: FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22. Before Dr. Johnson came to breakfast, Lady Lochbuy said, " he was a dungeon of wit;" a very common phrase in Scotland to express a profoundness of intellect, though he afterwards told ine, that he never had heard it. She proposed that he should have some cold sheep's-head for breakfast. Sir Allan seemed displeased at his sister's vulgarity, and wondered how such a thought should come into her head. From a mischievous love of sport, I took the lady's part; and very gravely said, "I think it is but fair to give him an offer of it. If he does not choose it, he may let it alone."—" I think so," said the lady, looking at her brother with an air of victory. Sir Allan, finding the matter desperate, strutted about the room, and took snuff. When Dr. Johnson came in, she called to him, "Do you choose any cold sheep's-head, sir?"--" No, MADAM," said he, with a tone of surprise and anger." It is here, sir," said she, supposing he had refused it to save the trouble of bringing it in. They thus went on at cross purposes, till he confirmed his refusal in a manner not to be misunderstood; while I sat quietly by, and enjoyed my suc cess. After breakfast, we surveyed the old castle, in the pit or dungeon of which Lochbuy had some years before taken upon him to imprison several persons; and though he had been fined in a considerable sum by the Court of Justiciary, he was so little affected by it, that while we were examining the dungeon, he said to me, with a smile, "Your father knows something of this;" (alluding to my father having sat as one of the judges on his trial.) Sir Allan whispered me, that the laird could not be persuaded that he had lost his heritable jurisdiction. We then set out for the ferry, by which we were to cross to the main land of Argyleshire. Lochbuy and Sir Allan accompanied us. We were told much of a war-saddle, on which this reputed Don Quixote used to be mounted; but we did not see it, for the young laird had applied it to a less noble purpose, having taken it to Falkirk fair with a drove of black cattle. We bade adieu to Lochbuy, and to our very kind conductor, Sir Allan M'Lean, on the shore of Mull, and then got into the ferry-boat, the bottom of which was strewed with branches of trees or bushes, upon which we sat. We had a good day and a fine passage, and in the evening landed at Oban, where we found a tolerable inn. After having been so long confined at different times in islands, from which it was always uncertain when we could get away, it was comfortable to be now on the main land, and to know that, if in health, we might get to any place in Scotland or England in a certain number of days. Here we discovered from the conjectures which were formed, that the people on the main land were entirely ignorant of our motions; for in a Glasgow news-paper we found a paragraph, which, as it contains a just and well-turned compliment to my illustrious friend, I shall here insert : "We are well assured that Dr. Johnson is con"fined by tempestuous weather to the isle of Sky; "it being unsafe to venture, in a small boat upon " such a stormy surge as is very common there at " this time of the year. Such a philosopher, de"tained on an almost barren island, resembles a "whale left upon the strand. The latter will be "welcome to every body, on account of its oil, "his bone, &c. and the other will charm his com"panions, and the rude inhabitants, with his supe"rior knowledge and wisdom, calm resignation, "and unbounded benevolence." SATURDAY, OCTOBER 23. After a good night's rest, we breakfasted at our leisure. We talked of Goldsmith's Traveller, of which Dr. Johnson spoke highly; and, while I was helping him on with his great coat, he repeated from it the character of the British nation, which he did with such energy, that the tear started into his eye : "Stern o'er each bosom reason holds her state, We could get but one bridle here, which, according to the maxim detur digniori, was appropriated to Dr. Johnson's sheltie. I and Joseph rode with halters. We crossed in a ferry-boat a pretty wide lake, and on the farther side of it, close by the shore, found a hut for our inn. We were much wet. I changed my clothes in part, and was at pains to get myself well dried. Dr. Johnson reso. lutely kept on all his clothes, wet as they were, letting them steam before the smoky turf fire. I thought him in the wrong; but his firmness was, perhaps, a species of heroism. I remember but little of our conversation. I mentioned Shenstone's saying of Pope, that he had the art of condensing sense more than any body. Dr. Johnson said, "It is not true, sir. There is more sense in a line of Cowley than in a page (or a sentence, or ten lines, I am not quite certain of the very phrase) of Pope." He maintained that Archibald, Duke of Argyle, was a narrow man. wondered at this; and observed, that his building so great a house at Inverary was not like a narrow man. "Sir, (said he,) when a narrow man has resolved to build a house, he builds it like another man, I But Archibald, Duke of Argyle, was narrow in his ordinary expences, in his quotidian expences." The distinction is very just. It is in the ordinary expences of life that a man's liberality or narrowness is to be discovered.-I never heard the word quotidian in this sense, and I imagined it to be a word of Dr. Johnson's own fabrication; but I have since found it in Young's Night Thoughts, (Night fifth,) "Death's a destroyer of quotidian prey." and in my friend's Dictionary, supported by the authorities of Charles I. and Dr. Donne. ner. It rained very hard as we journied on after dinThe roar of torrents from the mountains, as we passed along in the dusk, and the other circumstances attending our ride in the evening, have been mentioned with so much animation by Dr. Johnson, that I shall not attempt to say any thing on the subject. 4 We got at night to Inverary, where we found an excellent inn. Even here, Dr. Johnson would not change his wet clothes. The prospect of good accommodation cheered us much. We supped well; and after supper, Dr. Johnson, whom I had not seen taste any fermented liquor during all our travels, called for a gill of whiskey. "Come (said he,) let me know what it is that makes a Scotchman happy!" He drank it all but a drop, which I begged leave to pour into my glass, that I might say we had drunk whisky together. I proposed Mrs. Thrale should be our toast. He would not have her drunk in whisky, but rather " some insular lady;" so we drank one of the ladies whom we had lately left.-He owned tonight, that he got as good a room and bed as at an English inn. I had here the pleasure of finding a letter from home, which relieved me from the anxiety I had suffered, in consequence of not having received any account of my family for many weeks. I also found a letter from Mr. Garrick, which was a regale as agreeable as a pine-apple would be in a desert. He had favoured me with his correspondence for many years; and when Dr. Johnson and I were at Inverness, I had written to him as follows: "MY DEAR SIR, Inverness, Sunday, 29 Augúst, 1773. "HERE I am, and Mr. Samuel Johnson actually with me. We were a night at Fores, in coming to which, in the dusk of the evening, we passed over the bleak and blasted heath where Mac 1 |