ور

He renewed his promise of coming to Scotland and going with me to the Hebrides, but said he would now content himself with seeing one or two of the most curious of them. He said, “Macaulay, who writes the account of St. Kilda, set out with a prejudice against prejudice, and wanted to be a smart modern thinker; and yet affirms for a truth, that when a ship arrives there all the inhabitants are seized with a cold.”

Dr. John Campbell, the celebrated writer, took a great deal of pains to ascertain this fact, and attempted to account for it on physical principles, from the effect of effluvia from human bodies. Johnson, at another time, praised Macaulay, for his “magnanimity,” in asserting this wonderful story, because it was well attested. A lady of Norfolk, by a letter to my friend Dr. Burney, has favoured me with the following solution :

“Now for the explication of this seeming mystery, which is so very obvious as, for that reason, to have escaped the penetration of Dr. Johnson and his friend, as well as that of the author. Reading the book with my ingenious friend, the late Reverend Mr. Christian of Docking—after ruminating a little, "The cause,' says he, 'is a natural one. The situation of St. Kilda renders a north-east wind indispensably necessary before a stranger can land. The wind, not the stranger, occasions an epidemic cold. If I am not mistaken, Mr. Macaulay is dead; if living, this solution might please him, as I hope it will Mr. Boswell, in return for the many agreeable hours his works have afforded us."

Johnson expatiated on the advantages of Oxford for learning. “There is here, Sir,” said he, “such a progressive emulation. The students are anxious to appear well to their tutors ; the tutors are anxious to have their pupils appear well in the college ; the colleges are anxious to have their students appear well in the University ; and there are excellent rules of discipline in every college. That the rules are sometimes ill observed, may be true ; but is nothing against the system. The members of an University may, for a season, be unmindful of their duty. I am arguing for the excellency of the institution.”

Of Guthrie, he said, “ Sir, he is a man of parts. He has no great regular fund of knowledge ; but by reading so long, and writing so long, he no doubt has picked up a good deal.” He said he had lately been a long while at Lichfield, but had

grown very weary before he left it. BOSWELL: “I wonder at that, Sir; it is your native place.” Johnson: “Why so is Scotland your

native place."

His prejudice against Scotland appeared remarkably strong at this time. When I talked of our advancement in literature, “ Sir,” said he," you have learnt a little from us, and you think yourselves very great men. Hume would never have written History, had not Voltaire written it before him. He is an echo of Voltaire.” BOSWELL : “ But, Sir, we have Lord Kames.” JOHNSON : “ You have Lord Kames. Keep him ; ha, ha, ha! We don't envy you him. Do you ever see Dr. Robertson ?” BOSWELL : Yes, Sir.” JOHNSON : “ Does the dog talk of me?"

BOSWELL: “ Indeed, Sir, he does, and loves you. Thinking that I now had him in a corner, and being solicitous for the literary fame of my country, I pressed him for his opinion on the merit of Dr. Robertson's History of Scotland. But to my surprise, he escaped. Sir, I love Robertson, and I won't talk of his book.”

It is but justice both to him and Dr. Robertson to add, that though he indulged himself in this sally of wit, he had too good taste not to be fully sensible of the merits of that admirable work.

An essay, written by Mr. Deane, a Divine of the Church of England, maintaining the future life of brutes, by an explication of certain parts of the Scriptures, was mentioned, and the doctrine insisted on by a gentleman who seemed fond of curious speculation-Johnson, who did not like to hear anything concerning a future state which was not authorized by the regular canons of orthodoxy, discouraged this talk; and being offended at its continuation, he watched an opportunity to give the gentleman a blow of reprehension. So, when the poor speculatist, with a serious metaphysical pensive face, addressed him, " But really, Sir, when we see a very sensible dog, we don't know what to think of him.” Johnson, rolling with joy at the thought which beamed in his eye, turned quickly round, and replied, " True, Sir: and when we see a very foolish fellow, we don't know what to think of him.”

He then rose up, strided to the fire, and stood for some time laughing and exulting.

I told him that I had several times, when in Italy, seen the experiment of placing a scorpion within a circle of burning coals ; that it ran round and round in extreme pain, and finding no way to escape, retired to the centre, and like a true Stoic philosopher, darted its sting into its head, and thus at once freed itself from its woes. " This must end 'em.' I said this was a curious fact, as it showed deliberate suicide in a reptile. Johnson would not admit the fact. He said, Maupertuis? was of opinion that it does not kill itself, but dies of the heat ; that it gets to the centre of the circle, as the coolest place ; that its turning its

1 I should think it impossible not to wonder at the variety of Johnson's reading, however desultory it might have been. Who could have imagined that the High Church of England-man would be so prompt in quoting Maupertuis, who, I am sorry to think, stands in the list of those unfortunate mistaken men, who call themselves esprits forts. I have, however, a high respect for that philosopher whom the great Frederick of Prussia loved and honoured, and addressed pathetically in one of his poems,

“ Maupertuis ! cher Maupertuis !

Que notre vie est peu de chose." There was in Maupertuis a vigour and yet a tenderness of sentiment, united with strong

tail in upon its head is merely a convulsion, and that it does not sting itself. He said he would be satisfied if the great anatomist Morgagni, after dissecting a scorpion on which the experiment had been tried, should certify that its sting had penetrated into its head.

He seemed pleased to talk of natural philosophy. “ That wood cocks,” said he, “ fly over the northern countries, is proved, because they have been observed at sea. Swallows certainly sleep all the winter A number of them conglobulate together, by flying round and round, and then all in a heap throw themselves under water, and lie in the bed of a river.” He told us, one of his first essays was a Latin poem upon the glow-worn

orm ; I am sorry I did not ask where it was to be found. Talking of the Russians and the Chinese, he advised me to read “Bell's Travels.” I asked him whether I should read Du Halde's “Account of China." " Why, yes,” said he, as one reads such a book ; that is to say, consult it."

He talked of the heinousness of the crime of adultery, by which the peace of families was destroyed. He said, “confusion of progeny constitutes the essence of the crime; and therefore a woman who breaks her marriage vows is much more criminal than a man who does it. A man, to be sure, is criminal in the sight of God; but he does not do his wife a very material injury, if he does not insult her ; if, for instance, from mere wantonness of appetite, he steals privately to her chambermaid. Sir, a wife ought not greatly to resent this. I would not receive home a daughter who had run away from her husband on that account. A wife should study to reclaim her husband by more attention to please him. Sir, a man will not, once in a hundred instances, leave his wife and go to a harlot, if his wife has not been negligent of pleasing.”

Here he discovered that acute discrimination, that solid judgment, and that knowledge of human nature, for which he was upon all occasions remarkable. Taking care to keep in view the moral and religious duty, as understood in our nation, he showed clearly from reason and good sense, the greater degree of culpability in the one sex deviating from it than the other ; and, at the same time, inculcated a very useful lesson as to the way to keep him.

I asked him if it was not hard that one deviation from chastity should so absolutely ruin a young woman.

JOHNSON :

Why no, Sir; it is the great principle which she is taught. When she has given up that principle, she has given up every notion of female honour and virtue, which are all included in chastity.”

A gentleman talked to him of a lady whom he greatly admired and wished to marry, but was afraid of her superiority of talents. Sir, intellectual powers, and uncommon ardour of soul. Would he had been a Christian! I Cannot help earnestly venturing to hope that he is one now.-Boswell.

Maupertuis died in 1759 at the age of 62, in the arms of the Bernoullis, tres Chretiennement.-BURNEY.

said he, “ you need not be afraid ; marry her. Before a year goes about, you'll find that reason much weaker, and that wit not so bright. Yet the gentleman may be justified in his apprehension by one of Dr. Johnson's admirable sentences in his life of Waller : “He doubtless praised many whom he would have been afraid to marry; and, perhaps, married one whom he would have been ashamed to praise. Many qualities contribute to domestic happiness, upon which poetry has no colours to bestow : and many airs and sallies may delight imagination, which he who flatters them never can approve.'

He praised Signor Baretti. “ His account of Italy is a very entertaining book ; and, Sir, I know no man who carries his head higher in conversation than Baretti. There are strong powers in his mind. He has not, indeed, many hooks; but with what hooks he has, he grapples

very forcibly."

At this time I observed upon the dial-plate of his watch' a short Greek inscription, taken from the New Testament, Nuş yap epxetai, being the first words of our Saviour's solemn admonition to the improvement of that time which is allowed us to prepare for eternity: “ The night cometh when no man can work.” He sometime afterwards laid aside this dial-plate ; and when I asked him the reason, he said, “ It might do very

well upon a clock which a man keeps in his closet ; but to have it upon

his watch which he carries about with him, and which is often looked at by others, might be censured as ostentatious.' Mr. Steevens is now possessed of the dial-plate inscribed as above.

He remained at Oxford a considerable time ; I was obliged to go to London, where I received his letter, which had been returned from Scotland.

“TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ. · MY DEAR BOSWELL,

Oxford, March 23, 1768. “ I have omitted a long time to write to you, without knowing very well why. I could now tell why I should not write; for who would write to men who publish the letters of their friends, without their leave? Yet I write to you in spite of my caution, to tell you that I shall be glad to see you, and that I wish

you, would empty your head of Corsica, which I think has filled it rather too lony. But, at all events, I shall be glad, very glad, to see you.

“ I am, Sir, yours affectionately,

“SAM. JOHNSON.” I answered thus :

TO MR. SAMUEL JOHNSON, “ MY DEAR SIR,

London, 26th April, 1768. “I have received your last letter, which, though very short, and by no means complimentary, yet gave me real pleasure, because it contains these words, “I shall be glad, very glad, to see you.'—Surely you have no reason to complain of my publishing a single paragraph of one of your letters; the temptation to it was so strong. An irrevocable grant of your friendship, and your dignifying my desire of visiting Corsica with the epithet of 'a wise and noble curiosity,' are to me more valuable than many of the grants of kings.

“But how can you bid me empty my head of Corsica ? My noble-minded friend, do you not feel for an oppressed nation bravely struggling to be free? Consider fairly what is the case. The Corsicans never received any kindness from the Genoese. They never agreed to be subject to them. They owe them nothing, and when reduced to an abject state of slavery, by force, shall they not rise in the great cause of liberty, and break the galling yoke? And shall not every liberal soul be warm for them? Empty my head of Corsica! Empty it of honour, empty it of humanity, empty it of friendship, empty it of piety! No! while I live, Corsica and the cause of the brave islanders shall ever employ much of my attention, shall ever interest me in the sincerest manner.

"MY DEAR DEAR LOVE,

Oxford, April 18, 1768. “You have had a very great loss. To lose an old friend, is to be cut off from a great part of the little pleasure that this life allows. But such is the condition of our nature, that as we live on we must see those whom we love drop successively, and find our circle of relation grow less and less, till we are almost unconnected with the world; and then it must soon be our turn to drop into the grave. There is always this consolation, that we have one Protector who can never be lost but by our own fault, and every new experience of the uncertainty of all other comforts should determine us to fix our hearts where true joys are to be found. All union with the inhabitants of earth must in time be broken; and all the hopes that terminate here, must on [one] part or other end in disappointment.

“I am glad that Mrs. Adey and Mrs. Cobb do not leave you alone. Pay my respects to them, and the Sewards, and all my friends. When Mr. Porter comes, he will direct you. Let me know of his arrival, and I will write to him.

“When I go back to London, I will take care of your reading glass. Whenever I can do anything for you, remember, my dear darling, that one of my greatest pleasures is to please you.

“The punctuality of your correspondence I consider as a proof of great regard. When we shall see each other I know not, but let us often think on each other, and think with tenderness. Do not forget me in your prayers. I have for a long time back been very poorly; but of what use is it to complain? “Write often, for your letters always give great pleasure to, “My dear, your most affectionate and most humble servant,

“SAM. JOHNSON.” Upon his arrival in London in May, he surprised me one morning with a visit at my lodging in Half-moon-street, was quite satisfied with