Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica Part 23

This gentleman is the eldest son of the old General Giacinto Paoli. He is about fifty years of age, of a middle size and dark complexion, his eyes are quick and piercing, and he has something in the form of his mouth which renders his appearance very particular. His understanding is of the first rate; and he has by no means suffered it to lie neglected.

He was married, and has an only daughter, the wife of Signor Barbaggi one of the first men in the island.

For these many years past, Signor Clementi, being in a state of widowhood, has resided at Rostino, from whence the family of Paoli comes. He lives there in a very retired manner. He is of a Saturnine disposition, and his notions of religion are rather gloomy and severe.

He spends his whole time in study, except what he pa.s.ses at his devotions. These generally take up six or eight hours every day; during all which time he is in church, and before the altar, in a fixed posture, with his hands and eyes lifted up to heaven, with solemn fervour.

He prescribes to himself, an abstemious, rigid course of life; as if he had taken the vows of some of the religious orders. He is much with the Franciscans, who have a convent at Rostino. He wears the common coa.r.s.e dress of the country, and it is difficult to distinguish him from one of the lowest of the people.

When he is in company he seldom speaks, and except upon important occasions, never goes into publick, or even to visit his brother at Corte. When danger calls, however, he is the first to appear in the defence of his country. He is then foremost in the ranks, and exposes himself to the hottest action; for religious fear is perfectly consistent with the greatest bravery; according to the famous line of the pious Racine,

"Je crains DIEU, cher Abner; et n'ai point d'autre crainte."

"I fear my G.o.d; and Him alone I fear."

--A FRIEND.

In the beginning of an engagement he is generally calm; and will frequently offer up a prayer to heaven, for the person at whom he is going to fire; saying he is sorry to be under the necessity of depriving him of life; but that he is an enemy to Corsica, and Providence has sent him in his way, in order that he may be prevented from doing any farther mischief; that he hopes G.o.d will pardon his crimes, and take him to himself. After he has seen two or three of his countrymen fall at his side, the case alters. His eyes flame with grief and indignation, and he becomes like one furious, dealing vengeance every where around him.

His authority in the council is not less than his valour in the field.

His strength of judgement and extent of knowledge, joined to the singular sanct.i.ty of his character, give him great weight in all the publick consultations; and his influence is of considerable service to his brother the General.--Boswell's "Account of Corsica," page 222.

REVIEWS.

DR. JOHNSON:

HIS FRIENDS AND HIS CRITICS.

BY GEORGE BIRKBECK HILL, D.C.L.[159]

[Footnote 159: Smith, Elder, and Co. 1878]

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.

"Seldom has a pleasanter commentary been written on a literary masterpiece.... What its author has aimed at has been the reproduction of the atmosphere in which Johnson lived; and he has succeeded so well that we shall look with interest for other chapters of Johnsonian literature which he promises.... Throughout the author of this pleasant volume has spared no pains to enable the present generation to realise more completely the sphere, so near and so far from this latter half of the nineteenth century, in which Johnson talked and taught."--SAt.u.r.dAY REVIEW, _July 13th, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill has written out of his ripe scholars.h.i.+p several interesting disquisitions, all tending to a better understanding of the man and his times, and all written with the ease and the absence of pretence which come of long familiarity with a subject and complete mastery of its facts."--THE EXAMINER, _July 27th, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill has published a very interesting little book.... All the chapters are interesting in a high degree."--WESTMINSTER REVIEW, _October, 1878_.

"We think Dr. Hill has succeeded in bringing before his readers, vividly and exactly, both the College of Johnson's youth and the University of his later years.... We think he clearly establishes that Boswell, Murphy, and Hawkins were all alike wrong in supposing that the celebrated pa.s.sage in Chesterfield's letters describing the 'respectable Hottentot' refers to Johnson.... He devotes a chapter each to Langton and Beauclerk, in which he gathers together the various scattered references to them by Boswell and other biographers of Johnson and combines them into admirable sketches of each of these friends of Johnson."--WESTMINSTER REVIEW, _January, 1879_.

"With great industry Dr. Hill has ill.u.s.trated the condition of Oxford as a University in the last century.... His first chapter ... embodies, in a lively and entertaining form, a highly instructive picture of the University, the materials for which only laborious industry could have collected."--THE SPECTATOR, _August 17th, 1878_.

"The glimpses which these essays give us of the great men of the days of Burke, Reynolds, and Goldsmith, of Oxford, of London, and of the country, are as full of interest as the most powerful romance. The opening paper on the Oxford of Johnson's time is one of the longest, best, and most original of the whole set."--THE STANDARD, _August 12th, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill is at his best in examining the views of Johnson's critics.

Macaulay's rough and ready a.s.sertions are subjected to a searching criticism, and Mr. Carlyle's estimate of Johnson's position in London society in 1763, if not altogether destroyed, is severely damaged."--THE ACADEMY, _July 27th, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill's book is, in fact, a supplement to Boswell, is brimful of original and independent research, and displays so complete a mastery of the whole subject, that it must be regarded as only less essential to a true understanding of Johnson's life and character than Boswell himself."--THE WORLD, _July 17th, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill's 'Johnson: his Friends and his Critics' is a volume which no reader, however familiar with Boswell, will think superfluous. Its method is, in the main, critical; and even so far it possesses striking novelty from the tendency of the writer's judgment to obviously juster estimates than those of previous critics, both friendly and unfriendly."--THE DAILY NEWS, _August 24th, 1878_.

"The charming papers ... now published by Dr. Hill, under the t.i.tle of 'Dr. Johnson: his Friends and his Critics,' will be, to admirers of the great eighteenth century lexicographer, like the discovery of some new treasure.... It is not too much to say that it is a volume which will henceforth be indispensable to all who would form a full conception of Johnson's many-sided personality."--THE GRAPHIC, _August 3rd, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill's work is certainly not the outcome of any sudden itch to give forth a fresh estimate of the great lexicographer, but the result of long and careful studies and researches; very natural indeed in a member of Johnson's College at Oxford, Pembroke, but not such as any man, that was not gifted with the kind of genius which is patience, would be inclined to undertake. The first chapter, 'Oxford in Dr. Johnson's Time,' is one of the most admirable summaries of the kind we have ever read--doubly admirable here, as forming so fitting and ill.u.s.trative an introduction to his work, which is very complete and thorough."--THE BRITISH QUARTERLY REVIEW, _October, 1878_.

"Dr. Hill has produced an entertaining and instructive book, based on careful and minute research, which has been prompted by keen interest in his subject. The introductory sketch of Oxford in Johnson's time is admirably executed."--THE SCOTSMAN, _August 8th, 1878_.

"Every reader who would be fully informed about the period of English literature, and the men and women who then figured in society, must read Dr. Hill's volume, or miss much that is essential to a full comprehension of it."--THE NONCONFORMIST, _August 28th, 1878_.

"This work is the result of long study, has been accomplished with care and diligence, and is not only in itself a piece of very pleasant reading, but tends to place before us, in a truer light than anything that has before been written, the character of a man who did so much for the English language, and who deserves better than to be forgotten by his countrymen."--THE MORNING POST, _October 15th, 1878_.