Chapter 7

[1]"Dr. Johnson: His Friends and His Critics." By George Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L. Smith, Elder & Co.

[2]"Mrs. Barbauld's Poems," vol. i., p. 2. It is certainly strange that Boswell, so far as I know, nowhere quotes these lines. He was not wont to let the world remain in ignorance of any compliment that had been paid him. I fear that he was rather ashamed at finding himself praised by a writer who was not only a woman, but also was the wife of "a little presbyterian parson who kept an infant boarding school."

[3]"Gentleman's Magazine," vol. xxxix., p. 214.

[4]"Macaulay's Essays," vol. i., p. 377.

[5]"Chatham Correspondence," vol. iii., p. 246.

[6]"Boswelliana: The Commonplace Book of James Boswell." With a Memoir and Annotations, by the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D. London: Printed for the Grampian Club, 1874.

[7]Pronounced "Affleck."—Ed.

[8]The Soaping-Club—a Club in Edinburgh, the motto of which was, "Every Man soap his own Beard;" or, "Every Man indulge his own Humour." Their game was that facetious one, Snip, Snap, Snorum.

[9]Barclay and Bainbridge, two members of this Club.

[10]"And Captain Andrew's whiteness, &c." The writers of these Letters, instead of being rivals in wit, were rivals in complexion.

[11]In March, 1762, Boswell published "The Cub at Newmarket: a Tale." (Dodsley).—Ed.

[12]George III. was crowned on September 22nd, of this year.—Ed.

[13]The rest of Boswell's verses—more than a hundred in number—the reader will thank me for omitting.—Ed.

[14]Churchill's "Rosciad" had been published in March of this year.—Ed.

[15]"In manly tides of sense they roll'd along."—"The Rosciad."—Ed.

[15]

"In manly tides of sense they roll'd along."—"The Rosciad."—Ed.

[16]Donaldson, an Edinburgh bookseller, was bringing out a collection of Original Poems, by the Rev. Mr. Blacklock, and other Scotch gentlemen. Erskine was the editor.—Ed.

[17]Matthew Green (1696-1737). Author of "The Spleen."—Ed.

[18]Dodsley's shop was in Pall Mall.—Ed.

[19]The first two volumes of Tristram Shandy were published towards the end of 1759.—Ed.

[20]New-Tarbat, a wild seat in the western Highlands of Scotland, surrounded with mountains.

[21]"Far smoking o'er the interminable plain."—Thomson's "Seasons."—Spring.—Ed.

[21]

"Far smoking o'er the interminable plain."—Thomson's "Seasons."—Spring.—Ed.

[22]Boswell in a letter to his friend Temple, dated May 1st 1761, had thus described himself. "A young fellow whose happiness was always centred in London, ... who had got his mind filled with the most gay ideas—getting into the Guards, being about Court, enjoying the happiness of thebeau monde, and the company of men of genius, &c."—Ed.

[23]Tolbooth Prison.

[24]This Ode is not worth reprinting.—Ed.

[25]Adam Smith. Boswell had attended his classes on Moral Philosophy, when a student in the University of Glasgow.—Ed.

[26]"Sir Cloudesley Shovel's monument has very often given me great offence: instead of the brave, rough English Admiral, which was the distinguishing character of that plain, gallant man, he is represented on his tomb by the figure of a beau, dressed in a long periwig, and reposing himself upon velvet cushions under a canopy of state."—The "Spectator," No. 26.—Ed.

[27]"Avez-vous lu leTestament politique du Maréchal de Belle-Isle? C'est un ex-capucin de Rouen, nommé jadis Maubert, fripon, espion, escroc, menteur et ivrogne, ayant tous les talens de moinerie, qui a composé cet impertinent ouvrage."—Voltaire, Nov. 27, 1761.—Ed.

[28]This Letter was occasioned by seeing an Ode to Tragedy, written by a Gentleman of Scotland, and dedicated to James Boswell, Esq., advertised in the Edinburgh Newspapers. It afterwards appeared that the Ode was written by Mr. Boswell himself.

[29]In the "Tale of a Tub."—Ed.

[30]"I have observed that a reader seldom peruses a book with pleasure, till he knows whether the writer of it be a black or a fair man, of a mild or choleric disposition, married or a bachelor, with other particulars of the like nature that conduce very much to the right understanding of an author."—"The Spectator," No. 1.—Ed.

[31]He refers to the continuation of this Ode, which I have omitted in the present Edition.—Ed.

[32]In "The Way of the World," by Congreve.—Ed.

[33]The first volume of Macpherson's "Fingal" was published this winter.—Ed.

[34]"Would you believe, what I know is fact, that Dr. Hill earned fifteen guineas a week by working for wholesale dealers? He was at once employed on six voluminous works of Botany, Husbandry, &c., published weekly."—Horace Walpole, date of Jan. 3, 1761.—Ed.

[35]"Course of Lectures on Elocution," by Thomas Sheridan, M.A. London, 1762.—Ed.

[36]Dr. John Brown, the author of "An Estimate of the Manners and Principles of the Times."—Ed.

[37]The author of "Douglas."—Ed.

[38]"All the people of business at Edinburgh, and even the genteel company may be seen standing in crowds every day, from one to two in the afternoon, in the open street.... The company are entertained with a variety of tunes, played upon a set of bells, fixed in a steeple hard by. As these bells are well toned, and the musician, who has a salary from the city for playing upon them with keys, is no bad performer, the entertainment is really agreeable, and very striking to the ears of a stranger."—"Humphry Clinker," vol. ii., p. 223.—Ed.

[39]Hamilton was the proprietor of "The Critical Review." Its first editor was Smollett. Griffiths was the proprietor of "The Monthly Review." Goldsmith worked for him for some time. Griffiths was fool enough to venture, with the aid of his wife, to correct Goldsmith's compositions.—See Forster's "Life of Goldsmith."—Ed.

[40]By Colley Cibber. "Who upon earth has written such perfect comedies (as Molière)? for the 'Careless Husband' is but one."—Horace Walpole, Aug. 29, 1785.—Ed.

[41]"I am now, as I could wish every man of wisdom and virtue to be, in the regions of calm content and placid meditation."—"The Idler," No. 71.—Ed.

[42]Humphrey Bland, author of "Military Discipline," (1727). He served under the Duke of Marlborough. Was present also at the battles of Dettingen and Fontenoy. Became colonel of the Second Dragoon Guards.—Ed.

[43]"Thomas Boswell obtained from James IV., as a signal mark of royal favour, the estate of Auchinleck. He was slain at Flodden."—"Memoir of James Boswell," by Rev. C. Rogers, p. 3.—Ed.

[44]I have omitted the first eighty lines of this poem.—Ed.

[45]"Letters, Moral and Entertaining, in Prose and Verse," by Elizabeth Rowe.—Ed.

[46]"Pray, Sir," said Mr. Morgann to Johnson, "whether do you reckon Derrick or Smart the best poet?" Johnson at once felt himself roused; and answered, "Sir, there is no settling the point of precedency between a louse and a flea." Boswell's "Life of Johnson." Date of March 30th, 1783.—Ed.

[47]Temple wrote "An Essay upon Ancient and Modern Learning."—Ed.

[48]"The most ancient poets are considered as the best ... whether the first writers took possession of the most striking objects for description, and the most probable occurrences for fiction, and left nothing to those that followed them but transcription of the same events, and new combinations of the same images."—"Rasselas," chapter x.—Ed.

[49]Thomas Sheridan, the father of R.B. Sheridan, was about this time lecturing on Oratory. "He knows that I laugh at his oratory," Johnson once said to Boswell.—Ed.

[50]The Ode is not worth reprinting.—Ed.

[51]These stanzas are nearly as bad as Boswell's Ode, and, like it, are not worth reprinting.—Ed.

[52]"The time is wonderfully sickly; nothing but sore-throats, colds, and fevers." Horace Walpole, in a letter to George Montagu, April 29, 1762.—Ed.

[53]"If I were as tedious as a king, I could find it in my heart to bestow it all of your worship."—"Much Ado about Nothing." Act iii., scene 5.—Ed.

[54]The author of the "History of the Popes." He had been a professor in the University of Macerata, and a Counsellor of the Inquisition. He became a Protestant, and died in England.—Ed.

[55]Sir James Melville. Born 1535, died 1607. His "Memoirs" were published in 1683.—Ed.

[56]A snow (Low-German, snau; High-German, schnau) is a small vessel with beaked or snout-like bows, according to Wedgewood. But more probably it takes its name from the triangular shape of its sails.—Schnauzegel, a trysail.—Ed.

[57]"As we sat over our tea, Mr. Home's tragedy of Douglas was mentioned. I put Dr. Johnson in mind that once, in a coffee-house at Oxford, he called to old Mr. Sheridan, 'how came you, Sir, to give Home a gold medal for writing that foolish play?'" Boswell's "Tour to the Hebrides." Date of October 26, 1773.—Ed.

[58]"The Elements of Criticism," by Henry Home, Lord Kames. "Sir," said Johnson, "this book is a pretty essay and deserves to be held in some estimation though much of it is chimerical!" Boswell's "Life of Johnson." Date of May 16, 1763.—Ed.

[59]"In this play there is more bustle than sentiment; the plot is busy and intricate, and the events take hold on the attention; but, except a very few passages, we are rather amused with noise, and perplexed with stratagem, than entertained with any true delineation of natural characters."—Johnson's "Lives of the Poets."—Ed.

[60]"The Revenge," a tragedy, by Edward Young, author of "Night Thoughts."—Ed.

[61]"There is at Edinburgh a society or corporation of errand-boys, called 'cawdies,' who ply in the streets at night with paper lanthorns, and are very serviceable in carrying messages."—"Humphry Clinker," vol. ii., p. 240.—Ed.

[62]A distinguished Danish historian and antiquary, "Known in the history of anatomy by the bones of the skull named after himossa Wormiana."—Ed.

[63]In Ben Jonson's "Every Man in his Humour." This was thought to be Woodward's masterpiece.—Ed.

[64]This is scarcely correct. Garrick's popularity was, at this time, falling off, and his theatre did not fill. "The profits of the following season," says Davies, "fell very short to those of the preceding years." At the close of the season he went abroad, and was away for nearly two years. In Rogers's "Table Talk," it is recorded—"Before his going abroad, Garrick's attraction had much decreased; Sir W.W. Pepys said that the pit was often almost empty. But, on his return to England, people were mad about seeing him." His popularity did not wane a second time.—Ed.

[65]Walpole always expressed the greatest contempt for Boswell. In one of his letters he says that "he is the ape of most of Johnson's faults, without a grain of his sense." In another letter he writes about "a jackanapes who has lately made a noise here, one Boswell, by anecdotes of Dr. Johnson." Improbable though it was that Boswell should catch a little true poetic inspiration, it was still more improbable that he should ever have a single one of his works printed at The Strawberry Press.—Ed.

[66]Voltaire, "Précis du Siècle de Louis XV.," chapter xl.

[67]"The Gentleman's Magazine," vol. xv., p. 628.

[68]Boswell's birthday. Thepreface to the third editionalso bears the date of his birthday.—Ed.

[69]The Sardinian Consul in Corsica. Seepage 142.—Ed.

[70]The son of Pope's Lord Hervey. He succeeded in 1779 to the Earldom of Bristol.—Ed.

[71]Colonel Buttafoco was one of Rousseau's correspondents. At the time of the French Revolution he was elected Deputy from Corsica to the National Assembly. He was most violently attacked by Napoleon Buonaparte in a letter dated "From my closet at Milleli, 23rd January, Year 2." The letter thus begins:—"From Bonifacio to Cape Corso, from Ajaccio to Bastia, there is one chorus of imprecations against you." The writer goes on to say, "Your countrymen, to whom you are an object of horror, will enlighten France as to your character. The wealth, the pensions, the fruits of your treasons, will be taken from you.... O Lameth! O Robespierre! O Petion! O Volney! O Mirabeau! O Barnave! O Bailly! O La Fayette! this is the man who dares to seat himself by your side!"—Scott's "Life of Napoleon Buonaparte," vol. ix., Appendix I.—Ed.

[72]This is, I believe the author of "Sandford and Merton," who was born in 1748, and was nineteen years old at the date of the dedication of Boswell's work. His father had died when Day was a year old, and had left him a fortune of £1,200 a year.—Ed.

[73]See "Letters of James Boswell addressed to the Rev. W.J. Temple."—Bentley, London, 1857.—Ed.

[74]It is the custom in Scotland to give the Judges of the Court of Session the title of Lords by the names of their estates. Thus Mr. Burnett is Lord Monboddo, and Sir David Dalrymple is Lord Hailes.

[75]"Johnson this evening drank a bumper to Sir David Dalrymple, 'as a man of worth, a scholar, and a wit. I have,' said he, 'never heard of him, except from you; but let him know my opinion of him: for as he does not show himself much in the world, he should have the praise of the few who hear of him.'"—Boswell's "Johnson." Date of July 20, 1763.—Ed.

[76]"Adams.—But, Sir, how can you do this in three years?Johnson.—Sir, I have no doubt that I can do it in three years.Adams.—But the French Academy, which consists of forty members, took forty years to compile their Dictionary.Johnson.—Sir, thus it is. This is the proportion. Let me see; forty times forty is sixteen hundred. As three to sixteen hundred, so is the proportion of an Englishman to a Frenchman."—Boswell's "Johnson." Date of 1748.—Ed.

[77]I have not dared to disregard Boswell's request. His orthography is retained.—Ed.

[78]"The rational pride of an author may be offended, rather than flattered, by vague, indiscriminate praise; but he cannot, he should not, be indifferent to the fair testimonies of private and public esteem. Even his moral sympathy may be gratified by the idea, that now, in the present hour, he is imparting some degree of amusement or knowledge to his friends in a distant land; that one day his mind will be familiar to the grand-children of those who are yet unborn."—"Memoirs of my Life and Writings," by Edward Gibbon, vol. i., p. 273."Do thou teach me not only to foresee but to enjoy, nay even to feed on future praise. Comfort me by the solemn assurance, that when the little parlour in which I sit at this moment shall be reduced to a worse-furnished box, I shall be read with honour by those who never knew nor saw me, and whom I shall neither know nor see."—"Tom Jones," book xiii., chap. I. Quoted by Gibbon, or his Editor.—Ed.

"Do thou teach me not only to foresee but to enjoy, nay even to feed on future praise. Comfort me by the solemn assurance, that when the little parlour in which I sit at this moment shall be reduced to a worse-furnished box, I shall be read with honour by those who never knew nor saw me, and whom I shall neither know nor see."—"Tom Jones," book xiii., chap. I. Quoted by Gibbon, or his Editor.—Ed.

[79]I have not thought it needful to reprint this letter.—Ed.

[80]Boswell had left England, on August 6th, 1763, for the University of Utrecht, whither his father had sent him to study civil law. On his return to Scotland, he was to put on the gown as a member of the Faculty of Advocates. "Honest man!" he writes of his father to his friend Temple, "he is now very happy; it is amazing to think how much he has had at heart my pursuing the road of civil life." Boswell had once hoped to enter the Guards. A few days later on he wrote: "My father has allowed me £60 a quarter; that is not a great allowance, but with economy I may live very well upon it, for Holland is a cheap country. However I am determined not to be straightened, nor to encourage the least narrowness of disposition as to saving money, but will draw upon my father for any sums I find necessary." He did not give many months to his legal studies at Utrecht. In the following year he set out on his travels. He went through Germany and Switzerland to Italy. It was in the autumn of 1765 that he visited Corsica. He returned to England through France, and arrived in London in February, 1766.

[81]Rousseau came to England in January, 1766. He had not been here long before he quarrelled with Hume, who had been to him so true a friend.—Ed.

[82]George, tenth Earl Marischal. He had taken part in the Jacobite rising of 1715. Later on he held high office in the Prussian service. In 1759 his attainder was reversed, but he continued to live abroad. In one of his letters to Madame de Boufflers he says, in speaking of Rousseau, "Je lui avais fait un projet; mais en le disant un château en Espagne, d'aller habiter une maison toute meublée que j'ai en Ecosse; d'engager le bon David Hume de vivre avec nous."—"Hume's Private Correspondence," page 43.—Ed.

[83]Seepage 222.

[84]In the "Gentleman's Magazine" for 1750 (vol. xx., p. 42), we read, "The Phœnix, Captain Carberry, of Bristol, was taken on Christmas eve by an Algerine corsair off the rock of Lisbon, on pretence that his pass was not good, and ordered for Algiers with an officer and six other Turks; but in the passage Captain Carberry with three English sailors and a boy recovered the vessel, after flinging the Turkish officer and two other Turks overboard, and brought it with the Turkish sailors prisoners to Bristol." In the same year the English consul at Algiers wrote to say that some Algerine Corsairs had taken five English vessels because their passes were not good. The consul had complained to the Dey, "who said that he would give such orders that nothing of this sort should happen again, and then swore by his prophet that if any one controverted those orders he would take his head." The Dey had also seized a packet-boat of the British Crown. Commodore Keppel was sent to demand restitution. The Dey replied, "We are disposed to give full satisfaction to the King and the British nation for anything that may happen amiss hereafter; but as to what is past, if they have had any cause to complain, they must think no more of it, and bury it in oblivion." The packet-boat, he maintained, had not a proper Algerine pass, and therefore had been lawfully seized. By a treaty made with the Dey in the following year, the Commodore "settled all differences by waiving the restitution of the money and effects taken from on board the packet-boat on condition that his Majesty's packet-boats shall never be obliged to carry Algerine passports," &c. Whatever protection the English vessels may have had the Turkish corsairs continued to plunder the ships of most other nations. In the "Gentleman's Magazine" for 1785, (vol. lv., p. 830) we read, "The Algerines still continue their piracies in the Mediterranean. They even extend their captures to the Atlantic Ocean, and have struck the American traders with terror."—Ed.

[85]Compare Scribe's Comedy of "Le Diplomate."—Ed.

[86]Like master, like man.—Ed.

[87]SeeAppendix Bfor a curious custom described by Boswell.—Ed.

[88]A friend of mine, driving last September from Tunis to Utica, was overtaken by a storm of rain. The driver at once got down from the box and seated himself on the ground under the carriage. By way of excuse he said that he had but one coat.—Ed.

[89]Seneca de Consolatione.

[90]In 1745. SeeIntroduction.Page 110.—Ed.

[91]"The Syndicatori make a tour through the different provinces, as our judges in Britain go the circuits. They hear complaints against the different magistrates."—Boswell's "Account of Corsica," p. 153.—Ed.

[92]Boswell was too fond of seeing criminals and hangmen. He was frequently present at executions. In his "Life of Johnson" he records, under date of June 23rd, 1784, "I visited Johnson in the morning, after having been present at the shocking sight of fifteen men executed before Newgate." He once persuaded Sir Joshua Reynolds to accompany him, and they recognised among the sufferers a former servant of Mrs. Thrale's. He describes Mr. Akerman, the Keeper of Newgate, as his esteemed friend. According to Mr. Croker, he defended his taste in a paper he wrote for the "London Magazine," "as a natural and irresistible impulse."—Ed.

[93]So far as I have been able to ascertain, this passage, this great blot on Paoli and the Corsican patriots, excited no attention in England. But the Inquisition was still at its hateful work in many countries, and men's minds were used to cruelties. Torture was still employed in capital cases to force confession even in Holland and France.—Ed.

[94]"Their dignities, and a' that," are, it seems, to be found even among executioners. The man who shoots scorns the man who hangs. It would be an interesting inquiry how the headsman ranks.—Ed.

[95]See, however,page 201.—Ed.

[96]According to Macaulay ("Essays," vol. i., p. 378), "wit was utterly wanting to Boswell."—Ed.

[97]"For my part I like very well to hear honest Goldsmith talk away carelessly." Boswell, as reported by himself. "Life of Johnson." Date of April 11, 1772.—Ed.

[98]"I give admirable dinners, and good claret; and the moment I go abroad again, I set up my chariot."—Boswell, in a letter to Temple, May 14, 1768.—Ed.

[99]Sampiero had been the leader of a revolt which broke out in 1564. He was assassinated three years later.—Ed.

[100]Compare Boswell's introduction to Johnson.—Ed.

[101]Seepage 222.—Ed.

[102]"Then took Haman the apparel and the horse, and arrayed Mordecai, and brought him on horseback through the street of the city, and proclaimed before him, 'Thus shall it be done unto the man whom the king delighteth to honour.'"—Book of Esther, c. vi., v. 11.—Ed.

[103]"Finding him (Johnson) in a placid humour, and wishing to avail myself of the opportunity which I fortunately had of consulting a sage, to hear whose wisdom, I conceived, in the ardour of youthful imagination, that men filled with a noble enthusiasm for intellectual improvement would gladly have resorted from distant lands, I opened my mind to him ingenuously, and gave him a little sketch of my life, to which he was pleased to listen with great attention."—Boswell's "Johnson." Date of June 13, 1763.—Ed.

[104]Seepage 140.—Ed.

[105]I have sent him the works of Harrington, of Sidney, of Addison, of Trenchard, of Gordon, and of other writers in favour of liberty. I have also sent him some of our best books of morality and entertainment, in particular the works of Mr. Samuel Johnson, with a compleat set of the "Spectatour," "Tatler," and "Guardian;" and to the University of Corte, I have sent a few of the Greek and Roman Classicks, of the beautiful editions of the Messieurs Foulis at Glasgow.[A]

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