re-published; but not with perfect accuracy. I give it as dictated to me by 1775. himself, written down in his prefence, and authenticated by a note in his own Etat. 66. hand-writing, "This, I think, is a true copy."

"Mr. JAMES MACPHERSON,

" I RECEIVED your foolish and impudent letter. Any violence offered me I shall do my best to repel; and what I cannot do for myself, the law shall do for me. I hope I fhall never be deterred from detecting what I think a cheat, by the menaces of a ruffian.

"What would you have me retract? I thought your book an imposture; I think it an impofture ftill. For this opinion I have given my reasons to the publick, which I here dare you to refute. Your rage I defy. Your abilities, fince your Homer, are not fo formidable; and what I hear of your morals inclines me to pay regard not to what you shall fay, but to what you fhall prove. You may print this if you will.

"SAM. JOHNSON."

Mr. Macpherson little knew the character of Dr. Johnson, if he supposed that he could be easily intimidated; for no man was ever more remarkable for perfonal courage. He had, indeed, an aweful dread of death, or rather "of fomething after death;" and what rational man, who seriously thinks of quitting all that he has ever known, and going into a new and unknown state of being, can be without that dread? But his fear was from reflection, his courage natural. His fear, in that one instance, was the refult of philosophical and religious confideration. He feared death, but he feared nothing else, not even what might occafion death. Many instances of his refolution may be mentioned. One day, at Mr. Beauclerk's house in the country, when two large dogs were fighting, he went up to them, and beat them till they separated; and at another time, when told of the danger there was that a gun might burst if charged with many balls, he put in fix or feven, and fired it off against a wall. Mr. Langton told me, that when they were fwimming together near Oxford, he cautioned Dr. Johnson against a pool, which was reckoned particularly dangerous; upon which Johnfon directly fwam into it. He told me himself that one night he was attacked in the street by four men, to whom he would not yield, but kept them all at bay, till the watch came up, and carried both him and them to the round-house. In the play-house at Lichfield, as Mr. Garrick informed me, Johnson having for a moment quitted a chair which was placed for him between the fide-fcenes, a gentleman took

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poffeffion of it, and when Johnson on his return civilly demanded his feat, rudely Etat, 66. refufed to give it up; upon which Johnfon laid hold of him, and toffed him and the chair into the pit. Foote, who fo fuccessfully revived the old comedy, by exhibiting living characters, had refolved to imitate Johnfon on the stage, expecting great profits from his ridicule of fo celebrated a man. Johnson being informed of his intention, and being at dinner at Mr. Thomas Davies's the bookfeller, from whom I had the ftory, he afked Mr. Davies "what was the common price of an oak ftick;" and being anfwered fix-pence, "Why then, Sir, (faid he,) give me leave to fend your fervant to purchase me a fhilling one. I'll have a double quantity; for I am told Foote means to take me off, as he calls it, and I am determined the fellow fhall not do it with impunity.” Davies took care to acquaint Foote of this, which effectually checked the wantonnefs of the mimick. Mr. Macpherson's menaces made Johnson provide himself with the fame implement of defence; and had he been attacked, I have no doubt that, old as he was, he would have made his corporal prowess be felt as much as his intellectual.

A

His " Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland,*" is a most valuable performance. It abounds in extenfive philofophical views of fociety, and in ingenious fentiments and lively defcription. A confiderable part of it, indeed, confifts of fpeculations, which many years before he faw the wild regions which we vifited together, probably had employed his attention, though the actual fight of those fcenes undoubtedly quickened and augmented them. Mr. Orme, the very able historian, agreed with me in this opinion, which he thus ftrongly expreffed :-" There are in that book thoughts, which, by long revolution in the great mind of Johnson, have been formed and polished like pebbles rolled in the ocean!"

That he was to fome degree of excefs a true-born Englishman, fo as to have ever entertained an undue prejudice against both the country and the people of Scotland, must be allowed. But it was a prejudice of the head, and not of the heart. He had no ill will to the Scotch; for, if he had been confcious of that, he would never have thrown himself into the bofom of their country, and trufted to the protection of its remote inhabitants with a fearless confidence. His remark upon the nakednefs of the country, from its being denuded of trees, was made after having travelled two hundred miles along the eastern coaft, where certainly trees are not to be found near the road, and he said it was "a map of the road" which he gave. His difbelief of the authenticity of the poems afcribed to Offian, a Highland bard, was confirmed in the course of his journey, by a very strict examination of the evidence offered for it; and although

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their authenticity was made too much a national point by the Scotch, there were many respectable persons in that country who did not concur in this; Etat. 66. fo that his judgement upon the question ought not to be decried, even by those who differ from him. As to myfelf, I can only fay, upon a fubject now become very uninterefting, that when the fragments of Highland poetry first came out, I was much pleased with their wild peculiarity, and was one of those who fubfcribed to enable their editor, Mr. Macpherson, then a young man, to make a fearch in the Highlands and Hebrides for a long poem in the Erfe language, which was reported to be preserved fomewhere in those regions. But when there came forth an Epick Poem in fix books, with all the common circumstances of former compofitions of that nature; and when, upon an attentive examination of it, there was found a perpetual recurrence of the fame images which appear in the fragments; and when no ancient manuscript, to authenticate the work, was depofited in any publick library, though that was infifted on as a reasonable proof, who could forbear to doubt?

Johnson's grateful acknowledgements of kindneffes received in the courfe of this tour, completely refute the brutal reflections which have been thrown out against him, as if he had made an ungrateful return; and his delicacy in sparing in his book those who we find from his letters to Mrs. Thrale, were juft objects of cenfure, is much to be admired. His candour and amiable difpofition is confpicuous from his conduct, when informed by Mr. Macleod, of Rafay, that he had committed a mistake, which gave that gentleman fome uneafiness. He wrote him a courteous and kind letter, and inferted in the newspapers an advertisement, correcting the mistake.

The obfervations of my friend Mr. Dempfter in a letter written to me, foon after he had read Dr. Johnson's book, are so just and liberal, that they cannot be too often repeated:

"There is nothing in the book, from beginning to end, that a Scotchman need to take amifs. What he fays of the country is true; and his obfervations on the people are what muft naturally occur to a sensible, observing, and reflecting inhabitant of a convenient metropolis, where a man on thirty pounds a year may be better accommodated with all the little wants of life, than Col or Sir Allan..

"I am charmed with his refearches concerning the Erfe language, and the antiquity of their manufcripts. I am quite convinced, and I fhall rank Offian,

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and his Fingals and Oscars, amongst the nursery tales, not the true hiftory of Etat, 66. our country, in all time to come.

"Upon the whole, the book cannot difpleafe, for it has no pretenfions. The authour neither fays he is a geographer, nor an antiquarian, nor very learned in the hiftory of Scotland, nor a naturalift, nor a foffilift. The manners of the people, and the face of the country, are all he attempts to describe, or feems to have thought of. Much were it to be wifhed, that they who have travelled into more remote, and of courfe more curious regions, had all poffeffed his good fenfe. Of the state of learning, his obfervations on Glasgow University fhew he has formed a very found judgement. He understands our climate too; and he has accurately obferved the changes, however flow and imperceptible to us, which Scotland has undergone, in confequence of the bleffings of liberty and internal peace."

*

Mr. Knox, another native of Scotland, who has fince made the fame tour, and published an account of it, is equally liberal. "I have read (fays he,) his book again and again, travelled with him from Berwick to Glenelg, through countries with which I am well acquainted; failed with him from Glenelg to Rafay, Sky, Rum, Col, Mull, and Icolmkill, but have not been able to correct him in any matter of confequence. I have often admired the accuracy, the precifion, and the juftness of what he advances, refpecting both the country and the people.

"The Doctor has every where delivered his fentiments with freedom, and in many inftances with a feeming regard for the benefit of the inhabitants, and the ornament of the country. His remarks on the want of trees and hedges for fhade, as well as for fhelter to the cattle, are well founded, and merit the thanks, not the illiberal cenfure of the natives. He alfo felt for the diftreffes of the Highlanders, and explodes, with great propriety, the bad management of the grounds, and the neglect of timber in the Hebrides."

Having quoted Johnson's just compliments on the Rafay family, he says, "On the other hand, I found this family equally lavish in their encomiums upon the Doctor's converfation, and his fubfequent civilities to a young gentleman of that country, who, upon waiting upon him at London, was well received, and experienced all the attention and regard that a warm friend could bestow. Mr. Macleod having also been in London, waited upon the Doctor, who provided a magnificent and expensive entertainment, in honour of his old Hebridean acquaintance."

And

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And talking of the military road by Fort Auguftus, he fays, " By this road, though one of the most rugged in Great-Britain, the celebrated Dr. Johnson Etat. 66. paffed from Inverness to the Hebride Isles. His observations on the country

and people are extremely correct, judicious, and instructive"."

His private letters to Mrs. Thrale, written during the courfe of his journey, which therefore may be fuppofed to convey his genuine feelings at the time, abound in fuch benignant fentiments towards the people who fhewed him civilities, that no man whose temper is not very harsh and sour, can retain a doubt of the goodness of his heart.

It is painful to recollect with what rancour he was affailed by numbers: of fhallow irritable North-Britons, on account of his supposed injurious treatment of their country and countrymen, in his "Journey." Had there been any just ground for fuch a charge, would the virtuous and candid Dempster have given his opinion of the book, in the terms which I have quoted ?· Would the patriotick Knox have spoken of it as he has done? And let me add, that, citizen of the world as I hold myself to be, I have that degree of predilection for my natale folum, nay, I have that just sense of the merit of an ancient nation, which has been ever renowned for its valour, which in former times maintained its independence against a powerful neighbour, and in modern times has been equally distinguished for its ingenuity and industry in civilised life, that I should have felt a generous indignation at any injuftice done to it. Johnson treated Scotland no worse than he did even his best friends, whose characters he used to give as they appeared to him, both in light and fhade. Some people, who had not exercised their minds fufficiently, condemned him for cenfuring his friends. But Sir Joshua Reynolds, whofe philofophical penetration and justness of thinking are not lefs known to those who live with him, than his genius in his art is admired by the world, explained his conduct thus: "He was fond of difcrimination, which he could not fhew without pointing out the bad as well as the good in every character; and as his friends were those whofe characters he knew beft, they afforded him the best opportunity for fhewing the acuteness of his judgement."

He expreffed to his friend Mr. Windham of Norfolk, his wonder at the extreme jealousy of the Scotch, and their refentment at having their country described by him as it really was; when, to fay that it was a country as good.

7 Page 103.

& I obferve with much regret, while this work is paffing through the prefs, (Auguft, 1790,) that this ingenious gentleman is dead.

as.