l remark that they had agreed to differ alike in politics and
religion, but that there were points _ou nos ames sont unies_. The
feudal dogmas of Boswell and his rigid adherence to his pet idea of 'the
grand scheme of subordination' were of course not likely to be pleasing
to the sceptical _aqua fortis_ of the sombre Genevese, with his belief
in the fraternity of mankind and the greatness of the untutored Indian.

Boswell crossed the Alps, and either then or upon his homeward journey
visited Bologna, Venice, and Mantua. He passed through Rome and, unknown
to either, may have met Gibbon in the Eternal City into whose mind, some
weeks before, 'as I sat musing among the ruins of the Capitol while the
bare-footed friars were singing vespers in the Temple of Jupiter,' had
started the idea of writing the _Decline and Fall_. In the city he met
Andrew Lumsden, the Secretary of Prince Charles Edward, but we are not
informed if the young Jacobite of five, who had prayed for the exiled
family now sought any opportunity of making himself known to the object
of his devotion. Naples brought him into the more congenial society of
Wilkes with whom, he says, he 'enjoyed many classical scenes with
peculiar relish.' When Churchill had died at Boulogne in the arms of
Wilkes, the latter had retired to Naples to inscribe his sorrow 'in the
close style of the ancients' upon an urn of alabaster which had been the
gift of Winckelmann, and in that city now he was, as the literary
executor, preparing annotations on the works of Churchill. Boswell
managed with his curious want of tact in such matters, fitting the man
who could suggest cards to a dying friend with an uneasy conscience, to
hint that the poet had 'bounced into the regions below,' and to render
the _Il Bruto Inglese_, by which the papers of the land referred to
Wilkes and liberty, by a version significant of the notorious ugliness
of his gay acquaintance. Naples, as with Milton, was the limit of his
tour, and from it he returned to Rome. He reached that city in April
1765, and dispatched a letter to Rousseau, then 'living in romantick
retirement' in Switzerland, requesting his promised introduction to the
Corsican general, 'which if he refused, I should certainly go without
it, and probably be hanged as a spy.' The wild philosopher was as good
as his word, and the letter met the traveller at Florence. 'The charms
of sweet Siena detained me no longer than they should have done, I
requir