More Boswell

Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides. (Heinemann. 21s.) How pleased Boswell would have been at the delight we feel whenever we come upon anything new about him ! How lie would have rejoiced at the curiosity about James Boswell which, if justification were needed, would justify his curiosity about himself ! Ever since Mr. C. B. Tinker published the ',Tilers we have been all agog to read more about, this man whose chief fascination is his fascination with himself, and

his detached intellectual attitude towards the creature which behaved so oddly at variance with its precepts. Why it is so entrancing to hear Boswell moralising about Boswell is possibly because few of us can share his amazing aptitude for living both the life of reason and the life of impulse ; but in this matter every man must be his own judge.

Professor Abbott's catalogue will be of the first interest to all true Boswellians, and also to Johnsonians, for we hear

of letters which appear neither in the Life nor in the Lthers, or if they do it is only in truncated form. Only precis of

these are given, but they whet the appetite. Mr. Abbott has an engaging preface on Boswell himself, and an intro- duction which tells us how he found the letters; his story com- municates to the reader more than a little of the excitement he felt when, thanks to the hospitality of Lord Clinton, the treasures, in the form of• journals as well as letters, were revealed to him.

It is, however, the new edition of the Journal which will absorb and excite the general reader. This, printed from the original manuscript happily found in a croquet box, differs very considerably from the hitherto printed version, which was, indeed, based on this manuscript, but considerably edited

by Malone. The odd thing is. that though the chief differences were caused by blue peneillings, dictated by the need for keeping the book within reasonable dimensions, the printed

version sometimes expands. Where in the manuscript Boswell is content to say of the monument to Sir James Macdonald:

" It is a very pretty one. The inscription is rather too verbose," in the printed version we are not only told that the monument was elegantly executed at Rome, but we are given the whole inscription. Moreover, on that very date, September 5th, we arc offered much more conversation than is recorded in the manuscript. Further differences arc observable, but

Nvhich gives us most of the essential Boswell it is difficult to decide.

PRINTED VERSION.-.-After supper, Dr. Johnson told us, that Isaac Hawkins Browne, drank freely for thirty yews, and that he wrote his poem, Dr Animi Immortalitate, in some of the last of these years.-- 1 listened to him with the eagerness of one who, conscious of being himself fond of wine, is glad to hear that a man of so much genius and good thinking as Browne had the same la•opensity.

MANUSCRIPT VERSION.—Here we had Rorie's daughter, Miss Katie, a pretty girl enough. Captain Donald, and the rest who were with us yesterday, and drank a couple of bowls of punch. It was dark by the time we got back. I drank freely of punch by way of being social, and after supper I drank freely of port by way of keeping off a medium vitae. Altogether, 1 had too much.

Mr. Johnson told us that Isaac Hawkins Browne drank haul. for thirty years, and that he wrote his poem, De Animi Immorioli- tine, in the last of these years. Sir Alexander and I had another tlisputti tonight upon his method of proceeding, and he was again in a passion.

The old printed version, then, is far from being the actual journal which Dr. Johnson saw,. and so much approved. Parallel texts would reveal serious differences throughout. Malone and Boswell, however, did their work well. The old version is primarily about Johnson, the new is as much about

Boswell, and that is why it will be so eagerly read, especially in its latter part, in which more excisions were made. The old version -is in one sense a better work of art, but in the new we have again and again that artless art of self-revelation of which Boswell was, and largely remains, the great master. There were, alas, too many lapses over the irresistible bowl of poonch, lapses " very 'inconsistent with that conduct which I ought to maintain, while the companion of the Rambler." It is not every man who would have emerged so gaily from

h travel through the Hebrides kith 'hiseionsefenCi., even though conscience often administered its reproofs " with good-humoured English pleasantry." But, after all, conscience was not always there. Boswell was often separated from Jolmson, for did not the writing up of the Journal call for separation and seclusion ? Perhaps Boswell, for all his honesty was a little disingenuous here. Nor could Johnson prevent the eye from roving, the desires from stirring " Such is my amorous disposition " Boswell sighs a trifle ridiculously after noting the neat and attractive appearance of certain house- maids. The restraint may indeed have made Boswell more Boswell than ever.

Beyond all this, there is sometimes a freshness in the manuscript absent from the old version, especially in the description of people. There were things which Boswell could write, which Boswell-Malone would not be able to print. The changes may be slight, but they give a perceptibly different flavour :

PRINTED VERSION.—The truth is, that Loelibuy proved to be only a bluff, comely, noisy old gentleman, proud of his hereditary consequence, and a very hearty and hospitable landlord. • MANITSCRIPT VERSION.—But the truth was that Lochbuie proved to be only a bluff, hearty, rosy old gentleman, of a strong voice and no great depth of understanding.

The whole of the Lochbuie scene is much livelier and fuller in the new book than in the old, and this is to give only one instance out of many. The new version is certainly more entertaining than the old, and for this alone may be preferred ; but there is more in it than that for the true Boswellian. For now we see Boswell more plain, at -least as he was during the journey ; we see the movement of this mind which seems on the surface to be shallow, but was really so profoundly

adapted to the purpose. We see more of the essential con- ditions that allowed Boswell to be Boswell. Not .a moral man, no, in terms of the morality that we accept ; but then morality is not the only art, though it is the one that most of us try

to practise, perhaps because we can practise no other. But this raises questions more suitable for discussion in another part of this paper ; meanwhile there are Boswell and his consummate art to ponder over.

BOSTATtlY DOBILLE.