'JAMES BOSWELL.' ADVERTISEMENT, written by Dr. Johnson, and inserted by his desire in the Edinburgh newspapers:—Referred to in the foregoing letter[1140].
'THE authour of the Journey to the Western Islands, having related that the M'Leods of Rasay acknowledge the chieftainship or superiority of the M'Leods of Sky, finds that he has been misinformed or mistaken. He means in a future edition to correct his errour[1141], and wishes to be told of more, if more have been discovered.'
Dr. Johnson's letter was as follows:—
'To THE LAIRD OF RASAY.
'DEAR SIR,
'Mr. Boswell has this day shewn me a letter, in which you complain of a passage in The Journey to the Hebrides. My meaning is mistaken. I did not intend to say that you had personally made any cession of the rights of your house, or any acknowledgement of the superiority of M'Leod of Dunvegan. I only designed to express what I thought generally admitted,—that the house of Rasay allowed the superiority of the house of Dunvegan. Even this I now find to be erroneous, and will therefore omit or retract it in the next edition.
'Though what I had said had been true, if it had been disagreeable to you, I should have wished it unsaid; for it is not my business to adjust precedence. As it is mistaken, I find myself disposed to correct, both by my respect for you, and my reverence for truth. 'As I know not when the book will be reprinted, I have desired Mr. Boswell to anticipate the correction in the Edinburgh papers. This is all that can be done.
'I hope I may now venture to desire that my compliments may be made, and my gratitude expressed, to Lady Rasay, Mr. Malcolm M'Leod, Mr. Donald M'Queen, and all the gentlemen and all the ladies whom I saw in the island of Rasay; a place which I remember with too much pleasure and too much kindness, not to be sorry that my ignorance, or hasty persuasion, should, for a single moment, have violated its tranquillity.
'I beg you all to forgive an undesigned and involuntary injury, and to consider me as,
'Sir, your most obliged,