t published your Cub: Mr. H---- showed me a very
severe Epigram that somebody in London had written upon it. You know it
is natural to take a lick at a Cub. Pray come to us. I cannot all at
once come into the way of letter-writing again, so I must conclude,

Dear Boswell,

Your affectionate friend,

ANDREW ERSKINE.

* * * * *

LETTER XXV.

Auchinleck, April 22, 1762.

Dear ERSKINE,--This is a strange world that we live in. Things turn out
in a very odd manner. Every day produces something more wonderful than
another. Earthquakes, murders, conflagrations, inundations, jubilees,
operas, marriages, and pestilence, unite to make mortal men gape and
stare. But your last letter and mine being wrote on the same day,
astonishes me still more than all these things put together.

This is the most unaccountable rhodomontade that I ever uttered. I am
really dull at present, and my affectation to be clever, is exceedingly
awkward. My manner resembles that of a footman who has got an ensign's
commission, or a kept mistress who is made a wife.

I have not at any time been more insipid, more muddy, and more
standing-water like than I am just now. The country is my aversion. It
renders me quite torpid. Were you here just now, you would behold your
vivacious friend a most stupid exhibition. It is very surprising that
the country should affect me so; whether it be that the scenes to be met
with there, fall infinitely short of my ideas of pastoral simplicity; or
that I have acquired so strong a relish for the variety and hurry of a
town life, as to languish in the stillness of retirement; or that the
atmosphere is too moist and heavy, I shall not determine.

I have now pretty good hopes of getting soon into the guards, that gay
scene of life of which I have been so long and so violently enamoured.
Surely this will cause you to rejoice.

I have lately had the pleasure and the pride of receiving a most
brilliant epistle from Lady B----. It excels Captain Andrew's letters by
many degrees. I have picked as many diamonds out of it, as to make me a
complete set of buckles; I have turned so much of it into brocade
waistcoats, and so much into a very rich suit of embroidered
horse-furniture. I know how unequal I am to the task of answering it;
nevertheless present her Ladyship with the inclosed. It may amuse her a
little. It is better to have two shillings in the pound, than nothing at
all.

I was rea