ware of indirect expressions before a Caledonian.
Clap an extinguisher upon your irony, if you are unhappily blest
with a vein of it. Remember you are upon your oath. I have a print
of a graceful female after Leonardo da Vinci, which I was showing
off to Mr. ****. After he had examined it minutely, I ventured to
ask him how he liked MY BEAUTY (a foolish name it goes by among my
friends)--when he very gravely assured me, that "he had considerable
respect for my character and talents" (so he was pleased to say), "but
had not given himself much thought about the degree of my personal
pretensions." The misconception staggered me, but did not seem much
to disconcert him.--Persons of this nation are particularly fond
of affirming a truth--which nobody doubts. They do not so properly
affirm, as annunciate it. They do indeed appear to have such a love of
truth (as if, like virtue, it were valuable for itself) that all truth
becomes equally valuable, whether the proposition that contains it be
new or old, disputed, or such as is impossible to become a subject of
disputation. I was present not long since at a party of North Britons,
where a son of Burns was expected; and happened to drop a silly
expression (in my South British way), that I wished it were the father
instead of the son--when four of them started up at once to inform
me, that "that was impossible, because he was dead." An impracticable
wish, it seems, was more than they could conceive. Swift has hit off
this part of their character, namely their love of truth, in his
biting way, but with an illiberality that necessarily confines the
passage to the margin.[2] The tediousness of these people is certainly
provoking. I wonder if they ever tire one another!--In my early life
I had a passionate fondness for the poetry of Burns. I have sometimes
foolishly hoped to ingratiate myself with his countrymen by expressing
it. But I have always found that a true Scot resents your admiration
of his compatriot, even more than he would your contempt of him. The
latter he imputes to your "imperfect acquaintance with many of the
words which he uses;" and the same objection makes it a presumption
in you to suppose that you can admire him.--Thomson they seem to have
forgotten. Smollett they have neither forgotten nor forgiven for his
delineation of Rory and his companion, upon their first introduction
to our metropolis.--peak of Smollett as a great genius, and they will
retort upon you Hu