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gathered up and given to the world, I have myself taken part in the work, — and the world has quite properly neglected it, preferring Boswell.

Immediately after the appearance of the "Tour" Boswell began his preparations for writing the "Life." His first task was to collect Johnson's letters and such reminiscences of him as seemed authentic. He made application by letter to Bishop Percy, the Reverend Dr. Adams of Oxford, Francis Barber (who had in his possession papers of the highest value to a biographer of Johnson), Anna Seward, and, no doubt, to a score of others. The material which he received from such contributors he often wrote down in their presence, or revised the written record in their presence. It is to be regretted that we have no account of any of these sessions, for they would have revealed the biographer at one of his most characteristic and important tasks, which must have exercised all the powers of insinuation and tact which he possessed.

He thought at first that he could finish the book by the spring of 1789; but the care of Auchinleck, the death of Mrs. Boswell in the early summer, and his ill-advised candidacy at the General Election for an ad interim membership in Parliament, conspired to prevent it. Moreover there was his master," Lord Lonsdale, upon whom it was neces

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sary to dance attendance and who frequently summoned Boswell to his table to provide amusement (of no literary kind) for his retainers or "Ninepins.'

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Yet, in spite of all interruptions, he had nearly completed the first draft before the year was out, and by February, 1790, he could say that it was fairly in the press. The printers of the eighteenth century were a long-suffering generation. They actually began the printing of a book before the author had completed the manuscript. When they had received enough copy to fill up a sheet, the type was set, and proofs were pulled and sent to the author for correction. When he returned them, the sheet was printed and folded, and the type in the form distributed. The printer's devil hovered between the compositors and the author, bearing proofs hot from the press and appeals for more copy. It is only by imagining such a state of affairs, alien enough from those of our day, that we can understand the circumstances of Boswell's life in 1790 and 1791, when his "great work" was passing through the press before he himself had completed the rough draft of it. He gasped sometimes at its ever-increasing magnitude, and baulked at first at the thought of two volumes.

His chief assistant in the work - a man who has never received his due for his generous and friendly service was Edmond Malone, the Shakespearean

scholar. Malone, as a member of the Literary Club, had known Johnson. He respected Boswell's genius. The friendship of the two men is said, by a somewhat doubtful anecdote, to have been cemented (if not actually formed) in 1785, in the printing-house, where Boswell found Malone examining with admiration one of the proof-sheets of the "Tour to the Hebrides." Malone's labours on the "Life" began with the revision of the rough draft of the manuscript, which Boswell read aloud to him in the quiet of Malone's "elegant study." Of the copy that was sent to the printer no sheet is known to exist; but we have two sets of proofsheets, both of which were scanned, in whole or in part, by Malone.

These proof-sheets are a fascinating study. Their owner, Mr. R. B. Adam (a Johnsonian scholar of no mean standing) has repeatedly provided me with opportunities for examining them. The first of the two sets covers only 224 pages of the first volume,' of which three signatures (I, K, and L) are lacking. The set consists exclusively of the sheets for which Boswell had demanded a second "revise," or corrected proof; so that the lack of the three signatures may merely indicate that, in these cases, no revision was asked for

1The references are to the first edition of the Life, London, 1791.

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Engraving by J. Scott, from a portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds

This famous Shakespearean commentator, a member of the Literary Club, rendered Boswell invaluable aid in preparing the manuscript and reading the proofs of the Life, of which he annotated four later editions

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