As one of those who were intimately acquainted with him, you have a
tide to this address. You have obligingly taken the trouble to peruse
the original manuscript of this tour, and can vouch for the strict
fidelity of the present publication. Your literary alliance with our
much lamented friend, in consequence of having undertaken to render
one of his labours more complete, by your edition of Shakespeare, a
work which I am confident will not disappoint the expectations of the
publick, gives you another claim. But I have a still more powerful
inducement to prefix your name to this volume, as it gives me an
opportunity of letting the world know that I enjoy the honour and
happiness of your friendship; and of thus publickly testifying the
sincere regard with which I am.

My dear Sir,

Your very faithful and obedient servant,
James Boswell.
London, 20 September 1785.



"He was of an admirable pregnancy of wit, and that pregnancy much
improved by continual study from his childhood; by which he had gotten
such a promptness in expressing his mind, that his extemporal speeches
were little inferior to his premeditated writings. Many, no doubt, had
read as much and perhaps more than he; but scarce ever any concocted
his reading into judgement as he did."--Baker's Chronicle