the beginning of the year 1821, a few gentlemen of similar prepossessions, conceived it to be not only justifiable, but necessary, that the fervour of the radical press, as it was called, should be met by a corresponding fervour on the other side, so that the enemies of the government might be combated with their own weapons. Hence arose a newspaper in Edinburgh styled the Beacon, to which Sir Alexander Boswell contributed a few jeux d'esprit, aimed at the leading men on the other side, and alleged to have far exceeded the proper line of political sarcasm. These being continued in a subsequent paper, which was published at Glasgow, under the name of the Sentinel, at length were traced to their author by James Stuart, Esq. younger of Dunearn, who had been the object of some of the rudest attacks, and repeatedly accused of cowardice. The consequence of this discovery was a challenge from Mr Stuart to Sir Alexander, and the hostile parties having met near Auchtertool in Fife, March 26, 1822, the latter received a shot in the bottom of the neck, which terminated his existence next day. Mr Stuart was tried for this offence, by the High Court of Justiciary, but most honourably acquitted. Sir Alexander left a widow and several children.
BOSWELL, James, the second son of the biographer of Johnson, was, as already mentioned, educated at Westminster School. He was afterwards entered of Brazen-nose College, Oxford, and there had the honour to be elected fellow upon the Vinerian foundation. Mr Boswell possessed talents of a superior order, sound classical scholarship, and a most extensive and intimate knowledge of our early literature. In the investigation of every subject he pursued, his industry, judgment, and discrimination, were equally remarkable; his memory was unusually tenacious and accurate; and he was always as ready, as he was competent, to communicate his stores of information for the benefit of others. Mr Malone was influenced by these qualifications, ad led to the friendship which he entertained for Mr Boswell, to select him as his literary executor; and to his care this eminent commentator intrusted the publication of an enlarged and amended edition of Shakspeare, which he had long been meditating. As Mr Malone's papers were left in a state scarcely intelligible, it is believed that no man but one of kindred genius like Mr Boswell, could have rendered them at all available. This, however, Mr Boswell did in the most efficient manner; farther enriching the work with many excellent notes of his own, besides collating the text with all the earlier editions. This work, indeed, which extends to twenty-one volumes, 8vo, must be considered as not only the most elaborate edition of Shakspeare, but perhaps the greatest edition of any work in the English language. In the first volume, Mr Boswell has stepped forward to defend the literary reputation of Mr Malone against the severe attacks made by a writer of distinguished eminence, upon many of his critical opinions and statements; a task of great delicacy, and which Mr Boswell performed in so spirited and gentlemanly a manner, that his preface may be fairly quoted as a model of controversial writing. In the same volume are inserted "Memoirs of Mr Malone," originally printed by Mr Boswell for private circulation; and a valuable essay on the metre and phraseology of Shakspeare, the materials for which were partly collected by Mr Malone, but which was entirely indebted to Mr Boswell for arrangement and completion.
Mr Boswell inherited from his father a keen relish of the society of the metropolis, and accordingly he spent his life almost exclusively in the Middle Temple. Few men were better fitted to appreciate and contribute to the pleasures of social intercourse; his conversational powers, and the unfailing cheerfulness of his disposition, rendered him everywhere an acceptable guest; but it was the goodness of his heart, that warmth of friendship which knew no bounds
