56 JOHNSON. 



a Plymouth man. Rogues ! let them die of thirst ; they 

 sha'n't have a drop !" This was more than half jest ; 

 but no doubt can be entertained that his dislike of the 

 American cause, and his exertions for the mother 

 country, had their root in the same soil of rank pre- 

 judice a prejudice against the new people as much as 

 an opinion against their claims. " I am willing," he 

 once said, "to love all mankind except an American;" 

 and, he roared out with much abuse, "he'd burn and 

 destroy them." (Boswell, III. 314.) "Sir," said he on 

 another occasion, " they are a race of convicts, and ought 

 to be thankful for anything we allow them short of 

 hanging." (III. 327.) 



Akin to this were his strong and even intolerant 

 national prejudices. Of the French he ever spoke with 

 an unmeasured and an ignorant contempt. He could 

 not but allow that there were many successful cultivators 

 of letters in France : indeed, he admitted that there 

 " was a great deal of learning there," and ascribed 

 it to the number of religious establishments ; but 

 he maintained that the men generally knew no more 

 than the women : that their books were superficial ; 

 that their manners were bad ; that they are a " gross, 

 ill-bred, untaught people ;" nay, that their cookery is 

 unbearable, and their meat so vile as to be only fit for 

 sending to feed prisoners. But his prejudices were to 

 the full as strong against the Scotch ; towards whom no 

 reflection, no civility experienced in their hospitable 

 country, no intercourse with the most distinguished and 

 most deserving individuals, could ever reconcile him. 

 With this, and with most of his other prejudices, a 

 strong taint of religious as well as political bigotry mixed 



