a note-book in which Boswell jotted down from day to day the actual sayings and doings of the eminent lexicographer. This volume contains literary opinions and aphorisms peculiar to this great man, and of which many have never been published. He gives a specific account of the manner in which he compiled the 'Dictionary,' and relates other matters of interest, bearing on his long literary career and contemporaries. This manuscript, if it were to be seen, might reveal more definitely what Boswell's method was. The description of it can do nothing but emphasise the use of the 'tablets'; but its value as evidence depends upon its accuracy with regard to the sequence of the notes: if they were really 'jotted down from day to day,' then they are the 'tablets' without a doubt. The other note-book is 'Boswelliana'; and it is of a different kind. Boswell kept in a portfolio a quantity of loose quarto sheets, inscribed on each page _Boswelliana_. In certain of these sheets the pages are denoted by numerals in the ordinary fashion; another portion is numbered by the folios; while a further portion consists of loose leaves and letter-backs. The greater part of the entries are made so carefully as to justify the belief that the author intended to embody the whole in a volume of literary anecdotes.[10] Emphatically this collection was not 'tablets.' It was probably intended for a particular purpose. Boswell may have had several collections of a similar kind. But it is clear that the purpose of 'Boswelliana' has no connection with the 'Life of Johnson.'[11] Stories of Johnson it does indeed contain; but they are few, and are unconnected by any chronological arrangement. They form only a small part of the whole. The journal itself was kept in quarto and octavo volumes,[12] and Boswell on one occasion showed it to Sir William Forbes.[13] It seems that his object in doing this was to get an opinion which might encourage him to publish; he quotes with great pleasure in the 'Life' the praise which this gentleman had bestowed upon it. One would suppose that the journal displayed in this way gave the Johnsonian conversations and anecdotes in words almost identical with the text of the 'Life.' In the preface to the 'Corsican Journal' Boswell says of the Paoli memoirs: As I have related his remarkable sayings, I declare upon my honour, that I have neither added nor diminished; nay, so scrupulous have I been, that I would not make the smallest variation even when my friends thought it would be an improvement. I know with how much pleasure we read what is perfectly authentick.[14] One might easily expect that the same words would equally well apply to the 'Life.' But this is not the case.