He told us, that he had in one day written six sheets of a translation from the French, adding, ’I should be glad to see it now.  I wish that I had copies of all the pamphlets written against me, as it is said Pope had.  Had I known that I should make so much noise in the world, I should have been at pains to collect them.  I believe there is hardly a day in which there is not something about me in the newspapers.’

On Monday, June 4, we all went to Luton-Hoe, to see Lord Bute’s magnificent seat, for which I had obtained a ticket.  As we entered the park, I talked in a high style of my old friendship with Lord Mountstuart, and said, ‘I shall probably be much at this place.’  The Sage, aware of human vicissitudes, gently checked me:  ’Don’t you be too sure of that.’  He made two or three peculiar observations; as when shewn the botanical garden, ‘Is not every garden a botanical garden?’ When told that there was a shrubbery to the extent of several miles:  ’That is making a very foolish use of the ground; a little of it is very well.’  When it was proposed that we should walk on the pleasure-ground; ’Don’t let us fatigue ourselves.  Why should we walk there?  Here’s a fine tree, let’s get to the top of it.’  But upon the whole, he was very much pleased.  He said, ’This is one of the places I do not regret having come to see.  It is a very stately place, indeed; in the house magnificence is not sacrificed to convenience, nor convenience to magnificence.  The library is very splendid:  the dignity of the rooms is very great; and the quantity of pictures is beyond expectation, beyond hope.’

It happened without any previous concert, that we visited the seat of Lord Bute upon the King’s birthday; we dined and drank his Majesty’s health at an inn, in the village of Luton.

In the evening I put him in mind of his promise to favour me with a copy of his celebrated Letter to the Earl of Chesterfield, and he was at last pleased to comply with this earnest request, by dictating it to me from his memory; for he believed that he himself had no copy.  There was an animated glow in his countenance while he thus recalled his high-minded indignation.

On Tuesday, June 5, Johnson was to return to London.  He was very pleasant at breakfast; I mentioned a friend of mine having resolved never to marry a pretty woman.  Johnson.  ’Sir it is a very foolish resolution to resolve not to marry a pretty woman.  Beauty is of itself very estimable.  No, Sir, I would prefer a pretty woman, unless there are objections to her.  A pretty woman may be foolish; a pretty woman may be wicked; a pretty woman may not like me.  But there is no such danger in marrying a pretty woman as is apprehended:  she will not be persecuted if she does not invite persecution.  A pretty woman, if she has a mind to be wicked, can find a readier way than another; and that is all.’

At Shefford I had another affectionate parting from my revered friend, who was taken up by the Bedford coach and carried to the metropolis.  I went with Messieurs Dilly, to see some friends at Bedford; dined with the officers of the militia of the county, and next day proceeded on my journey.