Mr. Arthur Lee mentioned some Scotch who had taken possession of a
barren part of America, and wondered why they should choose it. JOHNSON.
'Why, Sir, all barrenness is comparative. The SCOTCH would not know it
to be barren.' BOSWELL. 'Come, come, he is flattering the English. You
have now been in Scotland, Sir, and say if you did not see meat and
drink enough there.' JOHNSON. 'Why yes, Sir; meat and drink enough to
give the enhabitants sufficient strength to run away from home.' All
these quick and lively sallies were said sportively, quite in jest, and
with a smile, which showed that he meant only wit. Upon this topick
he and Mr. Wilkes could perfectly assimilate; here was a bond of union
between them, and I was conscious that as both of them had visited
Caledonia, both were fully satisfied of the strange narrow ignorance
of those who imagine that it is a land of famine. But they amused
themselves with persevering in the old jokes. When I claimed a
superiority for Scotland over England in one respect, that no man can be
arrested there for a debt merely because another swears it against him;
but there must first be the judgement of a court of law ascertaining its
justice; and that a seizure of the person, before judgement is obtained,
can take place only, if his creditor should swear that he is about
to fly from the country, or, as it is technically expressed, is in
meditatione fugoe: WILKES. 'That, I should think, may be safely sworn of
all the Scotch nation.' JOHNSON. (to Mr. Wilkes,) 'You must know, Sir,
I lately took my friend Boswell and shewed him genuine civilised life in
an English provincial town. I turned him loose at Lichfield, my native
city, that he might see for once real civility: for you know he lives
among savages in Scotland, and among rakes in London.' WILKES. 'Except
when he is with grave, sober, decent people like you and me.' JOHNSON.
(smiling,) 'And we ashamed of him.'
They were quite frank and easy. Johnson told the story of his asking
Mrs. Macaulay to allow her footman to sit down with them, to prove the
ridiculousness of the argument for the equality of mankind; and he
said to me afterwards, with a nod of satisfaction, 'You saw Mr. Wilkes
acquiesced.' Wilkes talked with all imaginable freedom of the ludicrous
title given to the Attorney-General, Diabolus Regis; adding, 'I have
reason to know something about that officer; for I was prosecuted for
a libel.' Johnson, who many people would have supposed must have been
furiously angry at hearing this talked of so lightly, said not a word.
He was now, INDEED, 'a good-humoured fellow.'
After dinner we had an accession of Mrs. Knowles, the Quaker lady, well
known for her various talents, and of Mr. Alderman Lee. Amidst some
patriotick groans, somebody (I think the Alderman) said, 'Poor old
England is lost.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, it is not so much to be lamented that
Old England is lost, as that the Scotch have found it.' WILKES. 'Had
Lord Bute governed Scotland only, I should not have taken the trouble to
write his eulogy, and dedicate Mortimer to him.'
Mr. Wilkes held a candle to shew a fine print of a beautiful female
figure which hung in the room, and pointed out the elegant contour of
the bosom with the finger of an arch connoisseur. He afterwards, in
a conversation with me, waggishly insisted, that all the time Johnson
shewed visible signs of a fervent admiration of the corresponding charms
of the fair Quaker.
This record, though by no means so perfect as I could wish, will
serve to give a notion of a very curious interview, which was not only
pleasing at the time, but had the agreeable and benignant effect of
reconciling any animosity, and sweetening any acidity, which in the
various bustle of political contest, had been produced in the minds
of two men, who though widely different, had so many things in
common--classical learning, modern literature, wit, and humour, and
ready repartee--that it would have been much to be regretted if they had
been for ever at a distance from each other.
Mr. Burke gave me much credit for this successful NEGOCIATION; and
pleasantly said, that 'there was nothing to equal it in the whole
history of the Corps Diplomatique.'
I attended Dr. Johnson home, and had the satisfaction to hear him tell
Mrs. Williams how much he had been pleased with Mr. Wilkes's company,
and what an agreeable day he had passed.
I talked a good deal to him of the celebrated Margaret Caroline Rudd,
whom I had visited, induced by the fame of her talents, address, and
irresistible power of fascination. To a lady who disapproved of my
visiting her, he said on a former occasion, 'Nay, Madam, Boswell is in
the right; I should have visited her myself, were it not that they have
now a trick of putting every thing into the news-papers.' This evening
he exclaimed, 'I envy him his acquaintance with Mrs. Rudd.'
On the evening of the next day I took leave of him, being to set out for
Scotland. I thanked him with great warmth for all his kindness. 'Sir,
(said he,) you are very welcome. Nobody repays it with more.
The following letters concerning an Epitaph which he wrote for the
monument of Dr. Goldsmith, in Westminster-Abbey, afford at once a proof
of his unaffected modesty, his carelessness as to his own writings, and
of the great respect which he entertained for the taste and judgement of
the excellent and eminent person to whom they are addressed: