Boswell was not an old man when he died; and apart from the prostration caused by ill-health--for he was frequently ill towards the close of his life--his robust vigour seems hardly to have diminished. In July 1790, a year after Mrs. Boswell's death, he seems already to entertain some matrimonial scheme.[10] This apparently was the first of a fresh suite. In the spring of 1791 he is looking forward to the pleasure of meeting a certain Miss Bagnal, 'who may probably have six or seven hundred a year.' 'Here then I am, my Temple,' exclaims Boswell, 'my flattering self! A scheme, an adventure, seizes upon my fancy.' Assuredly this is the old Boswell. In his whole outlook upon life Boswell, in fact, changed very little. He had failed in the main battle; the ambitious dreams which pleased him most had not come to pass. Neither as politician nor as barrister had he won the smallest degree of fame. He was, and is, famous in a rarer sort: yet he had esteemed literary fame at a much lower rate. And at the end of his life he still measured distinction by the same old standards. He felt that the struggle had gone against him: but he never doubted of the cause for which he was fighting. As late as August 1791, some months after the 'Life of Johnson' appeared, he wrote to Temple as though he were on the eve of a legal career: I have gone the full round of the Home Circuit, to which I have returned, finding it much more pleasant, and, though I did not get a single brief, do not repent of the expense, as I am showing myself desirous of business and imbibing legal knowledge. He still was building castles in the air of the old type; still, sometimes, he took an opportunity to be 'conspicuous' and made conscious efforts to 'be the great man.' Almost simultaneously with the 'Life,' he published a political poem, 'No Abolition of Slavery, or The Universal Empire of Love.' It was of a semi-frivolous nature, the argument being drawn from a premise that slavery is the most agreeable of 'goods,' when it is enforced by the chains of loving devotion. The name of Miss Bagnal is introduced, and it is difficult to tell whether the whole may not be an elaborate attempt to bring off a marriage with that lady. But it is evident from a remark to Temple, that the main purpose is political: I am thinking to curtail my poem on the Slave Trade, and throw it into the world just before the great question comes on next Wednesday. A rumour of war with Russia also rouses the public spirit of Boswell to seek distinction, and he hesitates whether I should not write one of my characteristical pamphlets on this crisis--An Appeal to the People upon the threatened project of involving this country in a war with Russia, in order to assist the Turks.