We walked in the evening in Greenwich Park.  He asked me, I suppose, by way of trying my disposition, ‘Is not this very fine?’ Having no exquisite relish of the beauties of Nature, and being more delighted with ‘the busy hum of men,’ I answered, ’Yes, Sir; but not equal to Fleet-street.’  Johnson.  ‘You are right, Sir.’

I am aware that many of my readers may censure my want of taste.  Let me, however, shelter myself under the authority of a very fashionable Baronet in the brilliant world, who, on his attention being called to the fragrance of a May evening in the country, observed, ’This may be very well; but, for my part, I prefer the smell of a flambeau at the playhouse.’

We staid so long at Greenwich, that our sail up the river, in our return to London, was by no means so pleasant as in the morning; for the night air was so cold that it made me shiver.  I was the more sensible of it from having sat up all the night before, recollecting and writing in my journal what I thought worthy of preservation; an exertion, which, during the first part of my acquaintance with Johnson, I frequently made.  I remember having sat up four nights in one week, without being much incommoded in the day time.

Johnson, whose robust frame was not in the least affected by the cold, scolded me, as if my shivering had been a paltry effeminacy, saying, ‘Why do you shiver?’ Sir William Scott, of the Commons, told me, that when he complained of a head-ache in the post-chaise, as they were travelling together to Scotland, Johnson treated him in the same manner: 

‘At your age, Sir, I had no head-ache.’

We concluded the day at the Turk’s Head coffee-house very socially.  He was pleased to listen to a particular account which I gave him of my family, and of its hereditary estate, as to the extent and population of which he asked questions, and made calculations; recommending, at the same time, a liberal kindness to the tenantry, as people over whom the proprietor was placed by Providence.  He took delight in hearing my description of the romantick seat of my ancestors.  ’I must be there, Sir, (said he) and we will live in the old castle; and if there is not a room in it remaining, we will build one.’  I was highly flattered, but could scarcely indulge a hope that Auchinleck would indeed be honoured by his presence, and celebrated by a description, as it afterwards was, in his Journey to the Western Islands.

After we had again talked of my setting out for Holland, he said, ’I must see thee out of England; I will accompany you to Harwich.’  I could not find words to express what I felt upon this unexpected and very great mark of his affectionate regard.

Next day, Sunday, July 31, I told him I had been that morning at a meeting of the people called Quakers, where I had heard a woman preach.  Johnson.  ’Sir, a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hinder legs.  It is not done well; but you are surprized to find it done at all.’