[905] From a list in his hand-writing. BOSWELL.
[906] 'Such is the laxity of Highland conversation that the inquirer is kept in continual suspense, and by a kind of intellectual retrogradation, knows less as he hears more.' Johnson's Works, ix. 47. 'The Highlanders are not much accustomed to be interrogated by others, and seem never to have thought upon interrogating themselves; so that, if they do not know what they tell to be true, they likewise do not distinctly perceive it to be false.' Ib 114.
[907] Of his Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland. BOSWELL. It was sold at five shillings a copy. It did not reach a second edition till 1785, when perhaps a fresh demand for it was caused by the publication of Boswell's Hebrides. Boswell, in a note, post, April 28, 1778, says that 4000 copies were sold very quickly. Hannah More (Memoirs, i. 39) says that Cadell told her that he had sold 4000 copies the first week. This, I think, must be an exaggeration. A German translation was brought out this same year.
[908] Boswell, on the way to London, wrote to Temple:—'I have continual schemes of publication, but cannot fix. I am still very unhappy with my father. We are so totally different that a good understanding is scarcely possible. He looks on my going to London just now as an expedition, as idle and extravagant, when in reality it is highly improving to me, considering the company which I enjoy.' Letters of Boswell, p. 182.
[909] See post, under March 22, 1776.
[910] See ante, p. 292.
[911] 'A Scotchman must be a very sturdy moralist who does not love Scotland better than truth; he will always love it better than inquiry; and if falsehood flatters his vanity, will not be very diligent to detect it.' Johnson's Works, ix. 116.
[912] At Slanes Castle in Aberdeenshire he wrote:—'I had now travelled two hundred miles in Scotland, and seen only one tree not younger than myself.' Works, ix. 17. Goldsmith wrote from Edinburgh on Sept. 26, 1753:—'Every part of the country presents the same dismal landscape. No grove, nor brook lend their music to cheer the stranger, or make the inhabitants forget their poverty.' Forsters Goldsmith, i. 433.
[913] This, like his pamphlet on Falkland's Islands, was published without his name.
[914] See Appendix.