as a chimney. ‘Then,’ said the Rev. Dr. Maclaine, ‘her husband would be
a chimney-sweeper.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell said that Mademoiselle de Zuyl was too vivacious, and crowded
her _bon mots_ in conversation, so that one had not time to examine
them one by one, and see their beauties. He said, she used to make
people run through the Vatican, where you glance over a number of fine
pictures, but have not time to look at and relish any.”
* * * * *
“Fordyce was much scandalized at a French barber who shaved him in
Paris, and having caught a fly, called it _cette machine la_. ‘Why,’
said Boswell, ‘in England we call a machine a fly, why may not the
French call a fly a machine?’”
* * * * *
“Andrew Stuart,[163] Nairne,[164] Colonel Scott, and Boswell went in a
coach from the Hague to Rotterdam. The Dutch coachman was so heavy a
blockhead that Andrew Stuart took the reins from him and drove. A mole,
somehow or other, was seen upon the road. ‘Well,’ said Boswell, ‘when
Mr. Andrew Stuart drove a Dutch coach, he drove so hard that the very
moles came above ground to look at him.’”
* * * * *
“In the year 1715 Lord Marischal observed a Highlander crying, and
looking at the poor fellow he observed he had no shoes. He sent one to
him, who spoke Erse, and bid him not be cast down, for he should have
shoes. ‘Sir,’ said the Highlander, ‘I want no shoes; I am crying to see
a Macdonald retire from his enemy.’”
From LORD MARISCHAL.
* * * * *
“In the year 1715, when my Lord Marischal was preparing to leave London
and join the Stuart army, Fletcher of Salton[165] came to him at seven
in the morning, asked a dish of tea to get his servant out of the way,
and then said, ‘My lord, you are now going to join with people who will
not be honest, nor so steady as yourself. I advise you, don’t go.’ My
lord answered, ‘Sir, I shall not dispute whether King James or King
George has the best right to the crown. I know you are for no king.
But, as things are, I think we may get rid of the union which oppresses
us.’ ‘My lord,’ replied Fletcher, ‘it is a good thing to be young: when
I was your age I thought as you do, and would have acted as you do; but
I am now growing old, I have been sorely brought down by sickness, and
I find my mind is failing with my body.”
LORD MARISCHAL.
* * * * *
“Boswell went from Berlin to Charlottenburg while the entertainments
were there on account of the betrothing of the Princess Elizabeth
of Brunswick to the Prince of Prussia; all the ladies and gentlemen
pressed eagerly to get places at the windows of the palace, in order
to see the royal families at supper. Boswell found this a little
ridiculous, so came up to his acquaintances and said, ‘Allons, allons,
je vous en prie voyons la seconde table; je vous assure il vaut mieux
la peine; ces gens mangent plus que les autres?’ (‘Come, come, pray do
let us go see the second table; I assure you it is more worth while;
they eat more than the others.’)”
* * * * *
“Boswell said that Sir Joseph Yorke was so anxious lest people should
forget that he was an ambassador, that he held his head as high and
spoke as little as possible. As in the infancy of painting it was found
necessary to write below a picture, this is a cow, or this is a horse,
so from the mouth of Sir Joe cometh a label with these words—‘I am an
ambassador.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell said that the descriptions of human life which we find in
books are very false, because written in retirement. When a painter
would take a portrait or a landscape, he is always sure to be present,
whereas a painter of human life gets away from the object, buries
himself in the shade, or basks in the sunshine, and consequently gives
either too black or too gay a creature of his imagination, which he
calls human life.”
* * * * *
“Two Scotch Highlanders were benighted, and lay down to sleep on the
side of a mountain. After they had lain a little, one of them got up,
but soon returned again. The other asked him, ‘What’s this, Donald?
what have you been about?’ Duncan replied, ‘I was only bringing a
stane to put under my head.’ Donald started up and cried, ‘H—g your
effeminacy, man! canna ye sleep without a stane aneath your head?’”
MR. BURNET.
* * * * *
“After the Prince of Prussia had been defeated by the Austrians, the
King, who was marching desperate against them, wrote to him thus:—‘Mon
frère, Daun vous a traité comme un petit Ecolier. Il vous a foueté avec
des verges. Un homme qui va mourir, n’a rien d’dissimuler.’”
MR. BURNET.
* * * * *
“Lord Auchinleck was one of the most firm and indefatigable judges that
ever lived. Brown at Utrecht said that he was one of those great beams
which are placed here and there to support the edifice of Society.”
I was present.
* * * * *
“Boswell said that Berkley[166] reasoned himself out of house and home.”
* * * * *
“An unhappy hypochondriack complained that in his gloomy hours he
believed himself a fool. A hard-hearted wag was cruel enough to say to
him, ‘Crede quod habes et habes.’”
* * * * *
“Captain Bertie was in one of three English ships who advanced against
seven French. The sailors were so overjoyed at this noble opportunity
that they huzzaed and threw their hats overboard, and those who had no
hats, their wigs. They fought and beat the French heartily.”
CAPTAIN BERTIE.[167]
* * * * *
“If those who have no taste for the fine arts would fairly own it,
perhaps it would be better. Mr. Damer and Captain Howe, two true-born
Englishmen, were in the great gallery at Florence; they submitted
quietly to be shown a few of the pictures, but seeing the gallery so
immensely long their impatience burst forth and they tried, for a bet,
who should hop first to the end of it.”
THE HON. MR. HOWE.[168]
* * * * *
“When Boswell came first into Italy, and saw the extreme profligacy of
the ladies, he said, ‘Italy has been called the garden of Europe, I
think it is the _Covent Garden_.’”
* * * * *
“Churchill,[169] in his abusive poem against Scotland called the
‘Prophecy of Famine,’ had the following line:—
‘Far as the eye could reach no tree was seen.’
Mr. Jamieson, a true Scot, said, ‘Faith, I wish I had as many
Churchills to hang upon them as there’s trees.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell had a travelling box in which he carried his hats and
his papers. He was saying one day, ‘What connection now have they
together?’ Replied Mr. Lumisden,[170] ‘They have both a connection with
your head.’”
* * * * *
“An honest Scots sailor who had been wounded in the service took up a
public-house at Dundee, and on his sign had his story painted. First he
was drawn with both his legs firing away, with this inscription,—‘Thus
I was;’ then with one leg, and inscribed, ‘Thus _I am_, the Fortune of
war.’”
JAMES RAMSAY.[171]
MR. WILLISON.[172]
* * * * *
“A young fellow by chance let a china plate fall. His father asked
him, ‘Pray, sir, what way did you do that?’ He very gravely took up
another, and let it fall in the same manner: ‘That way, sir.’”
COLONEL EDMONSTOUNE.[173]
* * * * *
“A very big man said he intended often to have spoke in the House of
Commons. ‘I wish you had, sir,’ said Matthew Henderson; ‘for if you had
not been heard, you would at least have been seen.’”
CAPT. KEITH STUART.
* * * * *
P. 1. “April.—My father said to me, ‘I am much pleased with your
conduct in every respect.’ After all my anxiety while abroad, here is
the most perfect approbation and calm of mind. I never felt such sollid
(_sic_) happiness. But I feel I am not so happy with this approbation
and this calm as I expected to be. Alas! such is the condition of
humanity, that we are not allowed here the perfect enjoyment of the
satisfaction which arises even from worth. But why do I say alas! when
I really look upon this life merely as a transient state?
P. 2. “I must stay at Auchinleck. I have there just the kind of
complaining proper for me. All must complain, and I more than most of
my fellow-creatures.
P. 3. “A man is but in proportion to the impressions which his power
makes. I see there is variety of powers.”
* * * * *
“Saturday, April 19th.—This morning my worthy father wak’d me early
and told me of the sudden death of my Lord Justice Clerk (Lord
Minto),[174] and repeated with a calm solemnity,—
‘Trahimur sævo rapiente fato.’”
* * * * *
“A modern man of taste found fault with the avenues at Auchinleck, and
said he wished to see straggling trees. ‘I wish,’ said Boswell, ‘I
could see straggling fools in this world.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell said that business itself helps a man on just as the chaise
going down a hill helps on the horse which is in the shafts. ‘When,’
said he, ‘I think of the fatigues of the law I tremble. But when I have
once get on the harnessing of a Process, away I go without difficulty.
This is just; let a man never despond as to anything, let him be yok’d,
and no fear.’”
* * * * *
“When Boswell observed that the Lords of Session were often
inattentive, he said he wished he had liberty to speak to the bench as
one speaks to a company, where if any one whom one wishes to attend
appears to be absent, one can rouse him by directing the discourse
particularly to him. ‘So,’ said Boswell, ‘I would say, “My Lord Sagely,
your lordship must surely agree,” &c.; “But besides, my Lord Doubtfull,
it appears,” &c.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell had a great aversion to the law, but forced himself to enter
upon that laborious profession in compliance with the anxious desire
of his father, for whom he had the greatest regard. After putting on
the gown, he said with great good humour to his brother advocates,
‘Gentlemen, I am prest into the service here; but I have observed that
a prest man, either by sea or land, after a little time does just as
well as a volunteer.’”
* * * * *
“Lord Auchinleck said the great point for a judge is to conduct a cause
with safety and expedition, like a skillfull pilot. ‘The Agents always
endeavour to keep a cause afloat. But I keep my eye upon the haven, and
the moment I have got him fairly in order I give one hearty push, and
there he’s landed.’”
* * * * *
“Boswell said when we see a man of eminence we desire nothing more than
to be of his acquaintance; we then wish to have him as a companion; and
when we have attained that we are impatient till we gain a superiority
over him. Such is the restless progress of man!”
* * * * *
“A sailor, who had been long out at sea, was on his return asked by a
companion what sort of voyage they had. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘a very good
one; only we had prayers twice. But one of the times there was no more
occasion for them than if you and I should fall down and pray this
minute.’”
LORD LOUDOUN.[175]
* * * * *
“My Lord Stair,[176] who wrote a very bad hand, sent once to my Lord
Loudoun a written commission to be read to Sir Philip Honeywood.[177]
Lord Loudoun received the letter at the British Coffee-house, where he
was sitting after dinner with some friends taking a very hearty bottle;
and whether the wine made him see double or no, so it was that he read
the commission very distinctly. Next morning he went to wait on Sir
Philip Honeywood, and being then quite cool and in his sober senses
he could not read a word of it, and neither could Sir Philip. Lord
Loudoun could not go back to Lord Stair and tell him his hand was not
legible, so Sir Philip trusted to Lord Loudoun’s memory of what he had
read the day before, and could not then read at all, a most curious
fact. When the Duke of Cumberland was told of it he said, ‘Loudoun, why
did you not stay and dine with Sir Philip, and then you would both have
read it.’”
LORD LOUDOUN.
* * * * *
“Mr. Clark, uncle to Baron Clark, a most curious mortal, who had been
bred a surgeon, had travelled over the greatest part of the world, and
always walked. He had the misfortune to break one of his legs, and two
pieces of the bone came out of it. He had them drest, and made hafts
to a knife and fork of them. When he was dying he sent for Doctor
Clark[178] and the Baron.[179] ‘Now, gentlemen,’ said he, ‘this knife
and fork will be the most valuable part of my executory, and I’ll leave
them to any of you two who shall give me the best inscription to put
upon them. The Doctor, who was a fine classical scholar, tried a good
many times, but at length the baron fairly got the better of him by a
most elegant and well-adapted inscription,—
‘Quæ terra nostri non plena laboris?’”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Campbell of Suckoth[180] and his son were both men of great wit.
The father had been constantly attached to the Duke of Argyle, but
had never got the least assistance from him, upon which the son went
and paid court to the Duke of Hamilton. His dutchess (_sic_) was then
of the Spencer family.[181] So young Suckoth planted a mount, which
he called Mount Spencer. The dutchess made him a present of some fine
foreign trees in flower-pots, so he got a cart and a couple of horses
from his father to bring them home with, but most of them broke by the
way. The old man was not pleased that his son had deserted his chief,
so he says to him, ‘Dear John, why will you pay court to the House of
Hamilton, for I see naething ye get frae them but a wheen broken pigs?’
‘Sir,’ says he, ‘broken pigs are as good as broken promises.’ ‘Very
true,’ John, ‘but they’re no sae dear o’ the carriage.’”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Sir William Gordon[182] wanted a servant who could write well. ‘My
father,’ said he, ‘knew of a very clever fellow, but the most drunken,
good-for-nothing dog that ever lived.’ ‘Oh,’ said Sir William, ‘no
matter for that, let him be sent for.’ So when he came Sir William
asked him a great many questions, to which Brodie answered most
distinctly. At last he asked, him, ‘Can you write Latin, sir?’ ‘Can
your honour read it?’ said he. Sir William was quite fond of him, and
had him drest out to all advantage. One day, at his own table, he was
telling a story. ‘Not so, sir,’ said Brodie, who was standing at his
back. ‘You dog,’ said he, ‘how do you know?’ ‘Because I have heard
your honour tell it before.’ He lived with Sir William more than seven
years.”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Sir William Gordon was always a singular character. When he came to
be eighteen it was necessary for him to choose a curator, and he chose
his own livery servant, ‘for’ said he, ‘one is plagued seeking for a
curator to sign papers with you, and sometimes they refuse to sign.”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Mr. Charles Cochrane[183] said one day to my Lord Justice Clerk
(Charles Erskine[184]), ‘Pray, my lord, what is the reason that there
never was a gentleman a ruling elder, who was not either a knave or a
very weak man?’ ‘Ay, Charles’ said he, ‘why, I’m a ruling elder myself,
and what do you take me to be?’ ‘A very weak man, my lord.’”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Sir Walter Pringle,[185] afterwards Lord Newhall, was apt to be very
passionate when he thought a lord did not hear him properly. One day
he appeared before Lord Forglen,[186] who was very heavy. Sir Walter
opened his cause. The other party answered, and among other objections
which they stated, they insisted on some trifling point of form, that
the cause had not been regularly put up upon the wall. Sir Walter
replied to all their objections with accuracy and spirit, but took no
notice of the trifling point of form. ‘Lord Forglen,’ said Sir Walter,
‘you have pleaded your cause very well, but what do you say to the
wall?’ ‘Indeed’ said he, ‘my lord, I have been speaking to it this
half-hour;’ and off he went in a great passion.”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Jack Bowes, an Englishman, who was married to a noted midwife at
Edinburgh, and was really mad, but had great humour, got up one day on
the steps which lead up to the New Kirk (the lady’s steps), and there
he gathered a crowd about him, and preached to them. ‘Gentlemen,’ said
he, ‘you will find my text in the 2nd Epistle of St. Paul to Timothy,
the 4th chapter, and there the 13th verse, ‘The cloak that I left at
Troas with Carpus, when thou comest, bring with thee, and the books,
but especially the parchments.’ ‘We insist upon the first clause. We
see, gentlemen, from these words that Paul was a presbyter, for he wore
a cloak. He does not say the gown which I left at Troas, but the cloak
which I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest bring with thee.
Timothy, we all know, was a bishop. Now, my friends, the doctrine I
would inculcate from this is, that a presbyter had a bishop for his
baggageman.’”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“A drover owed another ——, as the price of —— lambs. His creditor
came and craved time for the money. ‘John,’ said he, ‘let me alone
for a fortnight, for I really cannot pay you sooner.’ The creditor
insisted, and called him before a judge and put him to his oath. He
swore positively that he owed no such debt. After the court was over,
the creditor asked him how he could swear against what he had owned so
often. ‘Because,’ said he, ‘you forced me, and I had nothing else for
it; but, however, John, you shall lose nothing by it, for I shall give
you my bill for the money payable in a fortnight,’ and actually he did
give his bill and paid him accordingly. A most wonderful mixture of
impiety and honesty.”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Sir William Gordon would needs make a library because my Lord
Sunderland made one, but all he wanted was just dear books. He came in
one day to Vanderaa’s shop, in Leyden, and asked if he had got any dear
new books. Vanderaa showed him the ‘Thesaurus Italiæ et Siciliæ’ in——
volumes. Sir William turned to Dr. Cooper and said, ‘Pray, Doctor, have
I got that book?’ ‘No, Sir William, nor do I think you have occasion
for it.’ ‘Mr. Cooper, I cannot be without that book.’ ‘Upon my word,
Sir William, I think you might very well be without it.’ ‘There, Mr.
Cooper, you and I differ.—Mr. Vanderaa, let that book be packed up and
sent for me to London.’”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Dr. Taylor, the oculist, was one evening supping at William Earl of
Dumfries’s, at Edinburgh. He harangued with his usual fluency and
impudence, and boasted that he knew the thoughts of everybody by
looking at their eyes. The first Lady Dumfries,[187] who was hurt with
his behaviour, asked him with a smile of contempt, ‘Pray, sir, do you
know what I am thinking?’ ‘Yes, madam,’ said he. ‘Then,’ replied the
countess, ‘it’s very safe, for I am sure you will not repeat it.’”
DR. WEBSTER, who was present.
* * * * *
“When the first Lady Dumfries was within a quarter of an hour of her
death, she showed an attention to the interests of religion, and at the
same time an address equal to that of any statesman. The earl came down
from her all in tears, and told it to the Rev. Mr. Webster. ‘My lord,’
said she, ‘you have always shown a proper regard to the ordinances
of religion. People have been pleased to say that you did so out of
compliment to me. Providence is now giving your lordship an opportunity
to show that it was entirely from yourself.’”
DR. WEBSTER.
* * * * *
“John Lord Hope[188] was educated at home about his father’s house,
full of conceit, full of petulance. His mother, the first Lady
Hopetown, stood much in awe of my lord, but when he was not present was
very lively and agreeable. One night at supper Lord Hope had made some
figure of the crumbs of his bread, and plagued all the company to tell
what it was. Many flattered him; some called it a pretty summerhouse;
some, one of the ruins of Rome, and so made him exceedingly vain. He
at last applied to my lady his mother. ‘Madam,’ said he, ‘you have not
told me what you think it is.’ ‘Well,’ said she, ‘if you will have what
I think it, I shall tell you I think it a monument of a young lord’s
folly.’”
DR. WEBSTER.
* * * * *
“Mr. William Nairne observed that it maybe said of a well-employed
barrister who lays by much money, what Horace says of the _ant_,—
‘_Ore_ trahit quodcunque potest atque addit acervo.’”
I was present.
* * * * *
“A gentleman expended immense sums of money in attempting to improve a
barren soil. Boswell observed ‘that the gentleman was as busy burying
gold as others are in digging it up.’”
* * * * *
“It has often occurred to me that artificial passions are stronger than
real ones, just as a wall built with good mortar is found to be harder
and worse to separate than the natural rock. A passion for pageantry,
and many more of the passions generated in civilized life, often
influence men more than the real genuine passions natural to man.”
* * * * *
“Cullen, the mimic,[189] had a wretched manner of his own. He was one
forenoon reading Lord Mansfield’s admirable speech on the Privilege
Bill. Several of our brother advocates were listening to him. I could
not help laughing, for I said hearing Lord Mansfield’s speech read by
Cullen was like hearing a piece of Handel’s music played on a (trump)
Jew’s harp.”
* * * * *
“I have observed that business has a different effect on the spirits of
different men. It sinks the spirits of some and raises the spirits of
others. To the spirits of some, a variety of affairs are like stones
put into a pool of water, which make the water rise in proportion
to the quantity of stones; to the spirits of others, affairs (_des
affaires_) are like sponges put into a pool of water, which suck it up.
Men of great firmness can retain their vivacity amidst a multiplicity
of business. The King of Prussia is a distinguished example.”[190]
* * * * *
“Mr. John Pettigrew,[191] minister of Govan, was one of the originals
amongst the clergy of Scotland, of which there were many in the last
age. His presbytery was once violently divided who should be moderator
in the room of one Mr. Love,[192] then in the chair. While they were
disputing with vast keenness Mr. Petticrew came in, and being asked
his opinion, he said, ‘Moderator, let brotherly love continue.’ The
presbytery took his advice, and so their disputes were ended in good
humour.”
LORD AUCHINLECK.
* * * * *
“Cullen, the mimick,[193] was excessively ugly, having most horrible
teeth, and, upon the whole, a physiognomy worse than Wilkes’s. His own
manner, as has been observed, was also wretched. One morning when he
was grinning and pleading a cause, I stood by and observed, ‘Whom is
Cullen taking off? He is taking off the devil.’”
* * * * *
“Sinclair, of Briggend, a Caithness laird, was telling that a gentleman
with whom he had played at loo had a way of keeping Pam in the head of
his boot, and bringing him out when he found him necessary. ‘Ay,’ said
Andrew Erskine, ‘it seems he played _booty_ with you.’”
I was present.
* * * * *
“I was defending one day poor Mrs. C—— at the time when her husband
was suing her for a divorce, and saying that she was no worse than
the Miss V——s, for all her faults were only innocent improprieties.
‘No worse!’ said Andrew Erskine, ‘she is ten times better; she only
intrigued with certain people, but the Miss V——s did it with
everybody that was near her, and would have done it with everybody at a
distance had it been possible.’”
* * * * *
“Cullen, the mimick, as has been more than once observed, had a
wretched manner of his own. I was one day to walk out with him to dine
at Craig House with Mr. Lockhart,[194] the Dean of Faculty. I was
saying to a lady that I wondered what characters he would give me by
the road. ‘Oh,’ said she, ‘no matter, providing you have not himself.
As Sir John Falstaff said to the hostess, when she offered the fat
knight a hog’s countenance, “Any countenance but thy own.”’”
* * * * *
“John Home showed the Lord Chief Baron Orde a pair of pumps he had on,
and desired his lordship to observe how well they were made, telling
him at the same time that they had been made for Lord Bute,[195] but
were rather too little for him, so his lordship had made John a present
of them. ‘I think,’ said the Lord Chief Baron, ‘you have taken the
measure of Lord Bute’s foot.’”
LORD CHIEF BARON ORDE.[196]
* * * * *
“A very awkward fellow was dancing at the Edinburgh Assembly. Matthew
Henderson[197] said, ‘He looks like a professor of dislocation.’”
HON. ALEX. GORDON, [_See note, p. 254_].[198]
* * * * *
“A man who uses a great many words to express his meaning shows that he
has no distinct idea, no neatness of speech. He is like a bad marksman,
who, instead of aiming a single stone at an object, takes up a handful
of stones, gravel, sand, and all, and throws at it, thinking that in
that manner he may hit it.”
* * * * *
“It sometimes happens that when a man throws out a reflection against
one, he, without intending it, pays a compliment. In such a case, I
think I am well entitled to take the compliment. If a man throws a
snowball at me, and I find a diamond in the heart of it, surely the
diamond is mine.”
* * * * *