' Johnson's _Works_, ix. 134. See _ante_, p. 241.
[856] 'After a journey difficult and tedious, over rocks naked and
valleys untracked, through a country of barrenness and solitude, we
came, almost in the dark, to the sea-side, weary and dejected, having
met with nothing but waters falling from the mountains that could raise
any image of delight.' _Piozzi Letters_, i. 170. 'It is natural, in
traversing this gloom of desolation, to inquire, whether something may
not be done to give nature a more cheerful face.' Johnson's _Works_,
ix. 136.
[857] _Ante_, p. 19.
[858] See _ante_, i. 521.
[859] See _ante_, p. 212.
[860] Sir William Blackstone says, in his _Commentaries_, that 'he
cannot find that ever this custom prevailed in England;' and therefore
he is of opinion that it could not have given rise to _Borough-English_.
BOSWELL. 'I cannot learn that ever this custom prevailed in England,
though it certainly did in Scotland (under the name of _mercketa_ or
_marcheta_), till abolished by Malcolm III.' _Commentaries_, ed. 1778,
ii. 83. Sir H. Maine, in his _Early History of Institutions_, p. 222,
writes:--'Other authors, as Blackstone tells us, explained it ["Borough
English"] by a supposed right of the Seigneur or lord, now very
generally regarded as apocryphal, which raised a presumption of the
eldest son's illegitimacy.
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