Well known is the rude reproof he gave to a talker, who asserted, that every individual in Scotland had literature. (By the by, modern statesmen do not wish that every one in the King's dominions should be able to write and read x .) ' The general learning of the Scotch nation ' (said he, in a bad humour) 'resembles the condition of a ship's crew, condemned to short allowance of provisions; every one has a mouthful, and nobody a belly full V Of this enough. His size has been described to be large : his mind and person both on a large scale. His face and features are happily preserved by Reynolds and by Nollekens 3 . His elocution was energetic, and, in the words of a great scholar in the north, who did not like him, he spoke in the Lincolnshire dialect 4 . His articulation became worse, by some dental losses. But he never was silent on that account, nor unwilling to talk. It never was said of him. that he was overtaken with liquor 5 , a declaration Bishop Hoadly makes of himself. But he owned that he drank his bottle at a certain time of life 6 . Lions, and the fiercest of the wild creation, drink nothing but water. Like Solomon, who tried so many things for curiosity and delight, he renounced strong liquors, (strong liquors, according to Fenton, of all kinds
1 For Johnson's defence of popular they will find me out to be of a par- education see Life, ii. 188. ticular county.' Ib. ii. 159.
2 * He defended his remark upon Boswell remarked at Lichfield that the general insufficiency of education 'there was pronounced like fear, in- in Scotland ; and confirmed to me stead of like fair ; once was pro- the authenticity of his witty saying nounced woonse, instead of wunse or on the learning of the Scotch : ivonse. Johnson himself never got "Their learning is like bread in a entirely free of those provincial ac- besieged town ; every man gets a cents.' Ib. ii. 464. At Aberdeen little, but no man gets a full meal." ' Boswell records: 'I was sensible Ib. ii. 363 ; ante, i. 321 ; ii. 5. to-day, to an extraordinary degree,
3 Life, iv. 421, n. 2 ; Letters, ii. of Dr. Johnson's excellent English 59. pronunciation.' Ib. v. 85.
4 The * great scholar ' was perhaps 5 See ante, ii. 322 #., where he Lord Monboddo ; for his dislike of said : ' I used to slink home when Johnson see Life, iv. 273, n. I. John- I had drunk too much.'
son's accent, such as it was, was of 6 * I have drunk three bottles of course that of Staffordshire. ' Sir,' port without being the worse for it. he said, ' when people watch me nar- University College has witnessed rowly, and I do not watch myself, this.* Life, Hi. 245.
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