’I have now finished my Tour of Seven Pages.  In what remains, I beg leave to offer my compliments, and those of ma tres chere femme, to you and Mrs. Boswell.  Pray unbend the busy brow, and frolick a little in a letter to,

’My dear Boswell,

’Your affectionate friend,

‘GEORGE DEMPSTER[1139].’

I shall also present the publick with a correspondence with the Laird of Rasay, concerning a passage in the Journey to the Western Islands, which shews Dr. Johnson in a very amiable light.

’To JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

’Rasay, April 10th, 1775.

’DEAR SIR,

’I take this occasion of returning you my most hearty thanks for the civilities shewn to my daughter by you and Mrs. Boswell.  Yet, though she has informed me that I am under this obligation, I should very probably have deferred troubling you with making my acknowledgments at present, if I had not seen Dr. Johnson’s Journey to the Western Isles, in which he has been pleased to make a very friendly mention of my family, for which I am surely obliged to him, as being more than an equivalent for the reception you and he met with.  Yet there is one paragraph I should have been glad he had omitted, which I am sure was owing to misinformation; that is, that I had acknowledged McLeod to be my chief, though my ancestors disputed the pre-eminence for a long tract of time.

’I never had occasion to enter seriously on this argument with the present laird or his grandfather, nor could I have any temptation to such a renunciation from either of them.  I acknowledge, the benefit of being chief of a clan is in our days of very little significancy, and to trace out the progress of this honour to the founder of a family, of any standing, would perhaps be a matter of some difficulty.

’The true state of the present case is this:  the McLeod family consists of two different branches; the M’Leods of Lewis, of which I am descended, and the M’Leods of Harris.  And though the former have lost a very extensive estate by forfeiture in king James the Sixth’s time, there are still several respectable families of it existing, who would justly blame me for such an unmeaning cession, when they all acknowledge me head of that family; which though in fact it be but an ideal point of honour, is not hitherto so far disregarded in our country, but it would determine some of my friends to look on me as a much smaller man than either they or myself judge me at present to be.  I will, therefore, ask it as a favour of you to acquaint the Doctor with the difficulty he has brought me to.  In travelling among rival clans, such a silly tale as this might easily be whispered into the ear of a passing stranger; but as it has no foundation in fact, I hope the Doctor will be so good as to take his own way in undeceiving the publick, I principally mean my friends and connections, who will be first angry at me, and next sorry to find such an instance of my littleness recorded in a book which has a very fair chance of being much read.  I expect you will let me know what he will write you in return, and we here beg to make offer to you and Mrs. Boswell of our most respectful compliments.