this "prosperous gentleman," was not there. The old tower must be of great antiquity. There is a draw-bridge, what has been a moat, and an ancient court. There is a hawthorn-tree, which rises like a wooden pillar through the rooms of the castle; for, by a strange conceit, the walls have been built round it. The thickness of the walls, the small slanting windows, and a great iron door at the entrance on the second storey as you ascend the stairs, all indicate the rude times in which this castle was erected. There were here some large venerable trees.*

work are somewhat Johnsonian in expression: e. g., "Silver and gold, stately houses and costly furniture, together with the fantastic luxury of dress and the table, they neither have nor desire. To rise in fleets and armies, amidst infinite toils and dangers; to earn posts or pensions, after having wriggled themselves into the favour of the great, at the expense of honour and conscience; to create overgrown estates, after having practised all the vile arts of avarice, frauds, extortion and servility, are passions and wishes which Providence has kindly concealed from them. The humble blessings of bread and wild-fowl, of peaceful cottages and little flocks, of angling-rods and huntingropes, are all the riches, honours, and profits they aspire after. If at a distance from the seats of justice, they are absolute strangers to the law's delays; if ignorant and unphilosophical, they are libertines neither in belief or practice, nor with learned speculations strike at the foundation of virtue, nor produce any breach of the public tranquillity or happiness."-See "Wilson's Voyage Round Scotland," 1842, in which there is a highly interesting account of St. Kilda. The population of the little island consists of about a score of families, or 105 souls, who pay their rent (about 607.) by means of the feathers of sea-fowl, of which united they are bound to contribute 240 stones, and each family also gives the proprietor twenty-three pecks of barley every year. The solan geese, fulmar, and other varieties of sea-fowl on the coast are innumerable, and the men arc bold cragsmen. Mr. Wilson was much struck with their fearless mode of collecting the

eggs and young of the various sea-fowì, from the faces of the vast precipitous cliffs

which overhang the sea.-ED.]

* The royal licence to build and fortify a castle at Calder was granted by James II., in the year 1454. From the nature of the ground the castle could never have been surrounded by a moat, properly so called, but by a dry fosse or ditch. The hawthorn-tree does not rise "through the rooms of the castle," but merely reaches the top of an arched vault or dungeon, in the centre of the structure, which had been built over the tree on the rock. The iron door securing this gloomy and singular apartment was carried off from Lochindorb Castle by special permission from the Crown. The Campbells acquired the estate by marriage, in 1510. A certain Thane dying in 1494, left a posthumous child, a daughter, named Muriel, or Marion. She was carried off when about six years of age by Campbell, of Inverliver, who came with a following of sixty men. Muriel's grandmother, in order to identify the child, seared and marked her on the hip with a key, and her two uncles, Alexander and Hugh Calder, pursued the party with what assistance they could muster. A conflict took place in Strathnairn; Campbell sent forward the child under an escort, and dressed up a sheaf of corn to represent the young heiress. The ruse succeeded; Muriel was taken off, and ultimately became the wife of Sir John Campbell, third son of Argyle. In the heat of the conflict between the Campbells and Calders, when the tide seemed to run against the former, Inverliver exclaimed in Gaelic, "It is a far cry to Loch Awe, and a distant help to the Campbells;" a saying which became proverbial in the north, to express imminent danger and distant relief. Boswell's friend, the "prosperous gentleman," was John Campbell, Esq., M.P. who died in 1779, and was succeeded by his grandson. The latter was elevated to the peerage in 1796, by the title of Lord Cawdor. The tradition as to the site of the castle and the mysterious hawthorn-tree is, that a wise man counselled the Thane to load an ass with a chest

I was afraid of a quarrel between Dr. Johnson and Mr. Macaulay, who talked slightingly of the lower English clergy. The Doctor gave him a frowning look, and said, "This is a day of novelties; I have seen old trees in Scotland, and I have heard the English clergy treated with disrespect."

I dreaded that a whole evening at Calder manse would be heavy; however, Mr. Grant, an intelligent and well-bred minister in the neighbourhood [parish of Daviot] was there, and assisted us by his conversation. Dr. Johnson, talking of hereditary occupations in the Highlands, said, "There is no harm in such a custom as this; but it is wrong to enforce it, and oblige a man to be a tailor or a smith because his father has been one." This custom, however, is not peculiar to our Highlands; it is well known that in India a similar practice prevails.

Mr. Macaulay began a rhapsody against creeds and confessions. Dr. Johnson showed that what he called imposition was only a voluntary declaration of agreement in certain articles of faith, which a Church has a right to require, just as any other society can insist on certain rules being observed by its members. Nobody is compelled to be of the Church, as nobody is compelled to enter into a society. This was a very clear and just view of the subject; but Macaulay could not be driven out of his track. Dr. Johnson said, Sir, you are a bigot to laxness."

Mr. Macaulay and I laid the map of Scotland before us, and he pointed out a route for us from Inverness, by Fort Augustus, to Glenelg, Sky, Mull, Icolmkill, Lorn, and Inverary, which I wrote down. As my father was to begin the northern circuit about the 18th of September, it was necessary for us either to make our tour with great expedition so as to get to Auchinleck before he set out, or to protract it so as not to be there till his return, which would be about the 10th of October. By Macaulay's calculation we were not to land in Lorn till the 20th of September. I thought that the interruptions by bad days, or by occasional excursions, might make full of gold, and to build his castle with the money, at the third hawthorn-tree at which the animal should stop. A similar tradition is related as to the site of the ruined Abbey of Altenberg, in Germany. The monks devolved upon an ass the choice of the situation for their new convent, and loaded him with the money to be expended on the building. "He went on till he entered a shady grove, that affords a delicious refuge from the burning rays of the afternoon sun, and stopped where a bright rivulet, trickling from the Spechtshard, and marking its course by a strip of the liveliest green, fell into the beautiful Dhun. His sonorous voice was drowned in the exulting psalms of the monks, and on this, the loveliest spot of the whole valley, the sacred edifice was erected." ("Byways of History," by Mrs. Percy Sinnett, 1847.) The ass of Cawdor was no less choice in his taste. The site of the castle, on the edge of a romantic, richly-wooded stream, is eminently picturesque and beautiful.-ED.

it ten days later; and I thought, too, that we might perhaps go to Benbecula, and visit Clanranald, which would take a week of itself.

Dr. Johnson went up with Mr. Grant to the library, which consisted of a tolerable collection; but the Doctor thought it rather a lady's library, with some Latin books in it by chance, than the library of a clergyman. It had only two of the Latin fathers, and one of the Greek fathers in Latin. I doubted whether Dr. Johnson would be present at a Presbyterian prayer. I told Mr. Macaulay

so, and said that the Doctor might sit in the library while we were at family worship. Mr. Macaulay said he would omit it rather than give Dr. Johnson offence; but I would by no means agree that an excess of politeness, even to so great a man, should prevent what I esteem as one of the best pious regulations. I know nothing more beneficial, more comfortable, more agreeable than that the little societies of each family should regularly assemble and unite in praise and prayer to our heavenly Father, from whom we daily receive so much good, and may hope for more in a higher state of existence. I mentioned to Dr. Johnson the over-delicate scrupulosity of our host; he said he had no objection to hear the prayer. This was a pleasing surprise to me, for he refused to go and hear Principal Robertson preach. "I will hear him," said he, "if he will get up into a tree and preach; but I will not give a sanction by my presence to a Presbyterian assembly."

Mr. Grant having prayed, Dr. Johnson said his prayer was a very good one, but objected to his not having introduced the Lord's Prayer. He told us that an Italian of some note in London said once to him, "We have in our service a prayer called the Pater Noster,' which is a very fine composition. I wonder who is the author of it." A singular instance of ignorance in a man of some literature and general inquiry!

SATURDAY, AUGUST 28.

Dr. Johnson had brought a Sallust with him in his pocket from Edinburgh. He gave it last night to Mr. Macaulay's son, a smart young lad about eleven years old. Dr. Johnson had given an account of the education at Oxford, in all its gradations. The advantage of being a servitor to a youth of little fortune struck Mrs. Macaulay much. I observed it aloud. Dr. Johnson very handsomely and kindly said that if they would send their boy to him when he was ready for the University, he would get him made a servitor, and would perhaps do more for him. He could not promise to do more, but would undertake for the servitorship.*

* Dr. Johnson did not neglect what he had undertaken. By his interest with the

I should have mentioned that Mr. White, a Welshman, who has been many years factor (i. e. steward) on the estate of Calder, drank tea with us last night, and upon getting a note from Mr. Macaulay, asked us to his house. We had not time to accept his invitation. He gave us a letter of introduction to Mr. Ferne, master of stores at Fort George. He showed it to me; it recommended "two celebrated gentlemen; no less than Dr. Johnson, author of his 'Dictionary,' and Mr. Boswell, known at Edinburgh by the name of Paoli." He said he hoped I had no objection to what he had written, if I had he would alter it. I thought it was a pity to check his effusions, and acquiesced; taking care, however, to seal the letter, that it might not appear that I had read it.

A conversation took place about saying grace at breakfast (as we do in Scotland) as well as at dinner and supper; in which Dr. Johnson said, "It is enough if we have stated seasons of prayer, no matter when. A man may as well pray when he mounts his horse, or a woman when she milks her cow (which Mr. Grant told us is done in the Highlands), as at meals; and custom is to be followed."*

We proceeded to Fort George. When we came into the square, I sent a soldier with the letter to Mr. Ferne. He came to us immediately, and along with him came Major Brewse, of the Engineers, pronounced Bruce. He said he believed it was originally the same Norman name with Bruce. That he had dined at a house in London where were three Bruces, one of the Irish line, one of the Scottish line, and himself of the English line. He said he was

shown it in the Heralds' Office spelt fourteen different ways. I told him the different spellings of my name. Dr. Johnson observed that there had been great disputes about the spelling of Shakspeare's name; at last it was thought that it would be settled by looking at the original copy of his will; but, upon examining it, he was found to have written it himself no less than three different ways.‡

Rev. Dr. Adams, master of Pembroke College, Oxford, where he was educated for some time, he obtained a servitorship for young Macaulay. But it seems he had other views; and I believe went abroad.-BoSWELL. [The death of his father, and consequently reduced circumstances of the family, had probably frustrated the scheme. The Rev. Kenneth Macaulay died at Calder, in 1779, and was succeeded by Mr. Grant, mentioned above.-ED.]

* He could not bear to have it thought that, in any instance whatever, the Scots are more pious than the English. I think grace as proper at breakfast as at any other meal. It is the pleasantest meal we have. Dr. Johnson has allowed the peculiar merit of breakfast in Scotland.-BOSWELL.

+ Built after the rebellion of 1745, and constructed for a garrison of about two thousand men. It is the most complete fort in the United Kingdom.-ED.

The three signatures of the poet attached to his will in Doctors' Commons are so indistinctly written, that it is impossible to tell how he spelt his name. Two othersexist, connected with a purchase in the Blackfriars. Fac-similes of the whole have

Mr. Ferne and Major Brewse first carried us to wait on Sir Eyre Coote, whose regiment, the 37th, was lying here, and who then commanded the fort. He asked us to dine with him, which we agreed to do.

Before dinner we examined the fort. The Major explained the fortification to us, and Mr. Ferne gave us an account of the stores. Dr. Johnson talked of the proportions of charcoal and saltpetre in making gunpowder, of granulating it, and of giving it a gloss. He made a very good figure upon these topics. He said to me afterwards that he had talked ostentatiously. We reposed ourselves a little in Mr. Ferne's house. He had everything in neat order as in England, and a tolerable collection of books. I looked into Pennant's "Tour in Scotland." He says little of this fort, but that "the barracks, &c., form several streets." This is aggrandising. Mr. Ferne observed, if he had said they formed a square, with a row of buildings before it, he would have given a juster description. Dr. Johnson remarked, How seldom descriptions correspond with realities; and the reason is that people do not write them till some time after, and then their imagination has added circumstances."

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We talked of Sir Adolphus Oughton. The Major said he knew a great deal for a military man.-JOHNSON: " Sir, you will find few men of any profession who know more. Sir Adolphus is a very extraordinary man; a man of boundless curiosity and unwearied diligence."

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I know not how the Major contrived to introduce the contest between Warburton and Lowth.-JOHNSON : Warburton kept his temper all along, while Lowth was in a passion. Lowth published some of Warburton's letters. Warburton drew him on to write some very abusive letters, and then asked his leave to publish them; which he knew Lowth could not refuse after what he had done. So that Warburton contrived that he should publish, appa rently with Lowth's consent, what could not but show Lowth in a disadvantageous light.”*

been carefully engraved, but the orthography is still unsettled. The poet seems to have dashed off his signature carelessly, little fancying that it was to be examined and debated, like the will in Swift's satire, totidem syllabis and totidem literis. The clerks spell it Shackspeare, which seems to mark the common pronunciation. There may have been, as Mr. Hunter suggests, a rustic and a courtly mode-Mr. Shackspeare in the country, and in polished or scholastic circles, as in poetry, the more stately Shakespeare. A copy of Florio's Montaigne, 1609, now in the British Museum, bears the poet's name on a blank page, and in this instance the spelling is clearly "Shakspere ;" but doubts are entertained as to the genuineness of the signature. The poems, "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucrece"-the only works which we know to have been published. by the poet himself-have the name printed on the title-page "Shake-speare.”—ED. * Here Dr. Johnson gave us part of a conversation held between a Great Personage