jection, nor the following observation." The following observation which Mr. Croker cannot understand is simply this: "In matters of genealogy," says Johnson, "it is necessary to give the bare names as they are. But in poetry, and in prose of any elegance in the writing, they require to have inflection given to them." If Mr. Croker had told Johnson that this was unintelligible, the doctor would probably have replied, as he replied on another occasion, "1 have found you a reason, sir; I am not bound to find you an understanding." Everybody who knows anything of Latinity knows that, in genealogical tables, Joannes Baro de Carteret, or Vicecomes de Carteret, may be tolerated, but that in compositions which pretend to elegance, Carteretus, or some other form which admits of inflection, ought to be used. All our readers have doubtless seen the two distichs of Sir William Jones, respecting the division of the time of a lawyer. One of the distichs is translated from some old Latin lines, the other is original. The former runs thus: "Six hours to sleep, to law's grave study six, Four spend in prayer, the rest on nature fix." "Rather," says Sir William Jones, "Six hours to law, to soothing slumbers seven, "Sir The second couplet puzzles Mr. Croker strangely. William," says he, "has shortened his day to twenty-three hours, and the general advice of 'all to heaven,' destroys the peculiar appropriation of a certain period to religious exercise."* Now, we did not think that it was in human dulness to miss the meaning of the lines so completely Sir William distributes twenty-three hours among various employments. One hour is thus left for devotion. The reader expects that the verse will end with-"and one to heaven." The whole point of the lines consist in the unexpected substitution of "all" for "one." The conceit is wretched enough; but it is perfectly intelligible, and never, we will venture to say, perplexed man, woman, or child before. Poor Tom Davies, after failing in business, tried to live * V. 233. by his pen. Johnson called him "an author generated by the corruption of a bookseller." This is a very obvious and even a commonplace allusion to the famous dogma of the old physiologists. Dryden made a similar allusion to the dogma before Johnson was born. Mr. Croker, however, is unable to understand it. "The expression," he says, "seems not quite clear." And he proceeds to talk about the generation of insects, about bursting into gaudier life, and Heaven knows what.* There is a still stranger instance of the editor's talent for finding out difficulty in what is perfectly plain. "No man," said Johnson, can now be made a bishop for his learning and piety." "From this too just observation," says Boswell, there are some eminent exceptions." Mr. Croker is puzzled by Boswell's very natural and simple language. That a general observation should be pronounced too just, by the very person who admits, that it is not universally just, is not a little odd."+ A very large portion of the two thousand five hundred notes which the editor boasts of having added to those of Boswell and Malone, consists of the flattest and poorest reflections-reflections such as the least intelligent reader is quite competent to make for himself, and such as no intelligent reader would think it worth while to utter aloud. They remind us of nothing so much as of those profound and interesting annotations which are pencilled by sempstresses and apothecaries' boys on the dog-eared margins of novels borrowed from circulating libraries-"How beautiful!"-" cursed prosy"-"I don't like Sir Reginald Malcolm at all"-"I think Pelham is a sad dandy." Croker is perpetually stopping us in our progress through the most delightful narrative in the language, to observe, that really Dr. Johnson was very rude; that he talked morc for victory than for truth; that his taste for port-wine with capillaire in it was very odd; that Boswell was impertinent; that it was foolish in Mrs. Thrale to marry the music-master; and other "merderies" of the same kind, to borrow the energetic word of Rabelais. Mr. We cannot speak more favourably of the manner in which the notes are written, than of the matter of which they con * IV. 323. VOL. II.-3 † III. 228. sist. We find in every page words used in wrong senses, and constructions which violate the plainest rules of grammar. We have the low vulgarism of "mutual friend," for "common friend." We have "fallacy" used as synony mous with "falsehood," or "misstatement." We have many such inextricable labyrinths of pronouns as that which follows: "Lord Erskine was fond of this anecdote; he told it to the editor the first time that he had the honour of being in his company." Lastly, we have a plentiful supply of sentences resembling those which we subjoin. "Markland, who, with Jartin and Thirlby, Johnson calls three contemporaries of great eminence."** "Warburton him self did not feel, as Mr. Boswell was disposed to think he did, kindly or gratefully of Johnson ?" "It was him that Horace Walpole called a man who never made a bad figure but as an author." We must add that the printer has done his best to fill both the text and notes with all sorts of blunders; and he and the editor have between them made the book so bad, that we do not well see how it could have been worse. to us. When we turn from the commentary of Mr. Croker to the work of our old friend Boswell, we find it not only worse printed than in any other edition with which we are acquainted, but mangled in the most wanton manner. Much that Boswell inserted in his narrative is, without the shadow of a reason, degraded to the appendix. The editor has also taken upon himself to alter or omit passages which he considers as indecorous. This prudery is quite unintelligible There is nothing immoral in Boswell's book-nothing which tends to inflame the passions. He sometimes uses plain words. But if this be a taint which requires expurgation, it would be desirable to begin by expurgating the morning and evening lessons. Mr. Croker has performed the delicate office which he has undertaken in the most capricious manner. A strong, old-fashioned, English word, familiar to all who read their Bibles, is exchanged for a softer synomyne in some passages, and suffered to stand unaltered in others. In one place, a faint allusion made by Johnson to an indelicate subject-an allusion so faint that, till Mr. Croker's note pointed it out to us, we had never I II. 461. * IV. 377. † IV. 415. noticed it, and of which we are quite sure that the meaning would never be discovered by any of those for whose sake books are expurgated-is altogether omitted. In another place, a coarse and stupid jest of Doctor Taylor, on the same subject, expressed in the broadest language-almost the only passage, as far as we remember, in all Boswell's book, which we should have been inclined to leave out-is suffered to remain. We complain, however, much more of the additions than of the omissions. We have half of Mrs. Thrale's book, scraps of Mr. Tyers, scraps of Mr. Murphy, scraps of Mr. Cradock, long prosings of Sir John Hawkins, and connecting observations by Mr. Croker himself, inserted into the midst of Boswell's text. To this practice we most decidedly object. An editor might as well publish Thucydides with extracts from Diodorus interspersed, or incorporate the lives of Suetonius with the History and Annals of Tacitus. Mr. Croker tells us, indeed, that he has done only what Boswell wished to do, and was prevented from doing by the law of copyright. We doubt this greatly. Boswell has studiously abstained from availing himself of the information contained in the works of his rivals, on many occasions on which he might have done so without subjecting himself to the charge of piracy. Mr. Croker has himself, on one occasion, remarked very justly that Boswell was very reluctant to owe any obligations to Hawkins. But be this as it may, if Boswell had quoted from Sir John and from Mrs. Thrale, he would have been guided by his own taste and judgment in selecting his quotations. On what he quoted, he would have commented with perfect freedom, and the borrowed passages, so selected, and accompanied by such comments, would have become original. They would have dovetailed into the work: no hitch, no crease would have been discernible. The whole would appear one and indivisible, Ut per læve severos, This is not the case with Mr. Croker's insertions. They are not chosen as Boswell would have chosen them. They are not introduced as Boswell would have introduced them. They differ from the quotations scattered through the origi nal life of Johnson, as a withered bough stuck in the ground differs from a tree skilfully transplanted, with all its life about it. Not only do these anecdotes disfigure Boswell's book; they are themselves disfigured by being inserted in his book. The charm of Mrs. Thrale's little volume is utterly destroyed. The feminine quickness of observation, the feminine softness of heart, the colloquial incorrectness and vivacity of style, the little amusing airs of a half-learned lady, the delightful garrulity, the "dear Doctor Johnson," the "it was so comical," all disappear in Mr. Croker's quo tations. The lady ceases to speak in the first person; and her anecdotes, in the process of transfusion, become as flat as champagne in decanters, or Herodotus in Beloe's version. Sir John Hawkins, it is true, loses nothing; and for the best of reasons. Sir John had nothing to lose. The course which Mr. Croker ought to have taken is quite clear. He should have reprinted Boswell's narrative precisely as Boswell wrote it; and in the notes or the appendix he should have placed any anecdotes which he might have thought it advisable to quote from other writers. This would have been a much more convenient course for the reader, who has now constantly to keep his eye on the margin in order to see whether he is perusing Boswell, Mrs. Thrale, Murphy, Hawkins, Tyers, Cradock, or Mr. Croker. We greatly doubt whether even the Tour to the Hebrides ought to have been inserted in the midst of the Life. one marked distinction between the two works. the Tour was seen by Johnson in manuscript. It does not appear that he ever saw any part of the Life. There is We love, we own, to read the great productions of the human mind as they were written. We have this feeling even about scientific treatises; though we know that the sciences are always in a state of progression, and that the alterations made by a modern editor in an old book on any branch of natural or political philosophy are likely to be improvements. Many errors have been detected by writers of this generation in the speculations of Adam Smith. A short cut has been made to much knowledge, at which Sir Isaac Newton arrived through arduous and circuitous paths. Yet we still look with peculiar veneration on the Wealth of Nations and on the Principia, and should regret to see aither of those great works garbled even by the ablest hands. |