DUCLOS, Charles Pineau (1704-1772), a French author, was born at Dinant, in Brittany, in 1704. At an early age he was sent to study at Paris. After some time spent in dissipation he began to cultivate the society of the wits of the time, and became a member of that club or association of young men who published their joint efforts in light literature under the titles of Recueil de ces Messieurs, Étrennes de la St Jean, Oeufs de Pâques, <fcc. His romance of Acajou and Zirphile, which was composed after a series of plates which had been engraved for another work, was one of the fruits of this association, and was produced in consequence of a sort of wager amongst its members. Duclos had previously written two other romances, which were more favourably received— The Baroness de Luz, and the Confessions of the Count de ***. His first serious publication was the History of Louis XI. , which is dry and epigrammatical in style, but displays considerable powers of research and impartiality. The reputation of Duclos as an author was confirmed by the publication of his Considerations sur les Moeurs, a work which is much and justly praised by Laharpe, as containing a great deal of sound and ingenious reflection. It was translated into English and German. The Mémoires pour servir à I’ Histoire du dix-huitième Siècle, which were intended by the author as a sort of sequel to the preceding work, are nevertheless much inferior in respect of both style and matter, and are, in reality, little better than a kind of romance. In consequence of his History oj Louis XI., he was appointed historiographer of France, when that place became vacant on Voltaire’s retirement to Prussia. His Secret Memoirs of the reigns of Louis XIV and Louis XV., and his Considerations on Italy, were not ...