health in a bumper. The toast was not proposed by me, which is a circumstance to be remarked, for I am now so connected with you, that anything that I can say or do, to your honour has not the value of an additional compliment. It is only giving you a guinea out of that treasure of admiration which already belongs to you, and which is no hidden treasure; for I suppose my admiration of you is co-existent with the knowledge of my character.

"I find that the Highlanders and Hebrideans in general are much fonder of your 'Journey,' than the low-country or hither Scots. One of the Grants said to-day, that he was sure you were a man of a good heart, and a candid man, and seemed to hope he should be able to convince you of the antiquity of a good proportion of the poems of Ossian. After all that has passed, I think the matter is capable of being proved to a certain degree. I am told that Macpherson got one old Erse MS. from Clanranald, for the restitution of which he executed a formal obligation; and it is affirmed, that the Gaelic (call it Erse or call it Irish) has been written in the Highlands and Hebrides for many centuries. It is reasonable to suppose, that such of the inhabitants as acquired any learning possessed the art of writing as well as their Irish neighbours and Celtic cousins; and the question is, can sufficient evidence be shown of this? "Those who are skilled in ancient writings can determine the age of MSS., or at least can ascertain the century in which they were written; and if men of veracity, who are so skilled, shall tell us that MSS. in the possession of families in the Highlands and isles are the works of a remote age, I think we should be convinced by their testimony.

"There is now come to this city, Ranald Macdonald from the Isle of Egg, who has several MSS of Erse poetry, which he wishes to publish by subscription. 1 have engaged to take three copies of the book, the price of which is to be six shillings, as I would subscribe for all the Erse that can be printed, be it old or new, that the language may be preserved. This man says, that some of his manuscripts are ancient; and, to be sure, one of them which was shown to me does appear to have the duskiness of antiquity. The inquiry is not yet quite hopeless, and I should think that the exact truth may be discovered, if proper means be used. I am, &c.

LETTER 207.

TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

"JAMES BOSWELL."

"Feb. 25, 1775.

"DEAR SIR,-I am sorry that I could get no books for my friends in Scotland. Mr. Strahan has at last promised to send two dozen to you. If they come, put the name of my friends into them; you may cut them out,' and paste them with a little starch in the book.

"You then are going wild about Ossian. Why do you think any part can be proved? The dusky manuscript of Egg is probably not fifty years old: if

1 From a list in his handwriting

ETAT 66

OSSIAN CONTROVERSY.

87

it be an hundred, it proves nothing. The tale of Clanranald is no proof. Has Clanranald told it? Can he prove it? There are, I believe, no Erse manuscripts. None of the old families had a single letter in Erse that we heard of. You say it is likely that they could write. The learned, if any learned there were, could; but knowing by that learning some written language, in that language they wrote, as letters had never been applied to their own. If there are manuscripts, let them be shown, with some proof that they are not forged for the occasion. You say many can remember parts of Ossian. I believe all those parts are versions of the English; at least there is no proof of their antiquity.

· Macpherson is said to have made some translations himself; and having taught a boy to write it, ordered him to say that he had learnt it of his grandmother. The boy, when he grew up, told the story. This Mrs. Williams heard at Mrs. Strahan's table. Don't be credulous; you know how little a Highlander can be trusted. Macpherson is, so far as I know, very quiet. Is not that proof enough? Everything is against him. No visible manuscript: no inscription in the language: no correspondence among friends: no transaction of business, of which a single scrap remains in the ancient families. Macpherson's pretence is that the character was Saxon. If he had not talked unskilfully of manuscripts, he might have fought with oral tradition much longer. As to Mr. Grant's information, I suppose he knows much less of the matter than ourselves.

1

"In the meantime, the bookseller says that the sale is sufficiently quick. They printed four thousand. Correct your copy wherever it is wrong, and bring it up. Your friends will all be glad to see you. I think of going myself into the country about May. I am sorry that I have not managed to send the book sooner. I have left four for you, and do not restrict you absolutely to follow my directions in the distribution. You must use your own discretion.

"Make my compliments to Mrs. Boswell: I suppose she is now beginning to forgive me. I am, dear Sir, your humble servant,

"SAM. JOHNSON."

LETTER 208.

TO MRS. THRALE.

"University College, Oxford, March 8, 1775.

"The fate of my proposal for our friend Mr. Carter will be decided on Monday. Those whom I have spoken to are all friends. I have not abated any part of the entrance or payment, for it has not been thought too much, and I hope he will have scholars.

"I am very deaf; and yet cannot well help being much in comply, though it is often very uncomfortable. But when I have done this thing, which I hope is a good thing, or find that I cannot do it, I wish to live a while under your care and protection."

1 Of his "Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland."

:

CHAPTER IV.

1775.

Boswell revisits London-Peter (arrica-Taxation no Tyranny"-Dr. Tower's "Answer" -Gerard Hamilton-Sheridan's Gold Medal to home-Mrs. Abington-Cibber's "Nonjuror "-Boswell's "Surveillance"-Garrick's Prologues-The Adams-Garrick's Imitations of Johnson-Gray's Odes-Lord Chesterfield's Letters-Johnson's Diploma of LL.D.-Abyssinian Bruce-Coleman's "Odes to Obscurity and Oblivion."- Mason's "Elfrida," and "Caractacus"-The Bath-Easton Vase-Fleet Street and Charing Cross.

ON Tuesday, 21st March, I arrived in London; and on repairing to Dr. Johnson's before dinner, found him in his study, sitting with Mr. Peter Garrick, the elder brother of David, strongly resembling him in countenance and voice, but of more sedate and placid manners. Johnson informed me, that though Mr. Beauclerk was in great pain, it was hoped he was not in danger, and that he now wished to consult Dr. Heberden, to try the effect of a "new understanding." Both at this interview, and in the evening at Mr. Thrale's, where he and Mr. Peter Garrick and I met again, he was vehement on the subject of the Ossian controversy; observing, "We do not know that there are any ancient Erse manuscripts; and we have no other reason to disbelieve that there are men with three heads, but that we do not know that there are any such men.” He also was outrageous upon his supposition that my countrymen "loved Scotland better than truth," saying, "All of them,--nay not all, but droves of them, would come up, and attest anything for the honour of Scotland." He also persevered in his wild allegation, that he questioned if there was a tree between Edinburgh and the English border older than himself. I assured him he was mistaken, and suggested that the proper punishment would be that he should receive a stripe at every tree above a hundred years old, that was found within that space. He laughed, and said, "I believe I might submit to it for a baubee."

The doubts which, in my correspondence with him, I had ver

88

ÆTAT. 66.

"TAXATION NO TYRANNY."

89

tured to state as to the justice and wisdom of the conduct of Great Britain towards the American colonies, while I at the same time requested that he would enable me to inform myself upon that momentous subject, he had altogether disregarded and had recently published a pamphlet, entitled "Taxation no Tyranny; au Answer to the Resolutions and Address of the American Con gress.” * 1

He had long before indulged most unfavourable sentiments of our fellow-subjects in America. For, as early as 1769, I was told by Dr. John Campbell, that he had said of them, “Sir, they are a race of convicts, and ought to be thankful for anything we allow them short of hanging."

Of this performance I avoided to talk with him; for I had now formed a clear and settled opinion, that the people of America were well warranted to resist a claim that their fellow-subjects in the mother country should have the entire command of their fortunes, by taxing them without their own consent; and the extreme violence which it breathed appeared to me so unsuitable to the mildness of a Christian philosopher, and so directly opposite to the principles of peace which he had so beautifully recommended in his pamphlet respecting Falkland's Islands, that I was sorry to see him appear in so unfavourable a light. Besides, I could not perceive in it that ability of argument, or that felicity of expression, for which he was, upon other occasions, so eminent. Positive assertion, sarcastical severity, and extravagant ridicule, which he himself reprobated as a test of truth, were united in this rhapsody.

That this pamphlet was written at the desire of those who were then in power, I have no doubt, and, indeed, he owned to me, that it had been revised and curtailed by some of them. He told me that they had struck out one passage, which was to this effect:

"That the colonists could with no solidity argue from their not having been taxed while in their infancy, that they should not now be taxed. We do not put a calf into the plough; we wait till he is an ox."

He said, "They struck it out either critically as too ludicrous, or politically as too exasperating. I care not which. It was their

1 Published March 7, 1775, by T. Cadell in the Stran

business. If an architect says I will build five stories, and the man who employs him says I will have only three, the employer is to decide." "Yes, Sir," said I, "in ordinary cases: but should it be so when the architect gives his skill and labor gratis ?”

Unfavourable as I am constrained to say my opinion of this pamphlet was, yet since it was congenial with the sentiments of numbers at that time, and as everything relating to the writings of Dr. Johnson is of importance in literary history, I shall therefore insert some passages which were struck out, it does not appear why, either by himself or those who revised it. They appear printed in a few proof leaves of it in my possession, marked with corrections in his own handwriting. I shall distinguish them by italics.

In the paragraph where he says, the Americans were incited to resistance by European intelligence from

་་

men whom they thought their friends, but who were friends only to themselves,"

there followed

"and made by their selfishness, the enemies of their country."

And the next paragraph ran thus:

"On the original contrivers of mischief, rather than on those whom they have deluded, let an insulted nation pour out its vengeance.

26

The paragraph which came next was in these words:

Unhappy is that country in which men can hope for advancement by favouring its enemies. The tranquillity of stable government is not always easily preserved against the machinations of single innovators; but what can be the hope of quiet, when factions hostile to the legislature can be oper formed and openly avowed?"

After the paragraph which now concludes the pamphlet, there follows this, in which he certainly means the great Earl of Chatham, and glances at a certain Lord Chancellor.'

“If, by the fortune of war, they drive us utterly away, what they will de next can only be conjectured. If a new monarchy is erected, they will want a

1 Lord Camden.-C.