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Fort Augustus.

[August 30. She asked us to sit down and take a dram. I saw one chair. She said she was as happy as any woman in Scotland. She could hardly speak any English except a few detached words. Dr. Johnson was pleased at seeing, for the first time, such a state of human life. She asked for snuff. She asked for snuff. It is her luxury, and she uses a great deal. We had none; but gave her sixpence a piece. She then brought out her whiskey bottle. I tasted it; as did Joseph and our guides, so I gave her sixpence more. She sent us away with many prayers in Erse.

We dined at a publick house called the General's Hut', from General Wade, who was lodged there when he commanded in the North. Near it is the meanest parish Kirk I ever saw. It is a shame it should be on a high road. After dinner, we passed through a good deal of mountainous country. I had known Mr. Trapaud, the deputy governour of Fort Augustus, twelve years ago, at a circuit at Inverness, where my father was judge. I sent forward one of our guides, and Joseph, with a card to him, that he might know Dr. Johnson and I were coming up, leaving it to him to invite us or not. It was dark when we arrived. The inn was wretched. Government ought to build one, or give the resident governour an additional salary; as in the present state of things, he must necessarily be put to a great expence in entertaining travellers. Joseph announced to us, when we alighted, that the governour waited for us at the gate of the fort. We walked to it. He met us, and with much civility conducted us to his house. It was comfortable to find ourselves in a wellbuilt little square, and a neatly furnished house, in good company, and with a good supper before us; in short, with all the conveniences of civilised life in the midst of rude mountains. Mrs. Trapaud, and the governour's daughter, and her husband, Captain Newmarsh, were all most obliging and polite. The governour had excellent animal spirits, the conversation of a

It is very odd, that when these roads were made, there was no care taken for Inns. The King's House, and the General's Hut, are miserable places; but the project and plans were purely military. WALTER SCOTT. Johnson found good entertainment here. 'We had eggs and

bacon and mutton, with wine, rum, and whisky. I had water.' Piozzi Letters, i. 124.

2 'Mr. Boswell, who between his father's merit and his own is sure of reception wherever he comes, sent a servant before,' &c. Johnson's Works, ix. 30.

soldier,

August 31.]

Governour Trapaud.

135

soldier, and somewhat of a Frenchman, to which his extraction entitles him. He is brother to General Cyrus Trapaud. We passed a very agreeable evening'.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 31.

The governour has a very good garden. We looked at it, and at the rest of the fort, which is but small, and may be commanded from a variety of hills around. We also looked at the galley or sloop belonging to the fort, which sails upon the Loch, and brings what is wanted for the garrison. Captains Urie and Darippe, of the 15th regiment of foot, breakfasted with us. They had served in America, and entertained Dr. Johnson much with an account of the Indians. He said, he could make a very pretty book out of them, were he to stay there. Governour Trapaud was much struck with Dr. Johnson. 'I like to hear him, (said he,) it is so majestick. I should be glad to hear him speak in your court.' He pressed us to stay dinner; but I considered that we had a rude road before us, which we could more easily encounter in the morning, and that it was hard to say when we might get up, were we to sit down to good entertainment, in good company: I therefore begged the governour would excuse us. Here too, I had another very pleasing proof how much my father is regarded. The governour expressed the highest respect for him, and bade me tell him, that, if he would come that way on the Northern circuit, he would do him all the honours of the garrison.

Between twelve and one we set out, and travelled eleven miles, through a wild country, till we came to a house in Glenmorison, called Anoch, kept by a M'Queen3. Our landlord was

'On April 6, 1777, Johnson noted down I passed the night in such sweet uninterrupted sleep as I have not known since I slept at Fort Augustus.' Pr. and Med. p. 159. On Nov. 21, 1778, he wrote to Boswell: The best night that I have had these twenty years was at Fort Augustus.' Ante, iii. 369.

2 See ante, iii. 246.

3A M'Queen is a Highland mode

of expression. An Englishman would say one M'Queen. But where there are clans or tribes of men, distinguished by patronymick surnames, the individuals of each are considered as if they were of different species, at least as much as nations are distinguished; so that a M'Queen, a M'Donald, a M'Lean, is said, as we say a Frenchman, an Italian, a Spaniard. BOSWELL.

a sensible

136

Treating a party of soldiers.

[August 31.

a sensible fellow; he had learned his grammar1, and Dr. Johnson justly observed, that 'a man is the better for that as long as he lives.' There were some books here: a Treatise against Drunkenness, translated from the French; a volume of The Spectator; a volume of Prideaux's Connection, and Cyrus's Travels. M'Queen said he had more volumes; and his pride seemed to be much piqued that we were surprised at his having books.

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Near to this place we had passed a party of soldiers, under a serjeant's command, at work upon the road. We gave them two shillings to drink. They came to our inn, and made merry in the barn. We went and paid them a visit, Dr. Johnson saying, Come, let's go and give 'em another shilling a-piece.' We did so; and he was saluted 'MY LORD' by all of them. He is really generous, loves influence, and has the way of gaining it. He said, 'I am quite feudal, Sir.' Here I agree with him. I said, I regretted I was not the head of a clan; however, though not possessed of such an hereditary advantage, I would always endeavour to make my tenants follow me. I could not be a patriarchal chief, but I would be a feudal chief.

The poor soldiers got too much liquor. Some of them fought, and left blood upon the spot, and cursed whiskey next morning. The house here was built of thick turfs, and thatched with thinner turfs and heath. It had three rooms in length, and a little room which projected. Where we sat, the side-walls were wainscotted, as Dr. Johnson said, with wicker, very neatly plaited. Our landlord had made the whole with his own hands.

After dinner, M'Queen sat by us a while, and talked with us. He said, all the Laird of Glenmorison's people would bleed for

'I praised the propriety of his language, and was answered that I need not wonder, for he had learnt it by grammar. By subsequent opportunities of observation I found that my host's diction had nothing pecu

liar. Those Highlanders that can speak English commonly speak it well, with few of the words and little of the tone by which a Scotchman is distinguished By their Lowland

...

neighbours they would not willingly be taught; for they have long considered them as a mean and degenerate race.' Johnson's Works, ix. 31. He wrote to Mrs. Thrale: "This man's conversation we were glad of while we staid. He had been out, as they call it, in forty-five, and still retained his old opinions.' Piozzi Letters, i. 130.

2

By the Chevalier Ramsay.

August 31.]

Life of a sailor.

137

him, if they were well used; but that seventy men had gone out of the Glen to America. That he himself intended to go next year; for that the rent of his farm, which twenty years ago was only five pounds, was now raised to twenty pounds. That he could pay ten pounds and live; but no more1. Dr. Johnson said, he wished M'Queen laird of Glenmorison, and the laird to go to America. M'Queen very generously answered, he should be sorry for it; for the laird could not shift for himself in America as he could do.

I talked of the officers whom we had left to-day; how much service they had seen, and how little they got for it, even of fame. JOHNSON. 'Sir, a soldier gets as little as any man can get.' BOSWELL. 'Goldsmith has acquired more fame than all the officers last war, who were not Generals'.' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, you will find ten thousand fit to do what they did, before you find one who does what Goldsmith has done. You must consider, that a thing is valued according to its rarity. A pebble that paves the street is in itself more useful than the diamond upon a lady's finger.' I wish our friend Goldsmith had heard this3.

I yesterday expressed my wonder that John Hay, one of our guides, who had been pressed aboard a man of war, did not choose to continue in it longer than nine months, after which time he got off. JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, no man will be a sailor, who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for, being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned".'

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and said, "Here's our friend.
poor doctor would have been happy
to hear of this." Ante, iii. 162.

See ante, i. 348 and ii. 438, and post, Sept. 23. Mackintosh says: 'Johnson's idea that a ship was a prison with the danger of drowning is taken from Endymion Porter's Consolation to Howell on his imprisonment in the Fleet, and was originally suggested by the pun.' Life of Mackintosh, ii. 83. The passage to which he refers is found in Howell's letter of Jan. 2, 1646 (book ii. letter 39), in which he writes to Porter :- You go on to We

138

COCKER'S ARITHMETIC.

[August 31.

We had tea in the afternoon, and our landlord's daughter, a modest civil girl, very neatly drest, made it for us. She told us, she had been a year at Inverness, and learnt reading and writing, sewing, knotting', working lace, and pastry. Dr. Johnson made her a present of a book which he had bought at Inverness2.

The room had some deals laid across the joists, as a kind of ceiling. There were two beds in the room, and a woman's gown was hung on a rope to make a curtain of separation between them. Joseph had sheets, which my wife had sent with us, laid on them. We had much hesitation, whether to

prefer my captivity in this Fleet to that of a voyager at sea, in regard that he is subject to storms and springing of leaks, to pirates and picaroons, with other casualties.'

See ante, iii. 242.

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2 This book has given rise to much enquiry, which has ended in ludicrous surprise. Several ladies, wishing to learn the kind of reading which the great and good Dr. Johnson esteemed most fit for a young woman, desired to know what book he had selected for this Highland nymph. They never adverted (said he) that I had no choice in the matter. I have said that I presented her with a book which I happened to have about me.' And what was this book? My readers, prepare your features for merriment. It was Cocker's Arithmetick! · Wherever this was mentioned, there was a loud laugh, at which Johnson, when present, used sometimes to be a little angry. One day, when we were dining at General Oglethorpe's, where we had many a valuable day, I ventured to interrogate him. 'But, Sir, is it not somewhat singular that you should happen to have Cocker's Arithmetick about you on your journey? What made you buy such a book at Inverness?' He gave me a very sufficient answer. 'Why, Sir, if you are to have but one book with you upon a journey, let it be a book

of science. When you have read through a book of entertainment, you know it, and it can do no more for you; but a book of science is inexhaustible.' BOSWELL.

Johnson thus mentions his gift: 'I presented her with a book which I happened to have about me, and should not be pleased to think that she forgets me.' Works, ix. 32. The first edition of Cocker's Arithmetic was published about 1660. Brit. Mus. Cata. Though Johnson says that 'a book of science is inexhaustible,' yet in The Rambler, No. 154, he asserts that the principles of arithmetick and geometry may be comprehended by a close attention in a few days.' Mrs. Piozzi says (Anec. p. 77) that 'when Mr. Johnson felt his fancy disordered, his constant recurrence was to arithmetic; and one day that he was confined to his chamber, and I enquired what he had been doing to divert himself, he shewed me a calculation which I could scarce be made to understand, so vast was the plan of it; no other indeed than that the national debt, computing it at £180,000,000, would, if converted into silver, serve to make a meridian of that metal, I forget how broad, for the globe of the whole earth.' See ante, iii. 207, and iv. 171, note 3.

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