monly ftrict, seemed to be puzzled for a moment what anfwer to make, as he certainly could not honestly commend the performance : with exquifite addrefs he evaded the question thus: "Sir, I do not fay that it may not be made a very good tranflation." Here nothing whatever in favour of the performance was affirmed, and yet the writer was not fhocked. A printed Ode to the Warlike Genius of Britain' came next in review: the bard was a lank bony figure, with fhort black hair; he was writhing with agitation while Johnson read, and fhewing his teeth in a grin of carnestness, exclaimed in broken fentences, and in a keen sharp tone, "Is that poetry, Sir?-Is it Pindar?"-JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, there is here a great deal of what is called poetry." Then turning to me the poet cried, "My mufe has not been long upon the town, and (pointing to the Ode) it trembles under the hand of the great critic." Johnson, in a tone of displea fure, afked him, "Why do you praise Anfon ?" I did not trouble him by asking his reafon for this question. He proceeded, "Here is an error, Sir; you have made Genius feminine."

"Palpable, Sir (cried the enthusiast); I know it. But (in a lower tone) it was to pay a coinpliment to the Duchefs of Devonshire, with which her Grace was pleafed. She is walking across Coxheath, in the military uniform, and I

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fuppofe her to be the Genius of Britain." JOHNSON. "Sir, you are giving a reason for it; but that will not make it right. You may have a reason why two and two fhould make five; but they will ftill make but four."

Mr. Bofwell having once regretted to Johnfon that he had learnt little Greek, as is too generally the cafe in Scotland; that he had for a long time hardly applied at all to the study of that noble language, he was defirous of being told by him what method to follow; he recommended as eafy helps, Sylvanus's First Book of the Iliad ;' Dawfon's Lexicon to the Greek New Testament;' and 'Hefiod,' with Paforis Lexicon at the end of it."

One night at the CLUB a tranflation of an Epitaph was produced which Lord Elibank had written in English for his Lady, and requefted of Johnfon to turn into Latin for him. Having read Domina de North et Gray, he faid to Mr. Dyer," You fee, Sir, what barbarisms weare compelled to make use of when modern titles are to be specifically mentioned in Latin infcriptions." When he had read it once aloud, and there had been a general approbation expreffed by the company, he addreffed himself to Mr. Dyer in particular, and faid, "Sir, I beg to have your judgment; for I know your nicety."- Dyer then Dyer then very properly defired to

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read it over again; which having done, he pointed out an incongruity in one of the fentences. Johnfon immediately affented to the obfervation, and faid, "Sir, this is owing to an alteration of a part of the fentence, from the form in which I had firft written it; and I believe, Sir, you may have remarked, that it is a very frequent cause of error in compofition, when one has made a partial change, without a due regard to the general ftructure of the fentence."

Johnson was well acquainted with Mr. Doffic, author of a treatife on Agriculture; and faid of him, "Of the objects which the Society of Arts have chiefly in view, the chymical effects of bodies operating upon other bodies, he knows more than almost any man." Johnson, in order to give Mr. Doffie his vote to be a mem ber of this Society, paid up an arrear which had run on for two years. On this occafion he mentioned a circumftance, as characteristic of the Scotch. "One of that nation (faid he) who had been a candidate, against whom I had voted, came up to me with a civil falutation.Now, Sir, this is their way. An Englishman would have ftomached it, and been fulky, and never have taken further notice of you; but a Scotchman, Sir, though you vote nineteen times against him, will accoft you, with equal complaifance

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plaifance after each time; and the twentieth time, Sir, he will get your vote."

His diftinction of the different degrees of attainment of learning was thus marked upon two occafions. Of Queen Elizabeth he said, "She had learning enough to have given dignity to a bishop;" and of Mr. Thomas Davies he faid, "Sir, Davies has learning enough to give credit to a clergyman."

He used to quote with great warmth the saying of Ariftotle recorded by Diogenes Laertius; "that there was the fame difference between one learned and unlearned, as between the living and the dead."

"Spanish plays (he obferved), being wildly and improbably farcical, would please children here, as children are entertained with ftories full of prodigies; their experience not being fufficient to cause them to be fo readily startled at deviations from the natural course of life.The machinery of the Pagans is uninterefting to us when a goddess appears in Homer or Virgil, we grow weary; ftill more fo in the Grecian tragedies, as in that kind of compofition a nearer approach to nature is intended. Yet there are good reafons for reading romances; as the fertility of invention, the beauty of ftile and expreffion, the curiofity of seeing with what kind of performances the age

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and country in which they were written was delighted; for it is to be apprehended, that at the time when very wild improbable tales were well received, the people were in a barbarous ftate, and fo on the footing of children, as has been explained.

"It is evident enough that no one who writes now can ufe the Pagan deities and mythology; the only machinery, therefore, feeins that of miniftring fpirits, the ghofts of the departed, witches, and fairies; though these latter, as the vulgar fuperftition concerning them (which, while in its force, infected at least the imagination of those that had more advantage in education, though their reafon fet them free from it) is every day wearing out, feem likely to be of little further affiftance in the machinery of poetry. As I recollect, Hammond introduces a hag or witch into one of his love elegies, where the effect is unmeaning and difgufting."

Of ridicule he obferved, "The man who in conversation ufes his talent of ridicule in creating or grofsly exaggerating the inftances he gives, who imputes abfurdities that did not happen, or when a man was a little ridiculous, defcribes him as having been very much fo, abufes his talents greatly. The great use of delineating abfurdities is, that we may know