and, with a greater freedom than the evidence then
justified, he put forth, in behalf of Babrias, a claim to the exclusive
authorship of these fables. Such a seemingly extravagant theory, thus
roundly asserted, excited much opposition. Dr. Bentley[18] met with an
able antagonist in a member of the University of Oxford, the Hon.
Mr. Charles Boyle,[19] afterwards Earl of Orrery. Their letters and
disputations on this subject, enlivened on both sides with much wit and
learning, will ever bear a conspicuous place in the literary history of
the seventeenth century. The arguments of Dr. Bentley were yet further
defended a few years later by Mr. Thomas Tyrwhitt, a well-read scholar,
who gave up high civil distinctions that he might devote himself the
more unreservedly to literary pursuits. Mr. Tyrwhitt published, A.D.
1776, a Dissertation on Babrias, and a collection of his fables in
choliambic meter found in a MS. in the Bodleian Library at Oxford.
Francesco de Furia, a learned Italian, contributed further testimony
to the correctness of the supposition that Babrias had made a veritable
collection of fables by printing from a MS. contained in the Vatican
library several fables never before published. In the year 1844,
however, new and unexpected light was thrown upon this subject. A
veritable copy of Babrias was found in a manner as singular as were the
MSS. of Quinctilian's Institutes, and of Cicero's Orations by Poggio in
the monastery of St. Gall A.D. 1416. M. Menoides, at the suggestion of
M. Villemain, Minister of Public Instruction to King Louis Philippe,
had been entrusted with a commission to search for ancient MSS., and
in carrying out his instructions he found a MS. at the convent of St.
Laura, on Mount Athos, which proved to be a copy o