Yet I think I may, without impropriety, mention one circumstance, as an instance of my father's address. Dr. Johnson challenged him, as he did us all at Talisker, to point out any theological works of merit written by presbyterian ministers in Scotland. My father, whose studies did not lie much in that way, owned to me afterwards, that he was somewhat at a loss how to answer, but that luckily he recollected having read in catalogues the title of Durham on the Galatians; upon which he boldly said, "Pray, Sir, have you read Mr. Durham's excellent commentary on the Galatians? 66 No, Sir," said Dr. Johnson. By this lucky thought my father kept him at bay, and for some time enjoyed his triumph; but his antagonist soon made a retort, which I forbear to mention. In the course of their altercation, Whiggism and presbyterianism, Toryism and episcopacy, were terribly buffeted. My worthy hereditary friend, Sir John Pringle, never having been mentioned, happily escaped without a bruise. My father's opinion of Dr. Johnson may be conjectured from the name he afterwards gave him, which was URSA MAJOR. But it is not true, as has been reported, that it was in consequence of my saying that he was constellation2 of genius and literature. It was a sly abrupt expression to one of his brethren on the bench of the court of session, in which Dr. Johnson was then standing; but it was not said in his hearing. Sunday, Nov. 7.-My father and I went to public worship in our parish church, in which I regretted that Dr. Johnson would not join us; for, though we have there no form of prayer, nor magnificent solemnity, yet, as God is worshipped in spirit and in truth, and the same doctrines preached as in the church of England, my friend would certainly have shown more liberality, had he attended. I doubt not, however, but he employed his time in private to very good purpose. His uniform and fervent piety was manifested on many occasions during our tour, which I have not mentioned. His reason for not joining in presbyterian worship has been recorded in a former page. Monday, Nov. 8. Notwithstanding the altercation that had passed, my father, who had the dignified courtesy of an old baron, was very civil to Dr. Johnson, and politely attended him to the post-chaise which was to convey us to Edinburgh. Thus they parted. They are now in another, and a higher state of existence 3: and as they his country; when, after being much tortured, Lord Auchinleck at last spoke out, "God, doctor! he gart kings ken that they had a lith in their neck "-he taught kings they had a joint in their necks. Jamie then set to mediating between his father and the philosopher, and availing himself of the judge's sense of hospitality, which was punctilious, reduced the debate to more order. WALTER SCOTT. All parties seem to have been in a happy state of ignorance; for it turns out that there is no such book as Durham "on the Galatians," though there is "on the were both worthy christian men, I trust they have met in happiness. But I must observe, in justice to my friend's political principles, and my own, that they have met in a place where there is no room for Whiggism. We came at night to a good inn at Hamilton. I recollect no more. Tuesday, Nov. 9. I wished to have shown Dr. Johnson the Duke of Hamilton's house, commonly called the palace of Hamilton, which is close by the town. It is an object which, having been pointed out to me as a splendid edifice, from my earliest years, in travelling between Auchinleck and Edinburgh, has still great grandeur in my imagination. My friend consented to stop, and view the outside of it, but could not be persuaded to go into it. We arrived this night at Edinburgh, after an absence of eighty-three days. For five weeks together, of the tempestuous season, there had been no account received of us. I cannot express how happy I was on finding myself again at home. Wednesday, Nov. 10.-OLD Mr. Drummond, the bookseller, came to breakfast. Dr. Johnson and he had not met for ten years. There was respect on his side, and kindness on Dr. Johnson's. Soon afterwards Lord Elibank came in, and was much pleased at seeing Dr. Johnson 'in Scotland. His lordship said, "hardly any thing seemed to him more impro bable." Dr. Johnson had a very high opinion of him. Speaking of him to me, he characterised him thus: "Lord Elibank has read a great deal. It is true, I can find in books all that he has read; but he has a great deal of what is in books, proved by the test of real life." Indeed, there have been few men whose conversation discovered more knowledge enlivened by fancy. He published several small pieces of distinguished merit; and has left some in manuscript, in particular an account of the expedition against Carthagena, in which he served as an officer in the army. His writings deserve to be collected. He was the early patron of Dr. Robertson, the historian, and Mr. Home, the tragic poet; who, when they were ministers of country parishes, lived near his seat. He told me, "I saw these lads had talents, and they were much with me." I hope they will pay a grateful tribute to his memory. The morning was chiefly taken up by Dr. Johnson's giving him an account of our Tour. The subject of difference in political principles was introduced. JOHNSON. "It is much increased by opposition. There was a violent Whig, with whom I used to contend with great eagerness. After his death I felt my Toryism much abated." I suppose he meant Mr. Walmesley of Lichfield, whose character he has drawn so well in his Life of Edmund Smith. Mr. Nairne came in, and he and I accompanied Dr. Johnson to Edinburgh castle, which he owned was "a great place." But I must mention, as a striking instance of that spirit of contradiction to which he had a strong propensity, when Lord Elibank was some days after talking of it with the natural elation of a Scotchman, or of any man who is proud of a stately fortress in his own country, Dr. Johnson affected to despise it, observing, that "it would make a good prison in ENGLAND." Lest it should be supposed that I have suppressed one of his sallies against my country, it may not be improper here to correct a mistaken account that has been circulated, as to his conversation this day. It has been said, that being desired to attend to the noble prospect from the Castle-hill, he replied, "Sir, the noblest prospect that a Scotchman ever sees is the high road that leads him to London." This lively sarcasm was thrown out at a tavern in London, in my presence, many years before.3 We had with us to-day at dinner, at my 1 Lord Elibank made a happy retort on Dr. Johnson's definition of oats, as the food of horses in England and of men in Scotland: "Yes," said he ;" and where else will you see such horses and such men ?". - WALTER SCOTT. 2 See antè, p. 19. It seems unlikely that he and Mr. Walmesley could have had much intercourse since Johnson removed to London, in 1737. It was therefore more probably some member of the Ivy-lane Club, Dyer, M'Ghie, or Barker, whose political and religious tenets were what Johnson would have called Whiggish,— CROKER. 3 See antè, p. 145.-C. Lady Elizabeth Erskine, daughter of the fifth Earl of Kellie, widow of Mr. Walter Macfarlane, and wife, by a second marriage, of the fourth Lord Colville: she died in 1794. CROKER. 5 Lady Anne, born in 1735; died in 1802, unmarried. — CROKER As seventh earl: born in 1736: he died in 1797, unmarried. - CROKER. ? These are the words of the first edition, in lieu of which, house, the Lady Dowager Colvill 4, and Lady Anne Erskine, sisters of the Earl of Kelly; the Hon. Archibald Erskine, who has now succeeded to that title; Lord Elibank, the Rev. Dr. Blair, Mr. Tytler, the acute vindicator of Mary, Queen of Scots, and [his son, the advocate.]* Fingal being talked of, Dr. Johnson, who used to boast that he had, from the first, resisted both Ossian and the giants of Patagonia 8, averred his positive disbelief of its authenticity. Lord Elibank said, "I am sure it is not M'Pherson's. Mr. Johnson, I keep company a great deal with you; it is known I do. I may borrow from you better things than I can say myself, and give them as my own; but if I should, every body will know whose they are." The doctor was not softened by this compliment. He denied merit to Fingal, supposing it to be the production of a man who has had the advantages that the present age affords; and said, "nothing is more easy than to write enough in that style if once you begin." 9 66 [Young Mr. Tytler briskly stepped forward, and said, "Fingal is certainly genuine, for I have heard a great part of it repeated in the original." Dr. Johnson indignantly asked him, Sir, do you understand the original?" TYTLER. No, sir." JOHNSON. "Why, then, we see to what this testimony comes: thus it is." He afterwards said to me, Did you observe the wonderful confidence with which young Tytler advanced with his front ready brazed?"] lo 66 66 I mentioned this as a remarkable proof how liable the mind of man is to credulity, when not guarded by such strict examination as that which Dr. Johnson habitually practised. The talents and integrity of the gentleman who made the remark are unquestionable; yet, had not Dr. Johnson made him advert to the consideration, that he who does not understand a language cannot know that something which is recited to him is in that language, he might have believed, and reported to this hour, that he had "heard a great part of Fingal repeated in the original." For the satisfaction of those on the north of the Tweed, who may think Dr. Johnson's account of Caledonian credulity and inaccuracy for a reason that will appear presently, Mr. Boswell afterwards substituted the words "some other friends." Young Mr. Tytler, the advocate, became afterwards a lord of session, under the title of Lord Woodhouselee. — CROKER. 8 The story told in Commodore Byron's Voyage of his having fallen in with a gigantic tribe of natives, on the coast of Patagonia. CROKER. 9 I desire not to be understood as agreeing entirely with the opinions of Dr. Johnson, which I relate without any remark. The many imitations, however, of Fingal, that have been published, confirm this observation in a considerable degree. BOSWELL. 10 In place of this passage of the first edition, Mr. Boswell afterwards substituted the following: "One gentleman in company expressing his opinion that Fingal was certainly genuine, for that he had heard a great part of it repeated in the original,' Dr. Johnson indignantly asked him, whether he understood the original; to which an answer being given in the negative, Why, then,' said Dr. Johnson, we see to what this testimony comes: thus it is.'"-CROKER. too strong, it is but fair to add, that he ad- or in the year after. A great number of witmitted the same kind of ready belief might nesses from those parts were examined on each be found in his own country. "He would un-side, and swore directly contrary to each other dertake," he said, "to write an epic poem on the story of Robin Hood; and half England, to whom the names and places he should mention in it are familiar, would believe and declare they had heard it from their earliest years." One of his objections to the authenticity of Fingal, during the conversation at Ulinish, is omitted in my Journal, but I perfectly recollect it. 66 Why is not the original deposited in some public library, instead of exhibiting attestations of its existence? Suppose there was a question in a court of justice, whether a man be dead or alive. You aver he is alive, and you bring fifty witnesses to swear it. I answer, Why do you not produce the man?' is an argument founded on one of the first principles of the law of evidence, which Gilbert' would have held to be irrefragable. This I do not think it incumbent on me to give any precise decided opinion upon this question, as to which I believed more than some, and less than others. The subject appears to have now become very uninteresting to the public. That Fingal is not from beginning to end a translation from the Gaelic, but that some passages have been supplied by the editor to connect the whole, I have heard admitted by very warm advocates for its authenticity. If this be the case, why are not these distinctly ascertained? Antiquaries and admirers of the work may complain, that they are in a situation similar to that of the unhappy gentleman whose wife informed him, on her death-bed, that one of their reputed children was not his; and, when he eagerly begged her to declare which of them it was, she answered, "That you shall never know;" and expired, leaving him in irremediable doubt as to them all. I beg leave now to say something upon second-sight, of which I have related two instances, as they impressed my mind at the time. I own, I returned from the Hebrides with a considerable degree of faith in the many stories of that kind which I heard with a too easy acquiescence, without any close examination of the evidence: but, since that time, my belief in those stories has been much weakened, by reflecting on the careless inaccuracy of narrative in common matters, from which we may certainly conclude that there may be the same in what is more extraordinary. It is but just, however, to add, that the belief in second-sight is not peculiar to the Highlands and Isles. Some years after our Tour, a cause was tried in the court of session, where the principal fact to be ascertained was, whether a ship-master, who used to frequent the Western Highlands and Isles, was drowned in one particular year, upon this simple question. One of them, a "Gen However difficult it may be for men who believe in preternatural communications, in modern times, to satisfy those who are of a different opinion, they may easily refute the doctrine of their opponents, who impute a belief in second-sight to superstition. To entertain a visionary notion that one sees a distant or future event may be called superstition; but the correspondence of the fact or event with such an impression on the fancy, though certainly very wonderful, if proved, has no more connection with superstition than magnetism or electricity. After dinner various topics were discussed; but I recollect only one particular. Dr. Johnson compared the different talents of Garrick and Foote, as companions, and gave Garrick greatly the preference for elegance, though he allowed Foote extraordinary powers of enter tainment. He said, "Garrick is restrained by some principle; but Foote has the advantage of an unlimited range. Garrick has some deli- | cacy of feeling: it is possible to put him out; you may get the better of him; but Foote is the most incompressible fellow that I ever knew when you have driven him into a corner, and think you are sure of him, he runs through between your legs, or jumps over your head, and makes his escape." Dr. Erskine and Mr. Robert Walker, two very respectable ministers of Edinburgh3, described in Guy Mannering. As to Dr. Webster, see antè, p. 279. n. 3. LOCKHART. ET. 64. BOSWELL'S LIFE OF JOHNSON. supped with us, as did the Rev. Dr. Webster. Thursday, Nov. 11.- Principal Robertson or "Post varios casus, per tot discrimina rerum, "- multum ille et terris jactatus, et alto.": which we receive. We are addressed as if we Lord Elibank came to us, as did Sir William Forbes. The rash attempt in 1745 being mentioned, I observed, that it would make a fine piece of history. Dr. Johnson said it would. Lord Elibank doubted whether any man of this age could give it impartially. JOHNSON. "A man, by talking with those of different sides, who were actors in it, and putting down all that he hears, may in time collect the materials of a good narrative. You are to consider, all history was at first oral. I suppose Voltaire was fifty years in collecting his Louis XIV. which he did in the way that 1 2 Through various hazards and events we move." Dryden. BoSWELL. **Long labours both by sea and land he bore." Dryden. - BOSWELL. It were to be wished that the master hand of Sir Walter Scott, which has created a European interest in the details of the Scotch character and manners, should give us a history of the Young Pretender's proceedings. Mr. Boswell's notes, the work called " Ascanius," the journals in the Lockhart papers, and the periodical publications of the day, contain a great deal of the prince's personal history; and the archives of the public offices and the Stuart papers would probably be open to his inquiries. There is perhaps little new to tell, but it might be collected into one view, and the interest heightened by his admirable powers of narration. — CROKER, This was written in the hope of directing my illus1831. friend's mind to a lighter, as I thought, and less trious exciting task than original invention; but, alas, the over "He did so. I am proposing." ROBERTSON. Dr. Johnson observed, that being in rebelconnected with depravity; and that we had lion from a notion of another's right was not this proof of it, that all mankind applauded the pardoning of rebels; which they would not do in the case of robbers and murderers. He said, with a smile, that "he wondered that the phrase of unnatural rebellion should be so much used, for that all rebellion was natural to man.” As I kept no Journal of any thing that passed after this morning, I shall, from memory, group together this and the other days, till that on which Dr.Johnson departed for London. They were in all nine days; on which he dined at Lady Colvill's, Lord Hailes's, Sir Adolphus Oughton's, Sir Alexander Dick's, Principal Robertson's, Mr. M'Laurin's, and thrice at He supped at the Lord Elibank's seat in the country, where we also passed two nights. Hon. Alexander Gordon's, now one of our judges, by the title of Lord Rockville; at worked intellect had already begun to fail, and I think I may say that the notes which his friendship had furnished to this work, were nearly the last efforts of his perfect mind. He died within little more than a year after their publication, on a calm and beautiful noon of the autumnal equinox, 21st Sept. 1832, "in presence of all his children." The last scene was one that he himself would have loved to anticipate!" It was," says Mr. Lockhart, "a beautiful day: so warm that every window was open: and so perfectly still, that the sound of all others most delicious to his ear, the gentle ripple of the Tweed over its pebbles, was distinctly audible as we knelt around the bed, and his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes." Lockhart's Life. - CROKER, 1846. 4 Hardly he was only 57 when it was published. CROKER. 5 A society for debate in Edinburgh, consisting of the most eminent men. - Boswell. DD Mr. Nairne's, now also one of our judges, by the title of Lord Dunsinan; at Dr. Blair's and Mr. Tytler's; and at my house thrice, one evening with a numerous company, chiefly gentlemen of the law; another with Mr. Menzies of Culdares, and Lord Monboddo, who disengaged himself on purpose to meet him; and the evening on which we returned from Lord Elibank's, he supped with my wife and me by ourselves. He breakfasted at Dr. Webster's, at old Mr. Drummond's, and at Dr. Blacklock's; and spent one forenoon at my uncle Dr. Boswell's, who showed him his curious museum; and, as he was an elegant scholar, and a physician bred in the school of Boerhaave, Dr. Johnson was pleased with his company. On the mornings when he breakfasted at my house, he had, from ten o'clock till one or two, a constant levee of various persons, of very different characters and descriptions. I could not attend him, being obliged to be in the court of session; but my wife was so good as to devote the greater part of the morning to the endless task of pouring out tea for my friend and his visiters. Such was the disposition of his time at Edinburgh. He said one evening to me, in a fit of languor, "Sir, we have been harassed by invitations." I acquiesced. “Ay, Sir,” he replied; "but how much worse would it have been if we had been neglected?" From what has been recorded in this Journal, it may well be supposed that a variety of admirable conversation has been lost, by my neglect to preserve it. I shall endeavour to recollect some of it as well as I can. At Mr. Tytler's I happened to tell that one evening, a great many years ago, when Dr. Hugh Blair and I were sitting together in the pit of Drury-Lane playhouse, in a wild freak of youthful extravagance, I entertained the audience prodigiously, by imitating the lowing of a cow. A little while after I had told this story, I differed from Dr. Johnson, I suppose too confidently, upon some point, which I now forget. He did not spare me. "Nay, Sir," said he, " if you cannot talk better as a man, I'd have you bellow like a cow." 3 66 At Dr. Webster's, he said, that he believed hardly any man died without affectation. This remark appears to me to be well founded, and will account for many of the celebrated deathbed sayings which are recorded. On one of the evenings at my house, when he told that Lord Lovat boasted to an English nobleman that, though he had not his wealth, At Lady Colvill's, to whom I am proud to he had two thousand men whom he could at introduce any stranger of eminence, that he any time call into the field, the Hon. Alexander may see what dignity and grace is to be found Gordon observed, that those two thousand men in Scotland, an officer observed that he had brought him to the block. "True, Sir," said heard Lord Mansfield was not a great English Dr. Johnson: "but you may just as well lawyer. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, supposing Lord argue concerning a man who has fallen over a Mansfield not to have the splendid talents precipice to which he has walked too near, which he possesses, he must be a great EnglishHis two legs brought him to that:' is he not lawyer, from having been so long at the bar, the better for having two legs?" and having passed through so many of the great offices of the law. Sir, you may as well maintain that a carrier, who has driven a packhorse between Edinburgh and Berwick for thirty years, does not know the road, as that Lord Mansfield does not know the law of England." At Mr. Nairne's he drew the character of Richardson, the author of Clarissa, with a strong yet delicate pencil. I lament much that I have not preserved it: I only remember that he expressed a high opinion of his talents and At Dr. Blair's I left him, in order to attend a consultation, during which he and his amiable host were by themselves. I returned to supper, at which were Principal Robertson, Mr. Nairne, and some other gentlemen. Dr. Robertson and Dr. Blair, I remember, talked well upon subordination and government; and, as my friend and I were walking home, he said to me, "Sir, these two doctors are good men, and wise men." I begged of Dr. Blair to recollect what he could of the long conversation that passed between Dr. Johnson and him alone, this heart I attempted imitations of some other animals, but with very inferior effect. My reverend friend, anxious for my fame, with an air of the utmost gravity and earnestness. addressed me thus: "My dear Sir, I would confine myself to the cow!"- BOSWELL. Blair's advice was expressed more emphatically, and with a peculiar burr—“Stick to the com, mon!"-WALTER SCOTT. |