boswellize_ (which is a verb that has gone into our
dictionaries) means not merely to transcribe faithfully the acts and
moods and import of a man's life; it implies also that the man so
delineated be a good man and a great. Horace Traubel was perhaps a
Boswell; but Rosner never.

It is pleasant to know that Boswell was not merely a kind of animated
note-book. He was a droll, vain, erring, bibulous, warm-hearted
creature, a good deal of a Pepys, in fact, with all the Pepysian vices
and virtues. Mr. A. Edward Newton's "Amenities of Book Collecting" makes
Boswell very human to us. How jolly it is to learn that Jamie (like many
lesser fry since) wrote press notices about himself. Here is one of his
own blurbs, which we quote from Mr. Newton's book:

Boswell, the author, is a most excellent man: he is of an ancient
family in the west of Scotland, upon which he values himself not a
little. At his nativity there appeared omens of his future
greatness. His parts are bright, and his education has been good. He
has traveled in post chaises miles without number. He is fond of
seeing much of the world. He eats of every good dish, especially
apple pie. He drinks Old Hock. He has a very fine temper. He is
somewhat of a humorist and a little tinctured with pride. He has a
good manly countenance, and he owns himself to be amorous. He has
infinite vivacity, yet is observed at times to have a melancholy
cast. He is rather fat than lean, rather short than tall, rather
young than old. His shoes are neatly made, and he never wears
spectacles.

This brings the excellent Boswell very close to us indeed: he might
almost be a member of the Authors' League. "Especially apple pie, bless
his heart!"

When we said that Boswell was a kind of Pepys, we fell by chance into a
happy comparison. Not only by his volatile errors was he of the tribe of
Samuel, but in his outstanding character by which he becomes of
importance to posterity--that of one of the great diarists. Now there is
no human failing upon which we look with more affectionate lenience than
that of keeping a diary. All of us, in our pilgrimage through the
difficult thickets of this world, have moods and moments when we have to
fall back on ourselves for the only complete understanding and
absolution we will ever find. In such times, how pleasant it is to
record our emotions and misgivings in the sure and secret pages of some
privy n