_Robert Deverell_ (Vol. i., p. 469.).--If my information is too scanty to
deserve a place among the Replies, you may treat it as a supplement to Dr.
Rimbault's Query. Mr. Deverell also published (according to Lowndes) _A New
View of the Classics and Ancient Arts, tending to show the invariable
Connexion with the Sciences_, 4to. Lond. 1806; and _Discoveries in
Hieroglyphics and other Antiquities_, 6 vols. 8vo. Lond. 1813,--which was
suppressed by the author after a few copies had been sold. I have the
second and third volumes, being all that relates to Shakspeare. They
consist of an edition of Hamlet, Lear, Othello, Merchant of Venice, and the
third satire of Horace, copiously illustrated with notes and woodcuts,
intended to prove that in the works in question, in common with "all the
classics and the different specimens of the arts which have come down to us
from the ancients, no part of them is to be understood without supposing
that they were mere vehicles of knowledge, not intended to meet the eye or
the understanding on the first inspection or perusal;" in short, that all
the phrases, characters, and incidents are merely allusions to the
appearances of the moon! a representation of which, and of Shakspearian
characters, &c., bearing supposed resemblance to its lights and shadows,
form the staple of the illustrations. I collect from passages in these
volumes, that the first was devoted to a similar illustration of Hudibras.
The whole affair seems to afford indications of insanity. In the
_Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors_, 8vo., Lond. 1816, I find that
in 1802 he was returned to Parliament by the borough of Saltash, in
Cornwall: and from the same authority it also appears that, in addition to
the works above noticed, he was the author of _A Guide to the Knowledge of
the Ancients_, 1803, and _A letter to Mr. Whitbread on two Bills pending in
Parliament_, 8vo. 1807.