Irish are in a most unnatural state; for we see there the minority prevailing over the majority. There is no instance, even in the ten persecutions, of such severity as that which the Protestants of Ireland have exercised against the Catholics."

These are no more than selections from the evidence which the ten volumes of the biography afford in illustration of the particular feature of Johnson's character with which I am dealing. But fragmentary and disjointed quotations of the kind can scarcely convey any idea of the charm of Boswell's method. One sample more of greater length may therefore be permitted which gives some suggestion of the qualities that have made his work a classic.

On Friday, August 5, we set out early in the morning in the Harwich stage-coach. A fat elderly gentlewoman, and a young Dutchman, seemed the most inclined among us to conversation. At the inn where we dined, the gentlewoman said that she had done her best to educate her children; and particularly, that she had never suffered them to be a moment idle. JOHNSON: "I wish, Madam, you would educate me, too: for I have been an idle fellow all my life." "I am sure, Sir," said she, you have not been idle." JOHNSON: "Nay, Madam, it is very true; and that gentleman there," pointing to me, "has been idle. He was idle at Edinburgh. His father sent him to Glasgow, where he continued to be idle. He then came to London, where he has been very idle; and now he is going to Utrecht, where he will be as idle as ever." I asked him privately how he could expose me so. JOHNSON: "Poh, poh!" said he, "they knew nothing about you, and will think of it no more." In the afternoon the gentlewoman talked violently against the Roman Catholics, and of the horrors of the Inquisition. To the utter astonishment of all the passengers but myself, who knew that he could talk upon any side of a question, he defended the Inquisition, and maintained, that "false doctrine should be checked on its first appearance; that the civil power should unite with the Church in punishing those who dare to attack the established religion, and that such only were punished by the Inquisition."

Evidences such as these led some of Johnson's acquaintances to impute to him something more than a mere sympathy with Catholic ideas. The father of his friend, Bennet Langton, went to his grave, we are told, believing that Johnson was of the Catholic communion; and Miss Seward-though not, indeed, the most trustworthy of witnesses-says that Boswell confessed to her his idea that Johnson was a Roman Catholic at heart." But to go to this length would be to do an injustice to Dr. Johnson's moral rectitude as a professing member of the

English Church. It would not be easy to reconcile with consistency the opinions on religious questions which he expressed at different times. With the instances noticed others could be given of a contrary tendency, and it is only fair to admit that some of the Catholic sentiments which shocked his hearers, or at least his manner of expressing them, may be attributed to that "humour of opposition" with which Boswell charges him. Johnson's mind was dominated by prejudices to an extent almost unexampled in a man of his breadth of view and intellectual power, and it was only natural that the influence of such feelings should not be confined to matters outside the sphere of religious thought. But whatever impression the biography may give us of his dogmatic beliefs, we cannot close its pages without the feeling that it is the record of a great Christian life. Two virtues are pre-eminent in the character it describes a spirit of compassion for the poor, which was no mere sentiment, but was active as it was generous, and a profound humility of mind: for Johnson, with his arrogant temper and intolerant bearing towards his fellow-men, had a deep and insistent sense of his own unworthiness as a creature in the eye of God that left no room for the sin of intellectual pride. To this, as much as to that morbid melancholy on which his critics have said so much, may be ascribed the constant dread of death and judgment that haunted him through life, but which happily fled from his mind and left him serene and confident when the end came. His friend, Sir John Hawkins, was summoned to assist in the making of his will :—

Sir John asked the Doctor whether he would choose to make any introductory declaration respecting his faith. The Doctor said he would. Sir John further asked if he would make any declaration of his being of the Church of England: to which the Doctor said “No !” but, taking a pen, he wrote on a paper the following words, which he delivered to Sir John, desiring him to keep it :

"I commit to the infinite mercies of Almighty God my soul, polluted with many sins; but purified, I trust, with repentance and the death of Jesus Christ."

CHARLES T. WATERS.

PENITENCE

WITH Wrong foot foremost, Mother said,
In solemn words of warning,

She thought I must have left my bed
Upon this rainy morning.

I got up, truly, much displeased
To hear the rain-drops patter;
But soon my youthful mind I eased
With loud and boisterous chatter.

Old nurse, in gloomy tones and low,
Was all the morning sighing :

"Ah, too much laughter, sir, you know,
Is sure to end in crying!

I must confess that she was right
(Though fain I would forget her !)
For now I've cried an hour quite-
And yet I don't feel better.

I'm in a very naughty way,
I know it to my sorrow;

But though I can't be good to-day,
I really will-to-morrow!

M. E. FRANCIS.

IN A MAGDALEN ASYLUM *

N a very hot afternoon towards the end of July, when the back-wash of the great American heat-wave had reached our shores, I received an invitation from a very dear friend to go with her to visit a Magdalen Asylum on the outskirts of the city. Being busy at the time about other things, and feeling a not inexcusable reluctance to walking a long stretch of hilly road in that baking sunless atmosphere, I set out on my journey with no pleasant anticipations beyond those of meeting my friend, and being for a little while in her company. I had never visited an institution of the kind before, and in my ignorance looked forward to doing so now with a feeling of something approaching depression.

That was all changed, however, as soon as we had passed through the green gates and entered the quiet shady lawn which stretched itself in front of the handsome pile of greystone buildings, the convent and chapel and the various other edifices of the institution. Here indeed one seemed to have left behind one the tired restlessness of the world; the very atmosphere was cooler, balmier. Under the green chestnuttrees which studded the undulating slopes of the lawn were set inviting-looking green seats where one might sit and read or pray. The windows of the penitents' rooms and those of the nuns' cells alike looked out on the green trees and on the emerald turf bedecked with many a gaily blossoming flowerbed. Here and there under the trees, or passing in and out amongst the flowery borders, one saw little groups of the penitents in their quaint old-fashioned gowns and snowy, neatly-goffered caps. This was the penitents' feast-day, we were told; it being the 22nd of July and the feast of St. Mary Magdalen. They had been in retreat for a week, and had now emerged from that period of silence and prayer and meditation to enjoy the innocent relaxations of the day.

The nuns had spared no pains to make the occasion a

Dublin readers will recognise St. Mary's, High Park, Drumcondra. -Ed. I. M.

pleasant one for their children." There was a concert in the great handsome many-windowed recreation-hall, each side and one end of which were lined with benches on which the penitents, over two hundred in all, were sitting. The other end was occupied by a piano, and the many seats for the nuns and visitors, the latter, with one or two exceptions, consisting of ladies and children. There were a great many songs and recitations, and some excellent piano and violin playing, all of which the penitents seemed to enjoy with a strange and unexpected appreciation; and one of them, an accomplished pianist, at the Reverend Mother's request, accompanied many of the singers, and played jigs and reels for the children dancers. Wonderfully happy and at peace did she seem, as indeed did all of them, as they sat along their benches chatting and laughing, extolling the performers, or stretching out tender appealing hands towards the little children as they passed. Old and young they were, some of them almost children, brighteyed, soft-cheeked, sunny-haired children. Others of them were very old, one of them, indeed, having celebrated her "Diamond Jubilee " some years before, being over sixty years in the institute; looking comfortable and happy, and at peace with themselves and the world as they talked to the friendly visitors with a warm and motherly interest.

"They are very good children," said the Reverend Mother, "real saints most of them. Indeed the wonderful act of humility and renunciation they make in giving up their liberty and coming to us here is enough to sanctify them for ever. But we have to be very kind to them, they need much kindness and gentleness." Looking at her and at the other gentle nuns about me, I did not doubt but that their "dear children," as they call them, would receive a full measure of kindness, and of praise when their deeds deserved it. All nuns are beautiful, but these nuns of the penitent asylum had a new beauty for me, a kind of maternal tenderness, love and pity, half earthly, wholly divine.

Amongst the penitents there is one old woman, “Mary Agnes" by name, who is a great "character." She is a little, low-sized, round bundle of fat and good humour, with a full moon face of such mingled roguery and innocence as one never sees out of Ireland. She has been for about twenty-five years