ut thoughtless follies laid him low,
And stain'd his name."

Boswell had, indeed, but little of that "prudent, cautious,
self-control," which, as Burns tells us, "is wisdom's root." It is a sad
thought that at the very same time the two most famous writers that
Ayrshire can boast, men whose homes were but a few miles apart, were at
the same time drinking themselves to death. Burns outlived Boswell
little more than a year.

Boswell was fifty-four years old when he died. Greatly as he relished
wine, he relished fame still more. He had worked hard for fame, and he
had fairly earned it; but in its full flush his intemperance swept him
away. There can be little question that his first triumph in the field
of letters, his book on Corsica brought him far greater pleasure than
his "Life of Johnson," by which his name will live. Perhaps the happiest
day in his life was when, at the Shakespeare Jubilee, he entered the
amphitheatre in the dress of a Corsican chief. "On the front of his cap
was embroidered, in gold letters, "_Viva la Liberta_," and on the side
of it was a handsome blue feather and cockade, so that it had an elegant
as well as a warlike appearance." "So soon as he came into the room,"
says the account in the "London Magazine," written, no doubt, by
himself, "he drew universal attention." The applause that his "Life of
Johnson" brought him was, no doubt, far greater, but then, as I have
said, his health was breaking, and his fine spirits were impaired. He
who would know Boswell at his happiest--when he was, as Hume described
him, very good humoured, very agreeable, and very mad, must read his
volume of Letters, and the Journals of his Tours to Corsica and the
Hebrides.

LETTERS

BETWEEN

THE HONOURABLE

ANDREW ERSKINE,

AND

JAMES BOSWELL, Esq;

LONDON:
Printed by SAMUEL CHANDLER;
For W. FLEXNEY, near Gray's-Inn-Gate, Holborn.
MDCCLXIII.

ADVERTISEMENT.

Curiosity is the most prevalent of all our passions; and the curiosity
for reading letters, is the most prevalent of all kinds of curiosity.
Had any man in the three Kingdoms found the following letters, directed,
sealed, and adorned with postmarks,--provided he could have done it
honestly--he would have read every one of them; or, had they been
ushered into the world, from Mr. Flexney's shop, in that manner, they
would have been bought up with the greatest avidity. As they really once
had all the advantages of conc