Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 4.djvu/87

Rh M'Lean, in a ; the ; the Perkins Institution for the ; the  and  ; the ' Home; the Carney ; the  ; the School for  and Feeble-minded; the Lying-in ; the Temporary, Washingtonian, and Appleton Homes; s for Women, Children, and Infants; Homes for Aged Men, for Aged Women and for  Women, for Little Wanderers; a Children's Mission; House of the Angel Guardian; Commissioners of Foreign , &c. The city institutions for paupers, the, and criminals, are in South Boston and on.

Ninety years after the settlement of the of Boston, Daniel Neal, of, wrote a description of it, returning from his visit. In this he says: "The conversation in this is as polite as in most of the  and s in, many of their merchants having travelled into , and those that stay at home having the advantage of a free conversation with travellers; so that a gentleman from  would almost think himself at home at Boston, when he observes the numbers of people, their houses, their , their tables, their , and conversation, which perhaps is as splendid and showy as that of the most considerable tradesmen in ." Though in the succession of visitors from abroad, particularly from, who have followed Mr Neal, there have been a few who have found matter for satire and depreciatory criticism in their accounts of Boston, of its citizens, their habits, &c., the great majority of its foreign guests, especially if their own manners and errands have recommended them, have written in a similar strain. They have found there much to learn and enjoy, and to remember with pleasure. Cultivated, particularly those who have visited Boston in recent years to obtain or to impart information, have found themselves at home there. The supposed conceit of its citizens over their own distinctive qualities or advantages has led to some pleasant banter from at home and abroad in characterizing the city as the " of " or "The Hub of the ."

The development, growth, and increased of the, under the liberal social influences, and the changes of opinion and habit, which in no part of the world are more marked and active than here, have, of course, wholly displaced the original homogeneousness of its people, and the peculiarly  character of the tone and customs of life. Its large foreign population make, in traditions, habits, social relations, and, a within a. The unfamiliar names which appear on the signs of shops and dwellings, the relaxed usages as regards the observance of, and the indulgence in amusements, large personal freedom, &c., have made Boston, substantially, a cosmopolitan. Those now living remember when a person who ventured to smoke a or a  in the  would have fallen into the hands of a. When the traffic in the s is annually obstructed by an elaborate procession, and on, on "'s Day," and when a , with other officials from the  of , comes hither to consecrate an  in a , it is difficult to recall the virgin promontory and the  exiles with which this notice began. (Author:George Edward Ellis)  BOSTON,, a popular and learned Scottish divine, born at Dunse, May 17, 1676. He was educated at Edinburgh, and in 1699 became minister of the parish of Simprin, from which he was translated in 1707 to Ettrick. It was by his recommendation that Hog of Carnock reprinted in 1718 the famous Marrow of Modern Divinity, which excited such a fierce controversy in the Scottish church. He also distinguished himself by being the only member of Assembly who entered a protest against the sentence passed on Professor Simson as being too slight a censure. He died May 20, 1732. His writings were numerous; but he is best known by his Fourfold State, the Crook in the Lot, and his Body of Divinity, works much esteemed by Presbyterians, and which long exercised a powerful influence over the minds of the Scottish peasantry. He left Memoirs of his own Life and Times, published in 1776. An edition of his works in 12 volumes appeared in 1849, ff.  BOSWELL,, the biographer of, was born at Edinburgh on the 29th October 1740. His father was one of the lords of Session, or judges of the supreme court in Scotland, and took his title, Lord Auchinleck, from the name of his property in Ayrshire. The family was of old and honourable descent, a fact of which both father and son were not only proud but vain. James, the eldest son, was educated at Edinburgh and Glasgow Universities, and during his student days contracted a close and life-long friendship with William Johnson Temple, afterwards vicar of St Gluvias and rector of Mamhead. His unrestrained correspondence with Temple, extending with occasional breaks from 1758 to the last year of his life, affords us the best materials for a knowledge of his career and an estimate of his character. At the age of eighteen he was busily engaged in the study of the law at Edinburgh, not entirely in accordance with his own inclination, but in obedience to the desire of his father. Already, however, he had begun to take a pride in being associated with men of distinction, and tells his friend, with some exultation, that he had accompanied Sir David Dalrymple (afterward Lord Hailes) on the Northern Circuit, and had kept a journal of what was said by the great man on the way. Some other peculiarities of his character also became manifest even at this early period of his life. He was evidently unsettled and unstable, "constitutionally unfit," as he afterwards said, "for any employment;" he disliked the Scottish style of life, and longed for the elegance, refinement, and liberality of London society. In 1760 this wish was so far gratified; he tasted some of the delights of the capital, and indulged in magnificent dreams of entering the Guards and spending his time about the court. Such a fancy, however, came to nothing; for as he has narrated with some pride, the duke of Argyll told his father that "this boy must not be shot at for three and sixpence a day." A military life, indeed, would hardly have suited him, for, as he frankly confesses, his personal courage was but small.

Boswell's tastes were always literary; he had contributed some slight things to the current magazines; and in 1762 he published a rather humorous little poem, The Cub at Newmarket. In the following year appeared a collection of Letters between the Hon. Andrew Erskine and James Boswell, Esq., which the vanity of the youthful authors induced them to think would be received with pleasure and profit by the world. The only prominent characteristic of these epistles is an overstrained attempt at liveliness and wit.

On Monday, 16th May 1763, Boswell, then on a second visit to London, had the supreme happiness to make the acquaintance of the object of his almost idolatrous admiration, Dr Johnson. Their first interview in the back parlour of Mr Davies's shop in Russell Street was characteristic of both; the calm strength and ponderous wit of the one, the fluttering folly and childish servility of the other, are portrayed to the life in Boswell's own narrative. Few things are more singular than the intimacy which sprang up between two men so differently constituted. Boswell might indeed congratulate himself that he had something about him that interested most people at first sight in his favour. He was then about to proceed to Utrecht in order