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 delightful doses of pardonable flattery. Of the others, even of Mrs. Piozzi, we can hardly say more than that they become amusing by the light of Boswell. He has revealed the actors to us with such skill that even the dry and pompous narratives enable us to supply what was wanting, as in the dullest of reports we can sometimes hear the accents of a familiar friend.

".—Mr. Percy Fitzgerald has recently published a 'Critical Examination' of Dr. Birkbeck Hill's Johnsonian editions. Mr. Fitzgerald refers more than once to the fact that I have been 'beguiled' into speaking of the edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson as the best known to me. Indeed, it seems that the edition has been very generally welcomed; and Mr. Fitzgerald's severe criticism comes as a rather surprising discord in a general chorus of praise. In any case, I feel it right to say a few words in defence of an opinion to which I confess that I still adhere without hesitation. My reason is simple. I have for years made constant use of the Life of Johnson, and have found Dr. Birkbeck Hill's notes exceedingly useful. Whenever I am in want of information about any of the Johnson circle, I regularly turn for help to this edition, and I very seldom open it without gaining some light upon the matter in hand. I think that I should have been ungrateful if I had not acknowledged so much; and I will briefly state why I cannot retract my acknowledgment. Mr. Fitzgerald criticises Dr. Birkbeck Hill for giving a great deal of irrelevant information, for frequently misunderstanding his author, and for frequent inaccuracy. The first count depends more or less upon what seems to me to be a matter for fair difference of opinion."