ong tone, 'Where's the merriment?' Then collecting himself,
and looking aweful, to make us feel how he could impose restraint, and
as it were searching his mind for a still more ludicrous word, he slowly
pronounced, 'I say the WOMAN was FUNDAMENTALLY sensible;' as if he had
said, hear this now, and laugh if you dare. We all sat composed as at a
funeral.

He and I walked away together; we stopped a little while by the rails of
the Adelphi, looking on the Thames, and I said to him with some emotion
that I was now thinking of two friends we had lost, who once lived in
the buildings behind us, Beauclerk and Garrick. 'Ay, Sir, (said he,
tenderly,) and two such friends as cannot be supplied.'

For some time after this day I did not see him very often, and of the
conversation which I did enjoy, I am sorry to find I have preserved but
little. I was at this time engaged in a variety of other matters, which
required exertion and assiduity, and necessarily occupied almost all my
time.

On Tuesday, May 8, I had the pleasure of again dining with him and Mr.
Wilkes, at Mr. Dilly's. No NEGOCIATION was now required to bring them
together; for Johnson was so well satisfied with the former interview,
that he was very glad to meet Wilkes again, who was this day seated
between Dr. Beattie and Dr. Johnson; (between Truth and Reason, as
General Paoli said, when I told him of it.) WILKES. 'I have been
thinking, Dr. Johnson, that there should be a bill brought into
parliament that the controverted elections for Scotland should be tried
in that country, at their own Abbey of Holy-Rood House, and not here;
for the consequence of trying them here is, that we have an inundation
of Scotchmen, who come up and never go back again. Now here is Boswell,
who is come up upon the election for his own county, which will not last
a fortnight.' JOHNSON. 'Nay, Sir, I see no reason why they should be
tried at all; for, you know, one Scotchman is as good as another.'
WILKES. 'Pray, Boswell, how much may be got in a year by an Advocate at
the Scotch bar?' BOSWELL. 'I believe two thousand pounds.' WILKES. 'How
can it be possible to spend that money in Scotland?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir,
the money may be spent in England: but there is a harder question. If
one man in Scotland gets possession of two thousand pounds, what remains
for all the rest of the nation?' WILKES. 'You know, in the last war, the
immense booty which Thurot carried off by the complete plunder of se