that we may be
incapacitated by the strength of our backbone for perceiving the mighty
merit of this astonishing satire. Steeped to the lips in national
prejudices in favour of Scotland, (not against England--heaven forbid!)
imbibed with the first gulp of Glenlivet that more than three quarters of
a century ago went gurgling down our filial throats--inured to hunger from
our tenderest years--"in life's morning march when our spirits were
young," ignorant of shoes, though haply not inexpert of sulphur--to us,
thus born and thus bred, it may not be given to behold with our outward
eyes, and feel with our inward hearts, the full glory of "The Prophecy of
Famine." Boswell, with an uneasy smirk, rather than a ghastly grin, said,
"It is indeed falsely applied to Scotland, but may on that account be
allowed a greater share of invention." Johnson in his heart loved
Scotland, as all his jeers show; and perhaps on that account was, like
ourselves, no fair judge of Churchill's genius. "I called the fellow a
blockhead at first--and I call him a blockhead still," comprehended all
his performances in one general contempt. In later times, Jeffrey has
dismissed him with little ceremony to find his place at the Third Table.
Campbell, who, though a Whig, cared nothing about Churchill, acknowledges
having been amused by the laughable extravagance of the "Prophecy." And
Lord Mahon says, "that it may yet be read with all the admiration which
the most vigorous powers of verse and the most lively touches of wit can
earn in the cause of slander and falsehood."

Suppose, rough-and-ready Readers, that you judge for yourselves. You have
not a copy of Churchill--so passing over the first part of the poem--about
three hundred lines--as dull as ditchwater in the season of powheads--let
us give you the cream, or marrow, or pith of the famous "Prophecy of
Famine," before which Scotia, "our auld respectit mither," bowed down and
fell, and was thought by some to have given up the ghost, or at least
"tined her dam."

"Two boys, whose birth, beyond all question, springs
From great and glorious tho' forgotten kings,
Shepherds of Scottish lineage, born and bred
On the same bleak and barren mountain's head;
By niggard Nature doom'd on the same rocks
To spin out life, and starve themselves and flocks;
Fresh as the morning which, enrob'd in mist,
The mountain's top with usual dulness kiss'd,
Jockey and Sawney, to their labours rose;