not infrequently of that highly personal character which distinguishes whatever he did-"Let me have another Revise sent to Sir Joshua Reynolds's in Liecester [sic] Square, where I dine, and it shall be returned instantly." "I am sorry the compositor has so much trouble." “I shall see this at the Printing house to-morrow morning before it is thrown off. Tuesday." "This Remains till an answer comes from Dr. Warton." Few books have been read for the printer with more scrupulous care.

Malone saw the proof-sheets of three quarters of the book. His advice was generally intended to make the style smoother. For example, on page 84, he writes of Johnson's poem, "Friendship," which Boswell had introduced without sufficient explanation, "Something she be s about its appearing in this year & having been given by Mr. Hector." On page 124, he comments, "Too abrupt"; and adds a sentence of his own, to serve as introduction to Dr. Johnson's letter to Birch. By an odd error Dr. Birkbeck Hill assumed that Malone's handwriting was that of the "corrector" at the printing-house, and thus he missed the significance of some of the corrections. It was Malone, for example, who suggested to Boswell that he should suppress the mention of Johnson's hands as "not over-clean," in the famous scene which depicts Johnson as squeezing lemons into a

punch-bowl, and calling out, "Who's for poonsh?" "He must have been a stout man,' said Garrick, 'who would have been for it."" This remark, too, was cancelled at the same time.

Five of the signatures (or folded sheets of eight pages) are marked by Malone as approved for the press. These are Rr - Xx, and they contain no corrections in Boswell's hand. I judge that they were corrected by Malone during some illness or indisposition of Boswell's. It is to be feared that the joy of seeing his book in proof sometimes led our Boswell to convivial indulgence in port, which made the correction of his pages well-nigh impossible. At any rate, signature H (pages 49-56) shows plain evidence of such incapacity: for he has made four attempts to alter "the scantiness of his circumstances" to "Johnson's narrow circumstances," and has barely succeeded on the fourth attempt.

After November, 1790, Boswell had no further help from Malone, who was obliged to go to Ireland. A third hand appears in the proof-sheets when Malone's is no longer found. It may be that of Mr. Selfe, the "corrector" at the printing-office, but I do not think so; for Selfe read the proofsheets after they were returned by the author. The hand I cannot identify, but it is that of a learned man.

Some day there will probably be found a copy of the "Life" more interesting than any which is at present known to exist. I refer, of course, to Boswell's own copy. It may perhaps still be in the possession of the representatives of the Boswell family. I do not know. The Boswell family have persistently repulsed all scholars who have had the temerity to apply to them for assistance. But they have already sold Boswell's own copy of the "Tour," which is said to contain annotations by the author on nearly every page. When the author's copy of the "Life," is found, his annotations will enable some future critic of Boswell to complete this history of the composition of that work. Meanwhile, the reader no doubt feels that he has already had enough.

CHAPTER XI

THE MASTER OF AUCHINLECK

I HAVE called this book "Young Boswell" because it seemed to me that the spirit which imbued his entire literary work was essentially youthful. Even in the rôle of hero-worshipper, - a simple conception of him which has satisfied many critics,

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there is something of youth and its illusions. When Boswell was at his best, there were present in him the qualities associated with youth, fidence, buoyancy, hope, and an appetite for experience, - as well as the common faults of youth - self-indulgence and self-esteem. It may seem presumptuous to add, at the end of a book devoted to a study of this youthful spirit, a final chapter on the latter years. They are not a pleasant study. In them Boswell felt the swift retributions of middle age; but he kept until the very end, much of the boy about him. He was always expecting some happy turn of fortune or some revocation of the edict of destiny. As the misfortunes of his middle age crowded upon him, he murmured at his lot; yet there was, had he been able to realise it, a relentless consistency in his sufferings, for

they all sprang from an over-indulgence in his peculiar pleasures.

One of these was a passion for London, the like of which Johnson himself averred that he had never seen. Had Boswell been willing to live quietly at Auchinleck during nine months of the year, visiting the metropolis only during "the season," except when he was engaged in putting some literary work through the press, a very different end might have been his. But the old fire raged in his veins. He felt it necessary to transfer his residence to England, to send his sons to Eton and Westminster, respectively, and to educate his daughters in the ways of London society, eradicating every trace of the Edinburgh manner.

The first steps towards this were made possible by the death, in August, 1782, of Lord Auchinleck. Boswell was thereafter free from the restraints imposed upon him by a querulous and dissatisfied father. But he was not happy in his inheritance of the great estates at Auchinleck. He had embarrassed himself by debts, contracted in his father's lifetime, which were now a burden upon the estate and a serious reduction of the income from it. He might perhaps have relieved himself by alienating some of the recently acquired property, had he not taken as much pride as ever in being a member of the landed gentry and in