[90] It may be observed, that I sometimes call my great friend, Mr.  Johnson, sometimes Dr.  Johnson:  though he had at this time a doctor’s degree from Trinity College, Dublin.  The University of Oxford afterwards conferred it upon him by a diploma, in very honourable terms.  It was some time before I could bring myself to call him Doctor; but, as he has been long known by that title, I shall give it to him in the rest of this Journal.  BOSWELL.  See ante, i. 488, note 3, and ii. 332, note I.

[91] In The Idler, No. viii, Johnson has the following fling at tragedians.  He had mentioned the terror struck into our soldiers by the Indian war-cry, and he continues:—­’I am of opinion that by a proper mixture of asses, bulls, turkeys, geese, and tragedians a noise might be procured equally horrid with the war-cry.’  See ante, ii.92.

[92] Tom Jones, Bk. xvi. chap. 5.  Mme. Necker in a letter to Garrick said:—­’Nos acteurs se metamorphosent assez bien, mais Monsieur Garrick fait autre chose; il nous metamorphose tous dans le caractere qu’il a revetu; nous sommes remplis de terreur avec Hamlet,’ &c. Garrick Corres. ii. 627.

[93] See ante, i. 432, and ii. 278.

[94] See ante, ii. 11.

[95] Euphan M’Cullan (not Eupham Macallan) is mentioned in Dalrymple’s [Lord Hailes] Remarks on the History of Scotland, p. 254.  She maintained that ‘she seldom ever prayed but she got a positive answer.’  The minister of her parish was ill.  ’She prayed, and got an answer that for a year’s time he should be spared; and after the year’s end he fell sick again.’  ‘I went,’ said she, ’to pray yet again for his life; but the Lord left me not an mouse’s likeness (a proverbial expression, meaning to reprove with such severity that the person reproved shrinks and becomes abashed), and said, ’Beast that thou art! shall I keep my servant in pain for thy sake?’ And when I said, ’Lord, what then shall I do?’ He answered me, ’He was but a reed that I spoke through, and I will provide another reed to speak through.’  Dalrymple points out that it was a belief in these ‘answers from the Lord’ that led John Balfour and his comrades to murder Archbishop Sharp.

[96] R. Chambers, in his Traditions, speaking of the time of Johnson’s visit, says (i. 21) on the authority of ’an ancient native of Edinburgh that people all knew each other by sight.  The appearance of a new face upon the streets was at once remarked, and numbers busied themselves in finding out who and what the stranger was.’

[97] It was on this visit to the parliament-house, that Mr. Henry Erskine (brother of Lord Erskine), after being presented to Dr. Johnson by Mr. Boswell, and having made his bow, slipped a shilling into Boswell’s hand, whispering that it was for the sight of his bear.  WALTER SCOTT.

[98] This is one of the Libraries entitled to a copy of every new work published in the United Kingdom.  Hume held the office of librarian at a salary of L40 a year from 1752 to 1757.  J.H.  Burton’s Hume, i. 367, 373.