1773-Æt. 64

He said, "Goldsmith should not be for ever attempting to shine in conversation: he has not temper for it, he is so much mortified when he fails. Sir, a game of jokes is composed partly of skill, partly of chance; a man may be beat at times by one who has not the tenth part of his wit. Now Goldsmith's putting himself against another, is like a man laying a hundred to one who cannot spare the hundred. It is not worth a man's while. A man should not lay a hundred to one unless he can easily spare it, though he has a hundred chances for him: he can get but a guinea, and he may lose a hundred. Goldsmith is in this state. When he contends, if he gets the better, it is a very little addition to a man of his literary reputation: if he does not get the better, he is miserably vexed."

Johnson's own superlative powers of wit set him above any risk of such uneasiness. Garrick had remarked to me of him, a few days before, “Rabelais and all other wits are nothing compared with him. You may be diverted by them; but Johnson gives you a forcible hug, and shakes laughter out of whether will or no."

you,

you

Goldsmith, however, was often very fortunate in his witty contests, even when he entered the lists. with Johnson himself. Sir Joshua Reynolds was in company with them one day, when Goldsmith said, that he thought he could write a good fable, mentioned the simplicity which that kind of composi

tion requires, and observed, that in most fables the animals introduced seldom talk in character. "For instance (said he), the fable of the little fishes, who saw birds fly over their heads, and envying them, petitioned Jupiter to be changed into birds. The skill (continued he) consists in making them talk like little fishes." While he indulged himself in this fanciful reverie, he observed Johnson shaking his sides, and laughing. Upon which he smartly proceeded, "Why, Dr. Johnson, this is not so easy as you seem to think; for if you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like whales."

1773-Et. 64

Vol. III, p. 85.

Goldsmith being mentioned; - Johnson: "It is amazing how little Goldsmith knows. He seldom comes where he is not more ignorant than anyone else." Sir Joshua Reynolds: "Yet there is no man whose company is more liked." Johnson: "To be sure, sir. When people find a man of the most distinguished abilities as a writer, their inferior while he is with them, it must be highly gratifying to them. What Goldsmith comically says of himself is very true, he always gets the better when he argues alone; meaning, that he is master of a subject in his study, and can write well upon it; but when he comes into company, grows confused, and unable to talk. Take him as a poet, his Traveler is a very fine performance: ay, and so is his Deserted

Village, were it not sometimes too much the echo of his Traveler. Whether, indeed, we take him as a poet, as a comic writer, or as an historian,

he stands in the first class.' Boswell: "An historian! My dear sir, you surely will not rank his compilation of the Roman History with the works of other historians of this age?" Johnson: "Why, who are before him?" Boswell: "Hume - Robertson Lord Lyttelton." Johnson (his antipathy to the Scotch beginning to rise): "I have not read Hume; but, doubtless, Goldsmith's History is better than the verbiage of Robertson, or the foppery of Dalrymple.” Boswell: "Will you not admit the superiority of Robertson, in whose History we find such penetration - such painting?" Johnson: "Sir, you must consider how that penetration and that painting are employed. It is not history, it is imagination. He who describes what he never saw draws from fancy. Robertson paints minds as Sir Joshua paints faces in a history-piece: he imagines an heroic countenance. You must look upon Robertson's work as romance, and try it by that standard. History it is not. Besides, sir, it is the great excellence of a writer to put into his book as much as his book will hold. Goldsmith has done this in his history. Now, Robertson might have put twice as much into his book. Robertson is like a man who has packed gold in wool; the wool takes up more room than the gold. No, sir, I always thought Robertson would be crushed by his own weight,

would be buried under his own ornaments.

Goldsmith tells you shortly all you want to know: Robertson detains you a great deal too long. No man will read Robertson's cumbrous detail a second time; but Goldsmith's plain narrative will please again and again. I would say to Robertson what an old tutor at college said to one of his pupils, 'Read over your compositions, and wherever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out.' Goldsmith's abridgment is better than that of Lucius Florus or Eutropius; and I will venture to say, that if you compare him with Vertot, in the same places of the Roman History, you will find that he excels Vertot. Sir, he has the art of compiling, and of saying everything he has to say in a pleasing manner. He is now writing a Natural History, and will make it as entertaining as a Persian Tale." - Vol. III, p. 90.

1773 Æt. 64

The gentlemen went away to their club, and I was left at Beauclerk's till the fate of my election [to the Literary Club] should be announced to me. I sat in a state of anxiety which even the charming conversation of Lady Di Beauclerk could not entirely dissipate. In a short time I received the agreeable intelligence that I was chosen. I hastened to the place of meeting, and was introduced to such a society as can seldom be found. Mr. Edmund Burke, whom I then saw for the first

time, and whose splendid talents had long made me ardently wish for his acquaintance; Dr. Nugent, Mr. Garrick, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. (afterwards Sir William) Jones, and the company with whom I had dined. Upon my entrance Johnson placed himself behind a chair, on which he leaned as on a desk or pulpit, and with humorous formality gave me a charge, pointing out the conduct expected from me as a good member of this club. Vol. III, p. 94.

1773-Æt. 64

His stay in Scotland was from the 18th of August, on which day he arrived, till the 22nd of November, when he set out on his return to London; and I believe ninety-four days were never passed by any man in a more vigorous exertion.

He came by the way of Berwick-upon-Tweed to Edinburgh, where he remained a few days, and then went by St. Andrews, Aberdeen, Inverness, and Fort Augustus, to the Hebrides, to visit which was the principal object he had in view. He visited. the isles of Skye, Raasay, Coll, Mull, Inchkenneth, and Icolmkill. He travelled through Argyllshire by Inveraray, and from thence by Loch Lomond and Dumbarton to Glasgow, then by Loudoun to Auchinleck in Ayrshire, the seat of the family, and then by Hamilton, back to Edinburgh, where he again spent some time. He thus saw the four universities of Scotland, its three principal cities, and as much of the Highland and insular life as was sufficient