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impudence in consideration of the genuine goodwill. David Hume and Wilkes seem to have felt the charm as much as Johnson and Burke. A man who takes you into his confidence so frankly is at least paying you a compliment. It was only such fine gentlemen as Walpole and Gibbon, who stood upon their dignity and would not take liberties even upon invitation, lest liberties should be taken with them, whom Boswell found intolerable. Gibbon in particular was an 'ugly, affected, disgusting fellow,' who 'poisoned' the club for him. Still worse, indeed, were the people who saw in Boswell's simplicity a chance of making him a butt for rough practical jokes. The sycophants who surrounded his patron, Lord Lowther, and the Bar of the Northern Circuit seem to have embittered the poor man's last years by using him in that capacity. His disposition, in fact, was not conducive to success in practical life. Boswell was far too easy-going and too apt to snatch at any indulgences which came in his way to play an effective part in a game of rough-and-tumble. The characteristic result was that Boswell became a kind of interested looker-on, like a delicate boy at a rough public school, who admires the games, though he cannot take