Often must I have occasion to upbraid myself, that soon after our return to the main land, I allowed indolence to prevail over me so much, as to shrink from the labour of continuing my journal with the same minuteness as before; sheltering myself in the thought, that we had done with the Hebrides; and not considering, that Dr. Johnson’s Memorabilia were likely to be more valuable when we were restored to a more polished society.  Much has thus been irrecoverably lost.

In the course of our conversation this day, it came out, that Lady Eglintoune was married the year before Dr. Johnson was born; upon which she graciously said to him, that she might have been his mother; and that she now adopted him; and when we were going away, she embraced him, saying, ‘My dear son, farewell[1010]!’ My friend was much pleased with this day’s entertainment, and owned that I had done well to force him out.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2.

We were now in a country not only ‘of saddles and bridles[1011],’ but of post-chaises; and having ordered one from Kilmarnock, we got to Auchinleck[1012] before dinner.

My father was not quite a year and a half older than Dr. Johnson; but his conscientious discharge of his laborious duty as a judge in Scotland, where the law proceedings are almost all in writing,—­a severe complaint which ended in his death,—­and the loss of my mother, a woman of almost unexampled piety and goodness,—­had before this time in some degree affected his spirits[1013], and rendered him less disposed to exert his faculties:  for he had originally a very strong mind, and cheerful temper.  He assured me, he never had felt one moment of what is called low spirits, or uneasiness, without a real cause.  He had a great many good stories, which he told uncommonly well, and he was remarkable for ‘humour, incolumi gravitate[1014],’ as Lord Monboddo used to characterise it.  His age, his office, and his character, had long given him an acknowledged claim to great attention, in whatever company he was; and he could ill brook any diminution of it.  He was as sanguine a Whig and Presbyterian, as Dr. Johnson was a Tory and Church of England man:  and as he had not much leisure to be informed of Dr. Johnson’s great merits by reading his works, he had a partial and unfavourable notion of him, founded on his supposed political tenets; which were so discordant to his own, that instead of speaking of him with that respect to which he was entitled, he used to call him ‘a Jacobite fellow.’  Knowing all this, I should not have ventured to bring them together, had not my father, out of kindness to me, desired me to invite Dr. Johnson to his house.

I was very anxious that all should be well; and begged of my friend to avoid three topicks, as to which they differed very widely; Whiggism, Presbyterianism, and—­Sir John Pringle.[1015] He said courteously, ’I shall certainly not talk on subjects which I am told are disagreeable to a gentleman under whose roof I am; especially, I shall not do so to your father.’