In the former,
nothing was so luminous, so striking, so abundant; in private, it was
forced, unnatural, and bombast.' See _ante_, p. 104, where Wilkes said
that in his oratory 'there was a strange want of taste.'
[854] _Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides_, third edition, p. 20 [_post_,
v. 32.] BOSWELL. See also _ante_, i. 453, and iii. 323.
[855] I have since heard that the report was not well founded; but the
elation discovered by Johnson in the belief that it was true, shewed a
noble ardour for literary fame. BOSWELL. Johnson wrote on Feb. 9:--'One
thing which I have just heard you will think to surpass expectation. The
chaplain of the factory at Petersburgh relates that the _Rambler_ is
now, by the command of the Empress, translating into Russian, and has
promised, when it is printed, to send me a copy.' _Piozzi Letters,_ ii.
349. Stockdale records (_Memoirs,_ ii. 98) that in 1773 the Empress of
Russia engaged 'six English literary gentlemen for instructors of her
young nobility in her Academy at St. Petersburgh.' He was offered one of
the posts. Her zeal may have gone yet further, and she may have wished
to open up English literature to those who could not read English.
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