in England who does not know that the Marquis was hanged.' Macaulay's
_Essays_, ed. 1843, i. 357
[810] It is observable that men of the first rank spelt very ill in the
last century. In the first of these letters I have preserved the
original spelling. BOSWELL.
[811] See _ante,_ i., 127.
[812] Muir-fowl is grouse. _Ante_ p. 44.
[813] See ante, p. 162, note 1.
[814] 'In Col only two houses pay the window tax; for only two have six
windows, which, I suppose, are the laird's and Mr. Macsweyn's.'
Johnson's _Works_, ix. 125. 'The window tax, as it stands at present
(January 1775)...lays a duty upon every window, which in England
augments gradually from twopence, the lowest rate upon houses with not
more than seven windows, to two shillings, the highest rate upon houses
with twenty-five windows and upwards.' _Wealth of Nations,_ v. 2. 2 .1.
The tax was first imposed in 1695, as a substitute for hearth money.
Macaulay's _England,_ ed. 1874, vii. 271. It was abolished in 1851.
[815] Thomas Carlyle was not fourteen when, one 'dark frosty November
morning,' he set off on foot for the University at Edinburgh--a distance
of nearly one hundred miles. Froude's _Carlyle_, i. 22.
[816] _Ante_, p. 290.
[817] _Of the Nature and Use of Lots: a Treatise historicall and
theologicall._ By Thomas Gataker. London, 1619. _The Spirituall Watch,
or Christ's Generall Watch-word._ By Thomas Gataker. London, 1619.
[818] See _ante_, p. 264.
[819] He visited it with the Thrales on Sept. 22, 1774, when returning
from his tour to Wales, and with Boswell in 1776 (_ante_, ii. 451).
[820] Mr. Croker says that 'this, no doubt, alludes to Jacob Bryant, the
secretary or librarian at Blenheim, with whom Johnson had had perhaps
some coolness now forgotten.' The supposition of the coolness seems
needless. With so little to go upon, guessing is very hazardous.
[821] Topham Beauclerk, who had married the Duke's sister, after she had
been divorced for adultery with him from her first husband Viscount
Bolingbroke. _Ante_, ii. 246, note 1.
[822] See _post_, Dempster's Letter of Feb. 16, 1775.
[823] See _ante_, ii. 340, where Johnson said that 'if he were a
gentleman of landed property, he would turn out all his tenants who did
not vote for the candidate whom he supported.'
[824] See _ante_, iii. 378.
[825] 'They have opinions which cannot be ranked with superstition,
because they regard only natural effects. They expect better crops of
grain by sowing their seed in the moon's increase. The moon has great
influence in vulgar philosophy. In my memory it was a precept annually
given in one of the English almanacks, "to kill hogs when the moon was
increasing, and the bacon would prove the better in boiling."' Johnson's
_Works,_ ix. 104. Bacon, in his _Natural History_(No.892) says:--'For
the increase of moisture, the opinion received is, that seeds will grow
soonest if they be set in the increase of the moon.'
[826] The question which Johnson asked with such unusual warmth might
have been answered, 'by sowing the bent, or couch grass.' WALTER SCOTT.
[827] See _ante,_ i. 484.
[828] See _ante_, i. 483.
[829] It is remarkable, that Dr. Johnson should have read this account
of some of his own peculiar habits, without saying any thing on the
subject, which I hoped he would have done. BOSWELL. See _ante_, p. 128,
note 2, and iv. 183, where Boswell 'observed he must have been a bold
laugher who would have ventured to tell Dr. Johnson of any of his
peculiarities.'
[830] In this he was very unlike Swift, who, in his youth, when
travelling in England, 'generally chose to dine with waggoners,
hostlers, and persons of that rank; and he used to lie at night in
houses where he found written of the door _Lodgings for a penny_. He
delighted in scenes of low life.' Lord Orrery's _Swift_, ed. 1752,
p. 33.
[831] This is from the _Jests of Hierocles._ CROKER.
[832] 'The grave a gay companion shun.' FRANCIS. Horace, 1 _Epis._
xviii. 89.
[833] Boswell in 1776 found that 'oats were much used as food in Dr.
Johnson's own town.' _Ante_, ii. 463.
[834] _Ante_, i. 294.
[835] See _ante_, ii. 258.
[836] 'The richness of the round steep green knolls, clothed with copse,
and glancing with cascades, and a pleasant peep at a small fresh-water
loch embosomed among them--the view of the bay, surrounded and guarded
by the island of Colvay--the gliding of two or three vessels in the more
distant Sound--and the row of the gigantic Ardnamurchan mountains
closing the scene to the north, almost justify the eulogium of
Sacheverell, [_post,_ p. 336] who, in 1688, declared the bay of
Tobermory might equal any prospect in Italy.' Lockhart's _Scott,_
iv. 338.
[837] 'The saying of the old philosopher who observes, that he who wants
least is most like the gods who want nothing, was a favourite sentence
with Dr. Johnson, who, on his own part, required less attendance, sick
or well, than ever I saw any human creature. Conversation was all he
required to make him happy.' Piozzi's _Anec._ p. 275.
[838] _Remarks on Several Parts of Italy_ (_ante_, ii. 346). Johnson
(_Works_, vii. 424) says of these _Travels_:--'Of many parts it is not a
very severe censure to say that they might have been written at home.'
He adds that 'the book, though awhile neglected, became in time so much
the favourite of the publick, that before it was reprinted it rose to
five times its price.'
[839] See _ante_, iii. 254, and iv. 237.
[840] Johnson (_Works_, viii. 320) says of Pope that 'he had before him
not only what his own meditation suggested, but what he had found in
other writers that might be _accomodated_ to his present purpose.'
Boswell's use of the word is perhaps derived, as Mr. Croker suggests,
from _accommoder_, in the sense of _dressing up or cooking meats_. This
word occurs in an amusing story that Boswell tells in one of his
Hypochondriacks (_London Mag_. 1779, p. 55):--'A friend of mine told me
that he engaged a French cook for Sir B. Keen, when ambassador in Spain,
and when he asked the fellow if he had ever dressed any magnificent
dinners the answer was:--"Monsieur, j'ai accommode un diner qui faisait
trembler toute la France."' Scott, in _Guy Mannering_ (ed. 1860, iii.
138), describes 'Miss Bertram's solicitude to soothe and _accommodate_
her parent.' See _ante_, iv. 39, note 1, for '_accommodated_ the
ladies.' To sum up, we may say with Justice Shallow:--'Accommodated! it
comes of _accommodo_; very good; a good phrase.' 2 _Henry IV_, act
iii. sc. 2.
[841] 'Louis Moreri, ne en Provence, en 1643. On ne s'attendait pas que
l'auteur du _Pays d'amour_, et le traducteur de _Rodriguez_, entreprit
dans sa jeunesse le premier dictionnaire de faits qu'on eut encore vu.
Ce grand travail lui couta la vie... Mort en 1680.' Voltaire's _Works_,
ed. 1819, xvii. 133.
[842] Johnson looked upon _Ana_ as an English word, for he gives it in
his _Dictionary_.
[843] I take leave to enter my strongest protest against this judgement.
_Bossuet_ I hold to be one of the first luminaries of religion and
literature. If there are who do not read him, it is full time they
should begin. BOSWELL.
[844]
Just in the gate, and in the jaws of hell,
Revengeful cares, and sullen sorrows dwell;
And pale diseases, and repining age;
Want, fear, and famine's unresisted rage;
Here toils and death, and death's half-brother, sleep,
Forms terrible to view their sentry keep.
Dryden, _Aeneid_, vi. 273. BOSWELL. Voltaire, in his Essay _Sur les
inconveniens attaches a la Litterature_ (_Works_, xliii. 173),
says:--'Enfin, apres un an de refus et de negociations, votre ouvrage
s'imprime; c'est alors qu'il faut ou assoupir les _Cerberes_ de la
litterature ou les faire aboyer en votre faveur.' He therefore carries
on the resemblance one step further,--
'Cerberus haec ingens latratu regna trifauci Personat.' _Aeneid_, vi.
417.
[845] It was in 1763 that Boswell made Johnson's acquaintance. _Ante_,
i. 391.
[846] It is no small satisfaction to me to reflect, that Dr. Johnson
read this, and, after being apprized of my intention, communicated to
me, at subsequent periods, many particulars of his life, which probably
could not otherwise have been preserved. BOSWELL. See _ante_, i. 26.
[847] Though Mull is, as Johnson says, the third island of the Hebrides
in extent, there was no post there. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 170.
[848] This observation is very just. The time for the Hebrides was too
late by a month or six weeks. I have heard those who remembered their
tour express surprise they were not drowned. WALTER SCOTT.
[849] _ The Charmer, a Collection of Songs Scotch and English._
Edinburgh, 1749.
[850] By Thomas Willis, M.D. It was published in 1672. 'In this work he
maintains that the soul of brutes is like the vital principle in man,
that it is corporeal in its nature and perishes with the body. Although
the book was dedicated to the Archbishop of Canterbury, his orthodoxy, a
matter that Willis regarded much, was called in question.' Knight's
_Eng. Cyclo_. vi. 741. Burnet speaks of him as 'Willis, the great
physician.' _History of his Own Time_, ed. 1818, i. 254. See _Wood's
Athenae_, iii. 1048.
[851] See _ante_, ii. 409 and iii. 242, where he said:--'Had I learnt to
fiddle, I should have done nothing else.'
[852] _Ante_, p. 277.
[853] _Ante_, p. 181.
[854] Mr. Langton thinks this must have been the hasty expression of a
splenetick moment, as he has heard Dr. Johnson speak of Mr. Spence's
judgment in criticism with so high a degree of respect, as to shew that
this was not his settled opinion of him. Let me add that, in the preface
to the _Preceptor_, he recommends Spence's _Essay on Papers Odyssey_,
and that his admirable _Lives of the English Poets_ are much enriched by
Spence's Anecdotes of Pope. BOSWELL. For the _Preceptor_ see _ante_, i.
192, and Johnson's _Works_, v. 240. Johnson, in his _Life of Pope (ib_.
viii. 274), speaks of Spence as 'a man whose learning was not very
great, and whose mind was not very powerful. His criticism, however, was
commonly just; what he thought he thought rightly; and his remarks were
recommended by his coolness and candour.' See _ante_, iv. 9, 63.
[855] 'She was the only interpreter of Erse poetry that I could ever
find.' Johnson's _Works_, ix. 134. See _ante_, p. 241.
[856] 'After a journey difficult and tedious, over rocks naked and
valleys untracked, through a country of barrenness and solitude, we
came, almost in the dark, to the sea-side, weary and dejected, having
met with nothing but waters falling from the mountains that could raise
any image of delight.' _Piozzi Letters_, i. 170. 'It is natural, in
traversing this gloom of desolation, to inquire, whether something may
not be done to give nature a more cheerful face.' Johnson's _Works_,
ix. 136.
[857] _Ante_, p. 19.
[858] See _ante_, i. 521.
[859] See _ante_, p. 212.
[860] Sir William Blackstone says, in his _Commentaries_, that 'he
cannot find that ever this custom prevailed in England;' and therefore
he is of opinion that it could not have given rise to _Borough-English_.
BOSWELL. 'I cannot learn that ever this custom prevailed in England,
though it certainly did in Scotland (under the name of _mercketa_ or
_marcheta_), till abolished by Malcolm III.' _Commentaries_, ed. 1778,
ii. 83. Sir H. Maine, in his _Early History of Institutions_, p. 222,
writes:--'Other authors, as Blackstone tells us, explained it ["Borough
English"] by a supposed right of the Seigneur or lord, now very
generally regarded as apocryphal, which raised a presumption of the
eldest son's illegitimacy.'
[861] 'Macquarry was used to demand a sheep, for which he now takes a
crown, by that inattention to the uncertain proportion between the value
and the denomination of money, which has brought much disorder into
Europe. A sheep has always the same power of supplying human wants, but
a crown will bring, at one time more, at another less'. Johnson's
_Works_, ix. 139.
[862] 'The house and the furniture are not always nicely suited. We were
driven once, by missing a passage, to the hut of a gentleman, where,
after a very liberal supper, when I was conducted to my chamber, I found
an elegant bed of Indian cotton, spread with fine sheets. The
accommodation was flattering; I undressed myself, and felt my feet in
the mire. The bed stood upon the bare earth, which a long course of rain
had softened to a puddle.' _Works_, ix. 98.
[863] Inchkenneth is a most beautiful little islet, of the most verdant
green, while all the neighbouring shore of Greban, as well as the large
islands of Colinsay and Ulva, are as black as heath and moss can make
them. But Ulva has a good anchorage, and Inchkenneth is surrounded by
shoals. It is now uninhabited. The ruins of the huts, in which Dr.
Johnson was received by Sir Allan M'Lean, were still to be seen, and
some tatters of the paper hangings were to be seen on the walls. Sir G.
O. Paul was at Inchkenneth with the same party of which I was a member.
[See Lockhart's _Scott_, ed. 1839, iii. 285.] He seemed to suspect many
of the Highland tales which he heard, but he showed most incredulity on
the subject of Johnson's having been entertained in the wretched huts of
which we saw the ruins. He took me aside, and conjured me to tell him
the truth of the matter. 'This Sir Allan,' said he, 'was he a _regular
baronet_, or was his title such a traditional one as you find in
Ireland?' I assured my excellent acquaintance that, 'for my own part, I
would have paid more respect to a knight of Kerry, or knight of Glynn;
yet Sir Allan M'Lean was a _regular baronet_ by patent;' and, having
giving him this information, I took the liberty of asking him, in
return, whether he would not in conscience prefer the worst cell in the
jail at Gloucester (which he had been very active in overlooking while
the building was going on) to those exposed hovels where Johnson had
been entertained by rank and beauty. He looked round the little islet,
and allowed Sir Allan had some advantage in exercising ground; but in
other respects he thought the compulsory tenants of Gloucester had
greatly the advantage. Such was his opinion of a place, concerning which
Johnson has recorded that 'it wanted little which palaces could afford.'
WALTER SCOTT.
[864] 'Sir Allan's affairs are in disorder by the fault of his
ancestors, and while he forms some scheme for retrieving them he has
retreated hither.' _Piozzi Letters_ i. 172.
[865] By Francis Gastrell, Bishop of Chester, published in 1707.
[866] _Travels through different cities of Germany, &c.,_, by Alexander
Drummond. Horace Walpole, on April 24, 1754 (_Letters_, ii. 381),
mentions 'a very foolish vulgar book of travels, lately published by one
Drummond, consul at Aleppo.'
[867] _ Physico-Theology; or a Demonstration of the Being and Attributes
of God from his Works of Creation._ By William Derham, D.D., 1713.
Voltaire, in _Micromegas,_ ch. I, speaking of 'l'illustre vicaire
Derham' says:--'Malheureusement, lui et ses imitateurs se trompent
souvent dans l'exposition de ces merveilles; ils s'extasient sur la
sagesse qui se montre dans l'ordre d'un phenomene et on decouvre que ce
phenomene est tout different de ce qu'ils ont suppose; alors c'est ce
nouvel ordre qui leur parait un chef d'oeuvre de sagesse.'
[868] This work was published in 1774. Johnson said on March 20, 1776
(_ante_, ii. 447), 'that he believed Campbell's disappointment on
account of the bad success of that work had killed him.'
[869] Johnson said of Campbell:--'I am afraid he has not been in the
inside of a church for many years; but he never passes a church without
pulling off his hat. This shows that he has good principles.' _Ante_,
i. 418.
[870] _New horse-shoeing Husbandry_, by Jethro Tull, 1733.
[871] 'He owned he sometimes talked for victory.' _Ante_, iv. 111, and
v. 17.
[872] 'They said that a great family had a _bard_ and a _senachi_, who
were the poet and historian of the house; and an old gentleman told me
that he remembered one of each. Here was a dawn of intelligence....
Another conversation informed me that the same man was both bard and
senachi. This variation discouraged me.... Soon after I was told by a
gentleman, who is generally acknowledged the greatest master of
Hebridian antiquities, that there had, indeed, once been both bards and
senachies; and that _senachi_ signified _the man of talk_, or of
conversation; but that neither bard nor senachi had existed for some
centuries.' Johnson's _Works_, ix. 109.
[873] See _ante_, iii. 41, 327
[874] 'Towards evening Sir Allan told us that Sunday never passed over
him like another day. One of the ladies read, and read very well, the
evening service;--"and Paradise was opened in the wild."' _Piozzi
Letters_, i. 173. The quotation is from Pope's _Eloisa to Abelard_,
l. 134:--
'You raised these hallowed walls; the desert smil'd,
And Paradise was open'd in the wild.'
[875] He sent these verses to Boswell in 1775. _Ante_ ii. 293.
[876] Boswell wrote to Johnson on Feb. 2, 1775, (_ante_, ii. 295):--'Lord
Hailes bids me tell you he doubts whether--
"Legitimas faciunt pectora pura preces,"
be according to the rubrick, but that is your concern; for you know, he
is a Presbyterian.'
[877] In Johnson's _Works_, i. 167, these lines are given with
amendments and additions, mostly made by Johnson, but some, Mr. Croker
believes, by Mr. Langton. In the following copy the variations are
marked in italics.
INSULA KENNETHI, INTER HEBRIDAS.
Parva quidem regio sed religione priorum
_Clara_ Caledonias panditur inter aquas.
Voce ubi Cennethus populos domuisse feroces
Dicitur, et vanos dedocuisse deos.
Huc ego delatus placido per caerula cursu,
Scire _locus_ volui quid daret _iste_ novi.
Illic Leniades humili regnabat in aula,
Leniades, magnis nobilitatus avis.
Una duas _cepit_ casa cum genitore puellas,
Quas Amor undarum _crederet_ esse deas.
_Nec_ tamen inculti gelidis latuere sub antris,
Accola Danubii qualia saevus habet.
Mollia non _desunt_ vacuae solatia vitae
Sive libros poscant otia, sive lyram.
_Fulserat_ illa dies, legis _qua_ docta supernae
Spes hominum _et_ curas _gens_ procul esse jubet.
_Ut precibus justas avertat numinis iras,
Et summi accendat pectus amore boni._
Ponti inter strepitus _non sacri_ munera cultus
Cessarunt, pietas hic quoque cura fuit.
_Nil opus est oeris sacra de turre sonantis
Admonitu, ipsa suas nunciat hora vices._
Quid, quod sacrifici versavit foemina libros?
_Sint pro legitimis pura labella sacris._
Quo vagor ulterius? quod ubique requiritur hic est,
Hic secura quies, hic et honestus amor.
Mr. Croker says of the third line from the end, that in a copy of these
verses in Johnson's own hand which he had seen, 'Johnson had
first written
_Sunt pro legitimis pectora pura sacris._
He then wrote
