At a time when the readers of "N. & Q.," and the world at large, have been
hearing of the gift of a bell to a village church in Normandy, so
pleasantly and readily made by the princely house of Russell, far exceeding
the modest solicitation of the curé for assistance by way of a
subscription, in remembrance of the Du Rozels having left their native
patrimony in France to share the fortunes of the Conqueror in Old England,
the following particulars may not be uninteresting.
Mr. Wiffen, when compiling his elaborate _Historical Memoirs of the House
of Russell, from the Time of the Norman Conquest_, had occasion to make
some inquiries respecting a statement put forth by a M. Richard Seguin, a
rich dealer in merceries and wooden shoes at Vire, in the department of
Calvados; who, it appears, had a mania for appropriating the literary
labours of others as his own, and, in fact, is stigmatised as a _voleur
littéraire_ by M. Quérard, in his curious work entitled _Les Supercheries
Littéraires Dévoilées_. Mr. Wiffen wished to ascertain M. Seguin's
authority for affirming in some work, the name of which is not given by M.
Quérard, but which is probably the _Histoire du Pays d'Auge et des Evêques
Comtes de Lisieux_, Vire, 1832, that the Du Rozels were descended from
Bertrand de Briquebec. M. Seguin's reply is contained in the following
letter from M. Le Normand of Vire, to whom Mr. Wiffen had written,
requesting him to obtain M. Seguin's authority for his statement:
"J'ai vu M. Séguin, et je lui ai demandé d'où provenaient les
renseignements dont il s'était servi pour dire dans son ouvrage que les
Du Rozel descendaient des Bertrand de Bricquebec. _Il m'a répondu qu'il
l'ignorait_; qu'il avait eu en sa possession une grande quantité de
Copies de Chartres et d'anciens titres qui lui avaient fourni les
matériaux de son histoire, _mais qu'il ne savait nullement d'où elles
provenaient_."--_Historical Memoirs, &c._, vol. i. p. 5. n. 1.
The fact appears to be, that M. Seguin had obtained possession, through
marriage, of a quantity of MSS., and was in the habit of printing them as
his own works. Some of them had belonged to an Abbé Lefranc, one of the
priests who were murdered in the diabolical massacre of the clergy in the
prisons of Paris in September, 1792; and others of the MSS. had been the
property of a M. Noël Deshayes, Curé de Compigni, whose _Mémoires pour
servir à l'Histoire des Evêques de Lisieux_, were published by Seguin as
his own, but altered and disfigured under the title of--
"Histoire du Pays d'Auge et des Evêques Comtes de Lisieux, contenant
des Notions sur l'Archéologie, les Droits, Coutumes, Franchises et
Libertés du Bocage et de la Normandie; Vire, Adam, 1832."
The MS., however, from which Seguin printed his forgery, turns out to have
been but a copy; the original having since been discovered by M. Formeville
in the library of the Séminaire of Evreux, and is now about to be published
by that gentleman (see _Supercheries_, tom. iv., Paris, 1852). By a just
retribution, M. Formeville is one of the literary men to whom Sequin
refused to point out his original authorities. M. Quérard quotes some {417}
passages, in juxtaposition, from Seguin's pretended work and from the
original MS., to show how the latter had been altered and corrupted in the
printed copy. M. Seguin was quite illiterate, and has committed the most
egregious blunders in his _chef d'oeuvre de plagiat_, as his _Histoire du
Pays d'Auge_ is termed by Quérard. Many other authors, besides Mr. Wiffen
and M. Formeville, wrote to Seguin for his authorities on various subjects,
but he never pointed out a single one. Full details are given of his
literary thefts by M. Quérard and his coadjutors. When the original work of
M. Deshayes appears, in its genuine state, as promised by M. Formeville,
the world will then learn what was really stated respecting the descent of
the Du Rozels from Bertrand de Briquebec; although the amiable and
accomplished Mr. Wiffen is no longer living to avail himself of the
information. Seguin died in 1847.