[501] ’The estate has not, during four hundred years, gained or lost a single acre.’ Ib. p. 55.

[502] Lord Stowell told me, that on the road from Newcastle to Berwick, Dr. Johnson and he passed a cottage, at the entrance of which were set up two of those great bones of the whale, which are not unfrequently seen in maritime districts.  Johnson expressed great horror at the sight of these bones; and called the people, who could use such relics of mortality as an ornament, mere savages.  CROKER.

[503] In like manner Boswell wrote:—­’It is divinely cheering to me to think that there is a Cathedral so near Auchinleck [as Carlisle].’ Ante, iii. 416.

[504] ’It is not only in Rasay that the chapel is unroofed and useless; through the few islands which we visited we neither saw nor heard of any house of prayer, except in Sky, that was not in ruins.  The malignant influence of Calvinism has blasted ceremony and decency together...  It has been for many years popular to talk of the lazy devotion of the Romish clergy; over the sleepy laziness of men that erected churches we may indulge our superiority with a new triumph, by comparing it with the fervid activity of those who suffer them to fall.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. 61.  He wrote to Mrs. Thrale:—­’By the active zeal of Protestant devotion almost all the chapels have sunk into ruin.’ Piozzi Letters, i. 152.

[505] ‘Not many years ago,’ writes Johnson, ’the late Laird led out one hundred men upon a military expedition.’ Works, ix. 59.  What the expedition was he is careful not to state.

[506] ’I considered this rugged ascent as the consequence of a form of life inured to hardships, and therefore not studious of nice accommodations.  But I know not whether for many ages it was not considered as a part of military policy to keep the country not easily accessible.  The rocks are natural fortifications.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. p. 54.

[507] See post Sept. 17.

[508] In Sky a price was set ’upon the heads of foxes, which, as the number was diminished, has been gradually raised from three shillings and sixpence to a guinea, a sum so great in this part of the world, that, in a short time, Sky may be as free from foxes as England from wolves.  The fund for these rewards is a tax of sixpence in the pound, imposed by the farmers on themselves, and said to be paid with great willingness.’  Johnson’s Works, ix. 57.

[509] Boswell means that the eastern coast of Sky is westward of Rasay.  CROKER.

[510] ’The Prince was hidden in his distress two nights in Rasay, and the King’s troops burnt the whole country, and killed some of the cattle.  You may guess at the opinions that prevail in this country; they are, however, content with fighting for their King; they do not drink for him.  We had no foolish healths’, Piozzi Letters, i. 145.

[511] See ante, iv. 217, where he said:—­’You have, perhaps, no man who knows as much Greek and Latin as Bentley.’