"AT dinner Mr. Johnson eat several platefuls of Scotch broth with pease in them and was very fond of the dish. I said, 'You never eat it before, sir.' 'No, sir, but I don't care how soon I eat it again.'"

Yes, it's Boswell and Johnson at it again. To bore you with extended criticism of style and manner of these two fast friends would be both vain and presumptuous, and we shall politely conclude that overworked angle with: "So much has been said on both sides, and so well, that we have nothing more to add."

What really is significant about this present edition is its unquestionable authenticity and completeness. Texts of Boswell's "Tour to the Hebrides" are nearly as old as the tour itself, but until 1936 they have been shot through with omissions and corrections by non-Boswellian hands. Lying away in the grey dust of an old eroquet-box in Malahide Castle for over 150 years the original manuscript in Boswell's handwriting was accidentally bumped into a few years ago. At first sight of the papers, Colonel Isham, the discoverer, who happened to be just finishing the private printing of a nineteen-volume edition of the Tour from far inferior sources, could not decide whether to whoop with joy or shrick in dismay. Unperplexed by any such dilemma. Viking Press is whooping with joy.

This first edition of the original journal is far more than a gold mine for perspicacious scholars and philologists. In it, for the first time, we find slightly gross incidents, evidently too perturbing for the delicate tastes of former Victorian editors. New light is shed on Boswell's simple, superstitious nature, and Johnson gives us more logic and heavy wit. There is, perhaps, no better account of life in Scotland around 1773.

These who have enjoyed James Boswell's "Life of Samuel Johnson" will find a pleasant sequel in "Journal of a Tour to the Bebrides." Those who have not yet read Boswell will probably treat him much as Dr. Johnson did his first plateful of Scotch broth.