are but three considerable tacksmen on Col’s part of the island[814]:  the rest is let to small tenants, some of whom pay so low a rent as four, three, or even two guineas.  The highest is seven pounds, paid by a farmer, whose son goes yearly on foot to Aberdeen for education, and in summer returns, and acts as a schoolmaster in Col.  Dr. Johnson said, ’There is something noble in a young man’s walking two hundred miles and back again, every year, for the sake of learning[815].’

This day a number of people came to Col, with complaints of each others’ trespasses.  Corneck, to prevent their being troublesome, told them, that the lawyer from Edinburgh was here, and if they did not agree, he would take them to task.  They were alarmed at this; said, they had never been used to go to law, and hoped Col would settle matters himself.  In the evening Corneck left us.

As, in our present confinement, any thing that had even the name of curious was an object of attention, I proposed that Col should shew me the great stone, mentioned in a former page[816], as having been thrown by a giant to the top of a mountain.  Dr. Johnson, who did not like to be left alone, said he would accompany us as far as riding was practicable.  We ascended a part of the hill on horseback, and Col and I scrambled up the rest.  A servant held our horses, and Dr. Johnson placed himself on the ground, with his back against a large fragment of rock.  The wind being high, he let down the cocks of his hat, and tied it with his handkerchief under his chin.  While we were employed in examining the stone, which did not repay our trouble in getting to it, he amused himself with reading Gataker on Lots and on the Christian Watch[817], a very learned book, of the last age, which had been found in the garret of Col’s house, and which he said was a treasure here.  When we descried him from above, he had a most eremitical appearance; and on our return told us, he had been so much engaged by Gataker, that he had never missed us.  His avidity for variety of books, while we were in Col, was frequently expressed; and he often complained that so few were within his reach.  Upon which I observed to him, that it was strange he should complain of want of books, when he could at any time make such good ones.

We next proceeded to the lead mine.  In our way we came to a strand of some extent, where we were glad to take a gallop, in which my learned friend joined with great alacrity.  Dr. Johnson, mounted on a large bay mare without shoes, and followed by a foal, which had some difficulty in keeping up with him, was a singular spectacle.