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THEJOURNALOF ATOUR TO THE HEBRIDESWITHSAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D.Dr. Johnson had for many years given me hopes that we should gotogether, and visit the Hebrides[9]. Martin's Account of those islandshad impressed us with a notion that we might there contemplate a systemof life almost totally different from what we had been accustomed tosee; and, to find simplicity and wildness, and all the circumstances ofremote time or place, so near to our native great island, was an objectwithin the reach of reasonable curiosity. Dr. Johnson has said in his_Journey_[10] 'that he scarcely remembered how the wish to visit theHebrides was excited;' but he told me, in summer, 1763[11], that hisfather put Martin's Account into his hands when he was very young, andthat he was much pleased with it. We reckoned there would be someinconveniencies and hardships, and perhaps a little danger; but these wewere persuaded were magnified in the imagination of every body. When Iwas at Ferney, in 1764, I mentioned our design to Voltaire. He looked atme, as if I had talked of going to the North Pole, and said, 'You do notinsist on my accompanying you?'--'No, Sir,'--'Then I am very willingyou should go.' I was not afraid that our curious expedition would beprevented by such apprehensions; but I doubted that it would not bepossible to prevail on Dr. Johnson to relinquish, for some time, thefelicity of a London life, which, to a man who can enjoy it with fullintellectual relish, is apt to make existence in any narrower sphereseem insipid or irksome. I doubted that he would not be willing to comedown from his elevated state of philosophical dignity; from asuperiority of wisdom among the wise, and of learning among the learned;and from flashing his wit upon minds bright enough to reflect it.He had disappointed my expectations so long, that I began to despair;but in spring, 1773, he talked of coming to Scotland that year with somuch firmness, that I hoped he was at last in earnest. I knew that, ifhe were once launched from the metropolis he would go forward very well;and I got our common friends there to assist in setting him afloat. ToMrs. Thrale in particular, whose enchantment over him seldom failed, Iwas much obliged. It was, '_I'll give thee a wind._'-' _Thou artkind._[12]'--To _attract_ him, we had invitations from the chiefsMacdonald and Macleod; and, for additional aid, I wrote to LordElibank[13], Dr. William Robertson, and Dr. Beattie.To Dr. Robertson, so far as my letter concerned the present subject, Iwrote as follows:'Our friend, Mr. Samuel Johnson, is in great health and spirits; and, Ido think, has a serious resolution to visit Scotland this year. The moreattraction, however, the better; and therefore, though I know he will behappy to meet you there, it will forward the scheme, if, in your answerto this, you express yourself concerning it with that power of which youare so happily possessed, and which may be so directed as to operatestrongly upon him.'His answer to that part of my letter was quite as I could have wished.It was written with the address and persuasion of the historian ofAmerica. 'When I saw you last, you gave us some hopes that you mightprevail with Mr. Johnson to make out that excursion to Scotland, withthe expectation of which we have long flattered ourselves. If he couldorder matters so, as to pass some time in Edinburgh, about the close ofthe summer session, and then visit some of the Highland scenes, I amconfident he would be pleased with the grand features of nature in manyparts of this country: he will meet with many persons here who respecthim, and some whom I am persuaded he will think not unworthy of hisesteem. I wish he would make the experiment. He sometimes cracks hisjokes upon us; but he will find that we can distinguish between thestabs of malevolence, and _the rebukes of the righteous, which are likeexcellent oil[14], and break not the head[15]_. Offer my bestcompliments to him, and assure him that I shall be happy to have thesatisfaction of seeing him under my roof.To Dr. Beattie I wrote, 'The chief intention of this letter is to informyou, that I now seriously believe Mr. Samuel Johnson will visit Scotlandthis year: but I wish that every power of attraction may be employed tosecure our having so valuable an acquisition, and therefore I hope youwill without delay write to me what I know you think, that I may read itto the mighty sage, with proper emphasis, before I leave London, which Imust do soon. He talks of you with the same warmth that he did lastyear[16]. We are to see as much of Scotland as we can, in the months ofAugust and September. We shall not be long of being at MarischalCollege[17]. He is particularly desirous of seeing some of theWestern Islands.'Dr. Beattie did better: _ipse venit_. He was, however, so polite as towave his privilege of _nil mihi rescribas[18]_, and wrote fromEdinburgh, as follows:--'Your very kind and agreeable favour of the20th of April overtook me here yesterday, after having gone to Aberdeen,which place I left about a week ago. I am to set out this day forLondon, and hope to have the honour of paying my respects to Mr. Johnsonand you, about a week or ten days hence. I shall then do what I can, toenforce the topick you mention; but at present I cannot enter upon it,as I am in a very great hurry; for I intend to begin my journey withinan hour or two.'He was as good as his word, and threw some pleasing motives into thenorthern scale. But, indeed, Mr. Johnson loved all that he heard, fromone whom he tells us, in his _Lives of the Poets_, Gray found 'a poet, aphilosopher, and a good man[19].'My Lord Elibank did not answer my letter to his lordship for some time.The reason will appear, when we come to the isle of _Sky_[20]. I shallthen insert my letter, with letters from his lordship, both to myselfand Mr. Johnson. I beg it may be understood, that I insert my ownletters, as I relate my own sayings, rather as keys to what is valuablebelonging to others, than for their own sake.Luckily Mr. Justice (now Sir Robert) Chambers[21], who was about to sailfor the East-Indies, was going to take leave of his relations atNewcastle, and he conducted Dr. Johnson to that town. Mr. Scott, ofUniversity College, Oxford, (now Dr. Scott[22], of the Commons,)accompanied him from thence to Edinburgh, With such propitious convoysdid he proceed to my native city. But, lest metaphor should make it besupposed he actually went by sea, I choose to mention that he travelledin post-chaises, of which the rapid motion was one of his most favouriteamusements[23].Dr. Samuel Johnson's character, religious, moral, political, andliterary, nay his figure and manner, are, I believe, more generallyknown than those of almost any man; yet it may not be superfluous hereto attempt a sketch of him. Let my readers then remember that he was asincere and zealous Christian, of high church of England and monarchicalprinciples, which he would not tamely suffer to be questioned; steadyand inflexible in maintaining the obligations of piety and virtue, bothfrom a regard to the order of society, and from a veneration for theGreat Source of all order; correct, nay stern in his taste; hard toplease, and easily offended, impetuous and irritable in his temper, butof a most humane and benevolent heart; having a mind stored with a vastand various collection of learning and knowledge, which he communicatedwith peculiar perspicuity and force, in rich and choice expression. Heunited a most logical head with a most fertile imagination, which gavehim an extraordinary advantage in arguing; for he could reason close orwide, as he saw best for the moment. He could, when he chose it, be thegreatest sophist that ever wielded a weapon in the schools ofdeclamation; but he indulged this only in conversation; for he owned hesometimes talked for victory[24]; he was too conscientious to makeerrour permanent and pernicious, by deliberately writing it. He wasconscious of his superiority. He loved praise when it was brought tohim; but was too proud to seek for it. He was somewhat susceptible offlattery[25]. His mind was so full of imagery, that he might have beenperpetually a poet. It has been often remarked, that in his poeticalpieces, which it is to be regretted are so few, because so excellent,his style is easier than in his prose. There is deception in this: it isnot easier, but better suited to the dignity of verse; as one may dancewith grace, whose motions, in ordinary walking, in the common step, areawkward. He had a constitutional melancholy, the clouds of whichdarkened the brightness of his fancy, and gave a gloomy cast to hiswhole course of thinking: yet, though grave and awful in his deportment,when he thought it necessary or proper, he frequently indulged himselfin pleasantry and sportive sallies. He was prone to superstition, butnot to credulity. Though his imagination might incline him to a beliefof the marvellous and the mysterious, his vigorous reason examined theevidence with jealousy. He had a loud voice, and a slow deliberateutterance, which no doubt gave some additional weight to the sterlingmetal of his conversation[26]. His person was large, robust, I may sayapproaching to the gigantick, and grown unwieldy from corpulency. Hiscountenance was naturally of the cast of an ancient statue, but somewhatdisfigured by the scars of that _evil_, which, it was formerly imagined,the _royal touch_[27] could cure. He was now in his sixty-fourth year,and was become a little dull of hearing. His sight had always beensomewhat weak; yet, so much does mind govern, and even supply thedeficiency of organs, that his perceptions were uncommonly quick andaccurate[28]. His head, and sometimes also his body shook with a kind ofmotion like the effect of a palsy: he appeared to be frequentlydisturbed by cramps, or convulsive contractions[29], of the nature ofthat distemper called _St. Vitus's dance_. He wore a full suit of plainbrown clothes, with twisted hair-buttons[30] of the same colour, alarge bushy greyish wig, a plain shirt, black worsted stockings, andsilver buckles. Upon this tour, when journeying, he wore boots, and avery wide brown cloth great coat, with pockets which might have almostheld the two volumes of his folio _Dictionary_; and he carried in hishand a large English oak stick. Let me not be censured for mentioningsuch minute particulars. Every thing relative to so great a man is worthobserving. I remember Dr. Adam Smith, in his rhetorical lectures atGlasgow[31], told us he was glad to know that Milton wore latchets inhis shoes, instead of buckles. When I mention the oak stick, it is butletting _Hercules_ have his club; and, by-and-by, my readers will findthis stick will bud, and produce a good joke[32].This imperfect sketch of 'the COMBINATION and the _form_[33]' of thatWonderful Man, whom I venerated and loved while in this world, and afterwhom I gaze with humble hope, now that it has pleased ALMIGHTY GOD tocall him to a better world, will serve to introduce to the fancy of myreaders the capital object of the following journal, in the course ofwhich I trust they will attain to a considerable degree ofacquaintance with him.His prejudice against Scotland[34] was announced almost as soon as hebegan to appear in the world of Letters. In his _London_, a poem, arethe following nervous lines:--'For who would leave, unbrib'd, Hibernia's land?Or change the rocks of Scotland for the Strand?There none are swept by sudden fate away;But all, whom hunger spares, with age decay.'The truth is, like the ancient Greeks and Romans, he allowed himself tolook upon all nations but his own as barbarians[35]: not only Hibernia,and Scotland, but Spain, Italy, and France, are attacked in the samepoem. If he was particularly prejudiced against the Scots, it wasbecause they were more in his way; because he thought their success inEngland rather exceeded the due proportion of their real merit; andbecause he could not but see in them that nationality which I believe noliberal-minded Scotsman will deny. He was indeed, if I may be allowedthe phrase, at bottom much of a _John Bull_[36]; much of a blunt _trueborn Englishman_[37]. There was a stratum of common clay under the rockof marble. He was voraciously fond of good eating[38]; and he had agreat deal of that quality called _humour_, which gives an oiliness anda gloss to every other quality.I am, I flatter myself, completely a citizen of the world.--In mytravels through Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Corsica, France, Inever felt myself from home; and I sincerely love 'every kindred andtongue and people and nation[39].' I subscribe to what my late trulylearned and philosophical friend Mr. Crosbie[40] said, that the Englishare better animals than the Scots; they are nearer the sun; their bloodis richer, and more mellow: but when I humour any of them in anoutrageous contempt of Scotland, I fairly own I treat them as children.And thus I have, at some moments, found myself obliged to treat evenDr. Johnson.To Scotland however he ventured; and he returned from it in great goodhumour, with his prejudices much lessened, and with very gratefulfeelings of the hospitality with which he was treated; as is evidentfrom that admirable work, his _Journey to the Western Islands ofScotland_, which, to my utter astonishment, has been misapprehended,even to rancour, by many of my countrymen. To have the company ofChambers and Scott, he delayed his journey so long, that the court ofsession, which rises on the eleventh of August, was broke up before hegot to Edinburgh[41].On Saturday the fourteenth of August, 1773, late in the evening, Ireceived a note from him, that he was arrived at Boyd's inn[42], at thehead of the Canongate. I went to him directly. He embraced me cordially;and I exulted in the thought, that I now had him actually in Caledonia.Mr. Scott's amiable manners, and attachment to our _Socrates_, at onceunited me to him. He told me that, before I came in, the Doctor hadunluckily had a bad specimen of Scottish cleanliness[43]. He then drankno fermented liquor. He asked to have his lemonade made sweeter; uponwhich the waiter, with his greasy fingers, lifted a lump of sugar, andput it into it. The Doctor, in indignation, threw it out of the window.Scott said, he was afraid he would have knocked the waiter down. Mr.Johnson told me, that such another trick was played him at the house ofa lady in Paris[44]. He was to do me the honour to lodge under my roof.I regretted sincerely that I had not also a room for Mr. Scott. Mr.Johnson and I walked arm-in-arm up the High=street, to my house inJames's court[45]: it was a dusky night: I could not prevent his beingassailed by the evening effluvia of Edinburgh. I heard a late baronet,of some distinction in the political world in the beginning of thepresent reign, observe, that 'walking the streets of Edinburgh at nightwas pretty perilous, and a good deal odoriferous.' The peril is muchabated, by the care which the magistrates have taken to enforce the citylaws against throwing foul water from the windows[46]; but from thestructure of the houses in the old town, which consist of many stories,in each of which a different family lives, and there being no coveredsewers, the ordour still continues. A zealous Scotsman would have wishedMr. Johnson to be without one of his five senses upon this occasion. Aswe marched slowly along, he grumbled in my ear, 'I smell you in thedark[47]!' But he acknowledged that the breadth of the street, and theloftiness of the buildings on each side made a noble appearance[48].My wife had tea ready for him, which it is well known he delighted todrink at all hours, particularly when sitting up late, and of which hisable defence against Mr. Jonas Hanway[49] should have obtained him amagnificent reward from the East-India Company. He shewed muchcomplacency upon finding that the mistress of the house was so attentiveto his singular habit; and as no man could be more polite when he choseto be so, his address to her was most courteous and engaging; and hisconversation soon charmed her into a forgetfulness of his externalappearance[50].I did not begin to keep a regular full journal till some days after wehad set out from Edinburgh; but I have luckily preserved a good manyfragments of his _Memorabilia_ from his very first evening in Scotland.We had, a little before this, had a trial for murder, in which thejudges had allowed the lapse of twenty years since its commission as aplea in bar, in conformity with the doctrine of prescription in the_civil_ law, which Scotland and several other countries in Europe haveadopted. He at first disapproved of this; but then he thought there wassomething in it, if there had been for twenty years a neglect toprosecute a crime which was _known_. He would not allow that a murder,by not being _discovered_ for twenty years, should escapepunishment[51]. We talked of the ancient trial by duel. He did not thinkit so absurd as is generally supposed; 'For (said he) it was onlyallowed when the question was _in equilibrio_, as when one affirmed andanother denied; and they had a notion that Providence would interfere infavour of him who was in the right. But as it was found that in a duel,he who was in the right had not a better chance than he who was in thewrong, therefore society instituted the present mode of trial, and gavethe advantage to him who is in the right.'We sat till near two in the morning, having chatted a good while aftermy wife left us. She had insisted, that to shew all respect to the Sageshe would give up her own bed-chamber to him and take a worse[52]. ThisI cannot but gratefully mention, as one of a thousand obligations whichI owe her, since the great obligation of her being pleased to accept ofme as her husband[53].SUNDAY, AUGUST 15[54]Mr. Scott came to breakfast, at which I introduced to Dr. Johnson andhim, my friend Sir William Forbes, now of Pitsligo[55]; a man of whomtoo much good cannot be said; who, with distinguished abilities andapplication in his profession of a Banker, is at once a good companion,and a good christian; which I think is saying enough. Yet it is butjustice to record, that once, when he was in a dangerous illness, he waswatched with the anxious apprehension of a general calamity; day andnight his house was beset with affectionate enquiries; and, upon hisrecovery, _Te deum_ was the universal chorus from the _hearts_ of hiscountrymen. Mr. Johnson was pleased with my daughter Veronica[56],then a child of about four months old. She had the appearance oflistening to him. His motions seemed to her to be intended for heramusement; and when he stopped, she fluttered, and made a littleinfantine noise, and a kind of signal for him to begin again. She wouldbe held close to him; which was a proof, from simple nature, that hisfigure was not horrid. Her fondness for him endeared her still more tome, and I declared she should have five hundred pounds of additionalfortune[57].We talked of the practice of the law. Sir William Forbes said, hethought an honest lawyer should never undertake a cause which he wassatisfied was not a just one. 'Sir, (said Mr. Johnson,) a lawyer has nobusiness with the justice or injustice of the cause which he undertakes,unless his client asks his opinion, and then he is bound to give ithonestly. The justice or injustice of the cause is to be decided by thejudge. Consider, Sir; what is the purpose of courts of justice? It is,that every man may have his cause fairly tried, by men appointed to trycauses. A lawyer is not to tell what he knows to be a lie: he is not toproduce what he knows to be a false deed; but he is not to usurp theprovince of the jury and of the judge, and determine what shall be theeffect of evidence,--what shall be the result of legal argument. As itrarely happens that a man is fit to plead his own cause, lawyers are aclass of the community, who, by study and experience, have acquired theart and power of arranging evidence, and of applying to the points atissue what the law has settled. A lawyer is to do for his client allthat his client might fairly do for himself, if he could. If, by asuperiority of attention, of knowledge, of skill, and a better method ofcommunication, he has the advantage of his adversary, it is anadvantage to which he is entitled. There must always be some advantage,on one side or other; and it is better that advantage should be had bytalents than by chance. Lawyers were to undertake no causes till theywere sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from atrial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined it might befound a very just claim[58].' This was sound practical doctrine, andrationally repressed a too refined scrupulosity[59] of conscience.Emigration was at this time a common topick of discourse[60]. Dr.Johnson regretted it as hurtful to human happiness: 'For (said he) itspreads mankind, which weakens the defence of a nation, and lessens thecomfort of living. Men, thinly scattered, make a shift, but a bad shift,without many things. A smith is ten miles off: they'll do without a nailor a staple. A taylor is far from them: they'll botch their own clothes.It is being concentrated which produces high convenience[61].'Sir William Forbes, Mr. Scott, and I, accompanied Mr. Johnson to thechapel[62], founded by Lord Chief Baron Smith, for the Service of theChurch of England. The Reverend Mr. Carre, the senior clergyman,preached from these words, 'Because the Lord reigneth, let the earth beglad[63].' I was sorry to think Mr. Johnson did not attend to thesermon, Mr. Carre's low voice not being strong enough to reach hishearing. A selection of Mr. Carre's sermons has, since his death, beenpublished by Sir William Forbes[64], and the world has acknowledgedtheir uncommon merit. I am well assured Lord Mansfield has pronouncedthem to be excellent.Here I obtained a promise from Lord Chief Baron Orde[65], that he woulddine at my house next day. I presented Mr. Johnson to his Lordship, whopolitely said to him, I have not the honour of knowing you; but I hopefor it, and to see you at my house. I am to wait on you to-morrow.' Thisrespectable English judge will be long remembered in Scotland, where hebuilt an elegant house, and lived in it magnificently. His own amplefortune, with the addition of his salary, enabled him to be splendidlyhospitable. It may be fortunate for an individual amongst ourselves tobe Lord Chief Baron; and a most worthy man now has the office; but, inmy opinion, it is better for Scotland in general, that some of ourpublick employments should be filled by gentlemen of distinction fromthe south side of the Tweed, as we have the benefit of promotion inEngland. Such an interchange would make a beneficial mixture of manners,and render our union more complete. Lord Chief Baron Orde was on goodterms with us all, in a narrow country filled with jarring interests andkeen parties; and, though I well knew his opinion to be the same with myown, he kept himself aloof at a very critical period indeed, when the_Douglas cause_ shook the sacred security of _birthright_ in Scotlandto its foundation; a cause, which had it happened before the Union, whenthere was no appeal to a British House of Lords, would have left thegreat fortress of honours and of property in ruins[66]. When we got