fortunate enough to find willing to extend my acquaintance among their friends, for these, my Lord, were the lions I came to see in London.' 'Aye,' says he, 'these indeed are lions worth seeing, and the sight of them may be of use to you.'
APRIL 2Oth. Fair, and somewhat softened by the fall of hail yesterday. Dined at Thrale's x , with Dr. Johnson, Barretti, and a Dean Wetherall of Oxford 2 , who is soliciting for a riding house at Oxford. When I mentioned to the Doctor another answer, entitled Resistance no Rebellion, coming out, he said, 'that is the seventh, the author finds the other six will not do, and I foresee that the title is the best part of the book.' He desired that I should visit him. N.B. Talking after dinner of the measures he would pursue with the Americans, he said the first thing he would do, would be to quarter the army on the citys, and if any refused free quarters, he would pull down that person's house, if it was joyned to other houses, but would burn it if it stood alone 3 . This and other schemes he proposed in the manuscript of Taxation no Tyranny, but these, he said, the Ministry expunged 4 .
34th. Rainy morning. Sat an hour with Dr. Johnson about noon. He was at breakfast with a Pindar 5 in his hand, and after over Pindar, layed the book down, and then told me he had seen my Lord Primate at Sir Joshua's, and ' I believe/ says he, ' I have not recommended myself much to him, for I differed widely in opinions from him, yet I hear he is doing good things in Ireland V I mentioned Skelton to him as a man of strong
1 Boswell was absent from London the Americans ' Rascals Robbers from April 1910 May 2. Life, ii. 371. Pirates; exclaiming he'd burn and
2 Dr. Wetherell was Master of destroy them,' and post, p. 55. University College, Oxford, and Dean 4 Life, ii. 313. For Hume's wise of Hereford. Johnson had written views see his Letters to Strahan, to Mrs. Thrale on April I : ' Dr. p. 288.
Wetherell is very desirous of seeing 5 Boswell had sent him an ' elegant
the brewhouse ; I hope Mr. Thrale Pindar.' Life, ii. 204.
will send him an invitation.' Letters, 6 ' He half-whistled in his usual
i. 313. For the riding-school see way when pleasant.' Ib. iii. 357.
Life, ii. 424 ; Letters, i. 309, n. I. 7 For Johnson's views* about Ire-
3 See Life, iii. 290, where he called land see Life, ii. 121, 130, 255.
imagination,
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