at island, it proceeded thus:--'I dare to call
this a spirited tour. I dare to challenge your approbation.'"--Boswell's
"Johnson." Date of 1765.]

Mr. Johnson was pleased with what I wrote here; for I received at Paris
an answer from him which I keep as a valuable charter. "When you return,
you will return to an unaltered, and I hope, unalterable friend. All
that you have to fear from me, is the vexation of disappointing me. No
man loves to frustrate expectations which have been formed in his
favour, and the pleasure which I promise myself from your journals and
remarks, is so great, that perhaps no degree of attention or discernment
will be sufficient to afford it. Come home however and take your chance.
I long to see you, and to hear you; and hope that we shall not be so
long separated again. Come home, and expect such a welcome as is due to
him whom a wise and noble curiosity has led where perhaps, no native of
this country ever was before."[141]

[Footnote 141: "Having had no letter from him, ... and having been told
by somebody that he was offended at my having put into my book an
extract of his letter to me at Paris, I was impatient to be with him....
I found that Dr. Johnson had sent a letter to me to Scotland, and that I
had nothing to complain of but his being more indifferent to my anxiety
than I wished him to be." In the letter, which is dated March 23, 1768,
Johnson had said, "I have omitted a long time to write to you, without
knowing very well why. I could now tell why I should not write; for who
would write to men who publish the letters of their friends without
their leave? Yet I write to you, in spite of my caution, to tell you
that I shall be glad to see you, and that I wish you would empty your
head of Corsica, which I think has filled it rather too long."--ED.]

I at length set out for Bastia. I went the first night to Rostino,
hoping to have found there Signor Clemente de' Paoli. But unluckily he
had gone upon a visit to his daughter; so that I had not an opportunity
of seeing this extraordinary personage, of whom I have given so full an
account,[142] for a great part of which I am indebted to Mr. Burnaby.

[Footnote 142: See Appendix C.--ED.]

Next day I reached Vescovato, where I was received by Signor Buttafoco,
who proved superiour to the character I had conceived of him from the
letter of M. Rousseau.[143] I found in him the incorrupted virtues of
the brave islander, with the improvements o