en. He was willing,
however, to talk calmly about eternal punishment, and to admit the
possibility of a "mitigated interpretation."

After supper he dictated to Boswell an argument in favour of the negro
who was then claiming his liberty in Scotland. He hated slavery with a
zeal which the excellent Boswell thought to be "without knowledge;" and
on one occasion gave as a toast to some "very grave men" at Oxford,
"Here's to the next insurrection of negroes in the West Indies." The
hatred was combined with as hearty a dislike for American independence.
"How is it," he said, "that we always hear the loudest yelps for liberty
amongst the drivers of negroes?" The harmony of the evening was
unluckily spoilt by an explosion of this prejudice. Boswell undertook
the defence of the colonists, and the discussion became so fierce that
though Johnson had expressed a willingness to sit up all night with him,
they were glad to part after an hour or two, and go to bed.

In 1778, Boswell came to London and found Johnson absorbed, to an extent
which apparently excited his jealousy, by his intimacy with the Thrales.
They had, however, several agreeable meetings. One was at the club, and
Boswell's report of the conversation is the fullest that we have of any
of its meetings. A certain reserve is indicated by his using initials
for the interlocutors, of whom, however, one can be easily identified as
Burke. The talk began by a discussion of an antique statue, said to be
the dog of Alcibiades, and valued at 1000_l_. Burke said that the
representation of no animal could be worth so much. Johnson, whose taste
for art was a vanishing quantity, said that the value was proportional
to the difficulty. A statue, as he argued on another occasion, would be
worth nothing if it were cut out of a carrot. Everything, he now said,
was valuable which "enlarged the sphere of human powers." The first man
who balanced a straw upon his nose, or rode upon three horses at once,
deserved the applause of mankind; and so statues of animals should be
preserved as a proof of dexterity, though men should not continue such
fruitless labours.

The conversation became more instructive under the guidance of Burke. He
maintained what seemed to his hearers a paradox, though it would be
interesting to hear his arguments from some profounder economist than
Boswell, that a country would be made more populous by emigration.
"There are bulls enough in Ireland," he remarked incid