BOSWELL'S LONDON JOURNAL 1762-1763 (370 pp.)—McGraw-Hill ($5).
One cold November morning in 1762, an ambitious young Scotsman left his Edinburgh home and took the highroad to London. At 22, James Boswell had no intention of becoming a lawyer like his eminent father, Lord Auchinleck.* He was out to become a Guards officer, not because he liked the army, but because it seemed the surest way to a soft life and quick acceptance in the best London circles. At the end of nine months of scheming and making up to persons of influence, he had failed...