‘Death’s a destroyer of quotidian prey,’

and in my friend’s Dictionary, supported by the authorities of Charles I. and Dr. Donne.

It rained very hard as we journied on after dinner.  The roar of torrents from the mountains, as we passed along in the dusk, and the other circumstances attending our ride in the evening, have been mentioned with so much animation by Dr. Johnson, that I shall not attempt to say any thing on the subject[924].

We got at night to Inverary, where we found an excellent inn.  Even here, Dr. Johnson would not change his wet clothes.

The prospect of good accommodation cheered us much.  We supped well; and after supper, Dr. Johnson, whom I had not seen taste any fermented liquor during all our travels, called for a gill of whiskey.  ’Come, (said he,) let me know what it is that makes a Scotchman happy[925]!’ He drank it all but a drop, which I begged leave to pour into my glass, that I might say we had drunk whisky together.  I proposed Mrs. Thrale should be our toast.  He would not have her drunk in whisky, but rather ‘some insular lady;’ so we drank one of the ladies whom we had lately left.  He owned to-night, that he got as good a room and bed as at an English inn.

I had here the pleasure of finding a letter from home, which relieved me from the anxiety I had suffered, in consequence of not having received any account of my family for many weeks.  I also found a letter from Mr. Garrick, which was a regale[926] as agreeable as a pine-apple would be in a desert[927].  He had favoured me with his correspondence for many years; and when Dr. Johnson and I were at Inverness, I had written to him as follows:—­

     Inverness,
     Sunday, 29 August, 1773.

     MY DEAR SIR,

’Here I am, and Mr. Samuel Johnson actually with me.  We were a night at Fores, in coming to which, in the dusk of the evening, we passed over the bleak and blasted heath where Macbeth met the witches[928].  Your old preceptor[929] repeated, with much solemnity, the speech—­

     “How far is’t called to Fores?  What are these,
      So wither’d and so wild in their attire,” &c.

This day we visited the ruins of Macbeth’s castle at Inverness.  I have had great romantick satisfaction in seeing Johnson upon the classical scenes of Shakspeare in Scotland; which I really looked upon as almost as improbable as that “Birnam wood should come to Dunsinane[930].”  Indeed, as I have always been accustomed to view him as a permanent London object, it would not be much more wonderful to me to see St. Paul’s Church moving along where we now are.  As yet we have travelled in post-chaises; but to-morrow we are to mount on horseback, and ascend into the mountains by Fort Augustus, and so on to the ferry, where we are to cross to Sky.  We shall see that island fully, and then visit some more of the Hebrides; after which we are to land in Argyleshire,