wrote the prescription in technical characters. The boy took him for a physician.

I doubted much which road to take, whether to go by the coast, or by Lawrence Kirk and Monboddo. 'I knew Lord Monboddo and Dr. Johnson did not love each other; yet I was unwilling not to visit his lordship; and was also curious to see them together. (1) I mentioned my doubts to Dr. Johnson, who said he would go two miles out of his way to see Lord Monboddo. I therefore sent Joseph forward, with the following note:

"Montrose, 21st August. "MY DEAR LORD, -Thus far I am come with Mr. Samuel Johnson. We must be at Aberdeen to-night. I know you do not admire him so much as I do; but I cannot be in this country without making you a bow at your old place, as I do not know if I may again have an opportunity of seeing Monboddo. Besides, Mr. Johnson says, he would go two miles out of his way to see Lord Monboddo. I have sent forward my servant, that we may know if your lordship be at home. I am ever, &c. JAMES BOSWELL.”

As we travelled onwards from Montrose, we had (1) There were several points of similarity between them; learning, clearness of head, precision of speech, and a love of research on many subjects which people in general do not investigate. Foote paid Lord Monboddo the compliment of saying, that he was "an Elzevir edition of Johnson." It has been shrewdly observed, that Foote must have meant a diminutive, or pocket edition.-B. Johnson himself thus describes Lord Monboddo to Mrs. Thrale: "He is a Scotch judge, who has lately written a strange book about the origin of language, in which he traces monkeys up to men, and says that in some countries the human species have tails like other beasts. He inquired for these long-tailed men from [Sir Joseph] Banks, and was not pleased that they had not been found in all his peregrinations. He talked nothing of this to me."- Letters, vol. i. p. 114. See antè, vol. iii. p. 225. C.

-

the Grampian hills in our view, and some good land around us, but void of trees and hedges. Dr. Johnson has said ludicrously, in his "Journey," that the hedges were of stone; for, instead of the verdant thorn to refresh the eye, we found the bare wall or dike intersecting the prospect. He observed, that it was wonderful to see a country so divested, so denuded of trees.

We stopped at Lawrence Kirk, where our great grammarian, Ruddiman, was once schoolmaster. We respectfully remembered that excellent man and eminent scholar, by whose labours a knowledge of the Latin language will be preserved in Scotland, if it shall be preserved at all. Lord Gardenston (1), one of our judges, collected money to raise a monument to him at this place, which I hope will be well executed. I know my father gave five guineas towards it. Lord Gardenston is the proprietor of Lawrence Kirk, and has encouraged the building of a manufacturing village, of which he is exceedingly fond, and has written a pamphlet upon it, as if he had founded Thebes, in which, however, there are many useful precepts strongly expressed. The village seemed to be irregularly built, some of the houses being of clay, some of brick, and some of brick and stone. Dr. Johnson observed, they thatched well here.

I was a little acquainted with Mr. Forbes, the minister of the parish. I sent to inform him that a

(1) Francis Garden, a Scotch Lord of Session, who erected a very pretty temple over St. Bernard's Well, on the bank of the Water of Leith. He was a man of talents, but of some irregularity of mind, and died (it is said, under melancholy circumstances) in 1794.-C.

answer,

gentleman desired to see him. He returned for "that he would not come to a stranger." I then gave my name, and he came. I remonstrated to him for not coming to a stranger; and, by presenting him to Dr. Johnson, proved to him what a stranger might sometimes be. His Bible inculcates "be not forgetful to entertain strangers,” and mentions the same motive. (1) He defended himself by saying, "He had once come to a stranger, who sent for him; and he found him a little worth person!'"

Dr. Johnson insisted on stopping at the inn, as I told him Lord Gardenston had furnished it with a collection of books, that travellers might have entertainment for the mind as well as the body. He praised the design, but wished there had been more books, and those better chosen.

About a mile from Monboddo, where you turn off the road, Joseph was waiting to tell us my lord expected us to dinner. We drove over a wild moor. It rained, and the scene was somewhat dreary. Dr. Johnson repeated, with solemn emphasis, Macbeth's speech on meeting the witches. As we travelled on, he told me, "Sir, you got into our Club by doing what a man can do. (2) Several of the members wished to keep you out. Burke told me, he doubted if you were fit for it: but, now you are in, none of them are sorry. Burke says, that you have so much good humour naturally, it is (1) Be not forgetful to entertain strangers; for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."-Heb. xiii. 2.-C.

(2) This, I find, is considered obscure. I suppose Dr. Johnson meant, that I assiduously and earnestly recommended myself to some of the members, as in a canvass for an election into

scarce a virtue." BOSWELL." They were afraid of you, Sir, as it was you who proposed me." JOHNSON. "Sir, they knew, that if they refused you, they'd probably never have got in another. I'd have kept them all out. Beauclerk was very earnest for you." BOSWELL." Beauclerk has a keenness of mind which is very uncommon." JOHNSON."Yes, Sir; and every thing comes from him so easily. It appears to me that I labour, when I say a good thing." BOSWELL. "You are loud, Sir, but it is not an effort of mind."

Monboddo is a wretched place, wild and naked, with a poor old house, though, if I recollect right, there are two turrets, which mark an old baron's residence. Lord Monboddo received us at his gate most courteously; pointed to the Douglas arms upon his house, and told us that his great-grandmother was of that family. "In such houses," said he, " our ancestors lived, who were better men than we." "No, no, my lord," said Dr. Johnson i we are as strong as they, and a great deal wiser." was an assault upon one of Lord Monboddo's capital dogmas, and I was afraid there would have been a violent altercation in the very close, before we got into the house. But his lordship is distinguished not only for "ancient metaphysics," but for ancient politesse, "la vieille cour," and he made no reply.

66

This

His lordship was drest in a rustic suit, and wore a little round hat; he told us, we now saw him as Farmer Burnet, and we should have his family dinner, a farmer's dinner. He said, "I should not have forgiven Mr. Boswell, had he not brought you

here, Dr. Johnson." He produced a very long stalk of corn, as a specimen of his crop, and said, " You see here the latas segetes:" he added, that Virgil seemed to be as enthusiastic a farmer as he, and was certainly a practical one. JOHNSON. "It does not always follow, my lord, that a man, who has written a good poem on an art, has practised it. Philip Miller (1) told me, that in Philips's "Cyder," a poem, all the precepts were just, and indeed better than in books written for the purpose of instructing; yet Philips had never made cyder." (2)

I started the subject of emigration. JOHNSON. "To a man of mere animal life, you can urge no argument against going to America, but that it will be some time before he will get the earth to produce. But a man of any intellectual enjoyment will not easily go and immerse himself and his posterity for ages in barbarism."

JOHN

He and my lord spoke highly of Homer. son. "He had all the learning of his age. The shield of Achilles shows a nation in war, a nation in peace harvest sport, nay stealing." (3) MON

(1) [Philip Miller, author of the "Gardener's Dictionary," He was born at Chelsea in 1691, and died in 1771.]

(2) ["To the poem of " Cyder" may be given this peculiar praise, that it is grounded in truth; that the precepts which it contains are exact and just; and that it is therefore, at once a book of entertainment and science."-JOHNSON, Life of Philips.]

(3) My note of this is much too short. Brevis esse laboro, obscurus fio. Yet as I have resolved, that the very Journal which Dr. Johnson read shall be presented to the public, I will not expand the text in any considerable degree, though I may occasionally supply a word to complete the sense, as I fill up the blanks of abbreviation in the writing, neither of which can be said to change the genuine Journal. One of the best critics of our age conjectures that the imperfect passage above has probably been as follows:-" In his book we have an accurate