MEZIRIAC, CLAUDE GASPAR BACRET SIEUR DE, one of the most ingenious men of the seventeenth century, was born at Bourg-en-Bresse on the 9th of October 1581. He was a good poet, an excellent grammarian, a great Greek scholar, and an admirable critic. He was well versed in the controversies both in philosophy and religion, and deeply skilled in algebra and geometry, of which he gave proof by publishing the six books of Diophantus, enriched with a very able commentary and notes. In his youth he spent a considerable time at Paris and also at Rome, where, in competition with Vaugelas, he wrote a small collection of Italian poems, amongst which there are imitations of the most beautiful similes contained in the first eight books of the Aeneid. He also translated Ovid's Epistles, great part of which he illustrated with very curious commentaries of his own; and undertook the translation of Plutarch's works, with notes, which he had nearly brought to a conclusion, when he died, at Bourg-en-Bresse, in 1638, at the age of fifty-seven. He left behind him several works, the principal of which are, 1. Problèmes Plaisans et Délectables qui se font par les Nombres, Lyons, 1613, 1624, in 8vo; 2. Diophanti Alexandrini Arithmeticonum libri sex, et de Numeris multangulis liber unus, Gr. et Lat. Commentar. illustrat. Paris, 1621, in folio; 3. Chansons dévotes et saintes sur toutes les principales fêtes de l'Année, et sur autres divers sujets, Dijon, 1615, in 8vo; 4. Les Epîtres d'Ovide, trad. en vers François, avec des Commentaires, Bourg-en-Bresse, 1626, in 8vo.