estive entertainment,
we had a small company, and cannot boast of our cheer. The particulars
are minuted in my Journal, but I shall not trouble the publick with
them. I shall mention but one characteristick circumstance. My shrewd
and hearty friend Sir Thomas (Wentworth) Blacket, Lady Macdonald's
uncle, who had preceded us in a visit to this chief, upon being asked by
him if the punch-bowl then upon the table was not a very handsome one,
replied, "Yes--if it were full." 'Sir Alexander Macdonald having been an
Eton scholar, Dr. Johnson had formed an opinion of him which was much
diminished when he beheld him in the isle of Sky, where we heard heavy
complaints of rents racked, and the people driven to emigration. Dr.
Johnson said, "It grieves me to see the chief of a great clan appear to
such disadvantage. This gentleman has talents, nay some learning; but he
is totally unfit for this situation. Sir, the Highland chiefs should not
be allowed to go farther south than Aberdeen. A strong-minded man, like
his brother Sir James, may be improved by an English education; but in
general they will be tamed into insignificance." 'I meditated an escape
from this house the very next day; but Dr. Johnson resolved that we
should weather it out till Monday.' Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale:--'We
saw the isle of Skie before us, darkening the horizon with its rocky
coast. A boat was procured, and we launched into one of the straits of
the Atlantick Ocean. We had a passage of about twelve miles to the point
where ---- ---- resided, having come from his seat in the middle of the
island to a small house on the shore, as we believe, that he might with
less reproach entertain us meanly. If he aspired to meanness, his
retrograde ambition was completely gratified... Boswell was very angry,
and reproached him with his improper parsimony.' _Piozzi Letters_, i.
137. A little later he wrote:--'I have done thinking of ---- whom we now
call Sir Sawney; he has disgusted all mankind by injudicious parsimony,
and given occasion to so many stories, that ---- has some thoughts of
collecting them, and making a novel of his life.' _Ib_. p. 198. The last
of Rowlandson's _Caricatures_ of Boswell's _Journal_ is entitled
_Revising for the Second Edition_. Macdonald is represented as seizing
Boswell by the throat and pointing with his stick to the _Journal_ that
lies open at pages 168, 169. On the ground lie pages 165, 167, torn out.
Boswell, in an agony of fear, is b