There were those who questioned from the beginning whether the Ossianic poems did really come from the Gaelic;--Dr. Johnson among them, whose contemptuous doubts infuriated the Macpherson to such a degree that he challenged the doughty Doctor. Johnson replied in what may be called forcible speech:-- "Mr. James Macpherson, I received your foolish and impudent letter. I hope I shall never be deterred from detecting what I think a cheat, by the menaces of a ruffian. What {226} would you have me retract? I thought your book an imposture; I think it an imposture still. Your rage I defy. Your abilities, since your Homer,[4] are not so formidable: and what I hear of your morals inclines me to pay regard--not to what you shall _say_, but to what you shall _prove_. You may print this if you will." Dr. Johnson carried a big oaken cudgel with him, when he travelled in Scotland. Hume, on the other hand, was, with Scotch patriotism, inclined to accept at first, Macpherson's story of authenticity:[5] but even he says of this author, with whom he came into altercation--"I have scarce ever known a man more perverse and unamiable." The Highland Society investigated the matter, and reported that while there was no trace of a complete poem in Gaelic corresponding {227} to Macpherson's verse, there were snatches of Highland song and ballads which supported his allegations. The question is not even yet fully settled, and is hardly worth the settlement. Macpherson's own obstinacies and petulancies put unnumbered difficulties in the way; he resented any denial of Gaelic origin for his verse; he resented any denial of his capacity to sing better than the Gael; he promised to show Highland originals, and always made occasions for delay; withal he was as touchy as a bad child, and as virulent as a fish-woman. Nothing satisfied him; one of those men whose steak is always too much done--or too little;--the sermon always too short or too long. He might have been the "Stout Gentleman" of _Bracebridge Hall_: for he was a big man, and always wore wax-topped boots. Old Mrs. Grant too--who must have been a neighbor of his, when she lived at Laggan--says that he had habits (with theories about social proprieties) which "excluded him from decent society." Mrs. Grant was, however "verra" correct, and a stickler for the minor, as well as the major virtues. Macpherson left inheritors of his name, and of {228} his estates in that upper valley of the Spey; and a daughter of his became the wife of Sir David Brewster, the eminent scientist. He was buried "by special request" in Westminster Abbey; he had been always covetous of such public testimonials to his consequence. Yet if his book of Ossianic poems was ten-fold better than it is, it would hardly give an enduring, or a brilliant gloss to the memory of James Macpherson.