iners,
Arthur Murphy, was so struck by this occurrence, unique in his long
experience of the Doctor, that on returning home he recorded the fact in
his journal, but ventured no explanation of it. It can only be accounted
for--so at least I venture to think--by the combined effect of four
wholly independent circumstances: _First_, the day was Christmas Day, a
day of peace and goodwill, and our beloved Doctor was amongst the
sincerest, though most argumentative, of Christians, and a great observer
of days. _Second_, the house was David Garrick's, and consequently we
may be certain that the dinner had been a superlatively good one; and has
not Boswell placed on record Johnson's opinion of the man who professed
to be indifferent about his dinner? _Third_, the subject under
discussion was India, about which Johnson knew he knew next to nothing.
And _fourth_, the offender was Edmund Burke, whom Johnson loved from the
first day he set eyes upon him to their last sad parting by the waters of
death.

In 1761 that shrewd old gossip, Horace Walpole, met Burke for the first
time at dinner, and remarks of him in a letter to George Montague:

'I dined at Hamilton's yesterday; there were Garrick, and young Mr.
Burke, who wrote a book in the style of Lord Bolingbroke, that was
much admired. He is a sensible man, but has not worn off his
authorism yet, and thinks there is nothing so charming as writers, and
to be one. He will know better one of these days.'

But great as were Burke's literary powers, and passionate as was his
fondness for letters and for literary society, he never seems to have
felt that the main burden of his life lay in that direction. He looked
to the public service, and this though he always believed that the pen of
a great writer was a more powerful and glorious weapon than any to be
found in the armoury of politics. This faith of his comes out sometimes
queerly enough. For example, when Dr. Robertson in 1777 sent Burke his
cheerful _History of America_, in quarto volumes, Burke, in the most
perfect good faith, closes a long letter of thanks thus:--

'You will smile when I send you a trifling temporary production made
for the occasion of the day, and to perish with it, in return for your
immortal work.'

I have no desire, least of all in Edinburgh, to say anything
disrespectful of Principal Robertson; but still, when we remember that
the temporary production he got in exchange f