10 APRIL 1880, Page 24

Boswell's Correspondence, and his Journal of a Tour to Corsica.

Edited, with Preface, Introduction, and Notes, by George Birkbeck D.C.L. (Thomas de la Rue.)—Dr. Hill has done quite right to liberate the "Journal of a Tour in Corsica" from the dead-weight of the history of Corsica. The history, if it ever could be told, would never be worth hearing. A very few pages suffice for all that is worth knowing. Its most brilliant passage was that of which Bos- well gives so lively a description in this volume, the days when Paolo was at the head of affairs. It required no little courage and dis- crimination in a young man like Boswell to select such a place and such a man to make acquaintance with, when he had all Europe to choose from. But Boswell shows himself worthy of the opportunity. He was vain and pleasure-seeking, but he knew greatness when he saw it. There must have been some sterling merit in the man who was admitted to such intimacy by Pascal Paoli and Samuel Johnson.