infant.' And in another, having mentioned Mrs. Williams, he says 'Whose death following that of Levett, has now made my house a solitude. She left her little substance to a charity school. She is, I hope, where there is neither darkness, nor want, nor sorrow.'

I wrote to him, begging to know the state of his health, and mentioned that 'Baxter's Anacreon, which is in the library at Auchinleck, was, I find, collated by my father in 1727 with the MS. belonging to the University of Leyden, and he has made a number of notes upon it. Would you advise me to publish a new edition of it?'

His answer was dated September 30: 'You should not make your letters such rarities, when you know, or might know, the uniform state of my health. It is very long since I heard from you; and that I have not answered is a very insufficient reason for the silence of a friend. Your Anacreon is a very uncommon book; neither London nor Cambridge can supply a copy of that edition. Whether it should be reprinted, you cannot do better than consult Lord Hailes. Besides my constant and radical disease, I have been for these ten days much harassed with the gout; but that has now remitted. I hope God will yet grant me a little longer life, and make me less unfit to appear before Him.'

He this autumn received a visit from the celebrated Mrs. Siddons. He gives this account of it in one of his letters to Mrs. Thrale, October 27:

circumstances happened to prevent the representation of King Henry the Eighth during the Doctor's life.

In the course of the evening he thus gave his opinion upon the merits of some of the principal performers whom he remembered to have seen upon the stage: "Mrs. Porter in the vehemence of rage, and Mrs. Clive in the sprightliness of humour, I have never seen equalled. What Clive did best, she did better than Garrick; but could not do half so many things well; she was a better romp than any I ever saw in nature.-Pritchard, in common life, was a vulgar idiot; she would talk of her gound; but, when she appeared upon the stage, seemed to be inspired by gentility and understanding.-I once talked with Colley Cibber, and thought him ignorant of the principles of his art.-Garrick, madam, was no declaimer; there was not one of his own scene-shifters who could not have spoken To be, or not to be, better than he did; yet he was the only actor I ever saw, whom I could call a master both in tragedy and comedy, though I liked him best in comedy. A true conception of character, and natural expression of it, were his distinguished excellences." Having expatiated, with his usual force and eloquence, on Mr. Garrick's extraordinary eminence as an actor, he concluded with this compliment to his social talents: "And after all, madam, I thought him less to be envied on the stage than at the head of a table."

Johnson, indeed, had thought more upon the

Mr. Kemble has favoured me with the following minute of what passed at this visit :

'When Mrs. Siddons came into the room, there happened to be no chair ready for her, which he observing, said with a smile, "Madam, you who so often occasion a want of seats to other people, will the more easily excuse the want of one yourself."

'Having placed himself by her, he with great good humour entered upon a consideration of the English drama; and, among other inquiries, particularly asked her which of Shakspeare's characters she was most pleased with. Upon her answering that she thought the character of Queen Catherine in Henry the Eighth the most natural-“I think so too, madam," said he; "and whenever you perform it, I will once more hobble out to the theatre myself." Mrs. Siddons promised she would do herself the honour of acting his favourite part for him; but many

posed. Talking of it one day to Mr. Kemble, he said, 'Are you, sir, one of those enthusiasts who believe yourself transformed into the very character you represent?' Upon Mr. Kemble's answering that he had never felt so strong a persuasion himself: 'To be sure not, sir,' said Johnson, the thing is impossible. And if Garrick really believed himself to be that monster Richard the Third, he deserved to be hanged every time he performed it.'

1 My worthy friend, Mr. John Nichols, was present when Mr. Henderson, the actor, paid a visit to Dr. Johnson, and was received in a very courteous manner. -See the Gentleman's Magazine, June 1791.

I found, among Dr. Johnson's papers, the following letter to him, from the celebrated Mrs. Bellamy :'TO DR. JOHNSON.

'No. 10, DUKE STREET, ST. JAMES'S, May 11, 1783.

'SIR, The flattering remembrance of the partiality you honoured me with some years ago, as well as the humanity you are known to possess, has encouraged me to solicit your patronage at my benefit.

'By a long Chancery suit, and a complicated train distress, which obliges me once more to request the of unfortunate events, I am reduced to the greatest

indulgence of the public.

'Give me leave to solicit the honour of your company, and to assure you, if you grant my request, the gratification I shall feel, from being patronized by Dr.

'TO MRS. LUCY PORTER, IN LICHFIELD.

'BOLT COURT, FLEET STREET,
Nov. 10, 1783.

'DEAR MADAM,-The death of poor Mr. Porter, of which your maid has sent an account, must have very much surprised you. The death of a friend is almost always unexpected: we do not love to think of it, and therefore are not prepared for its coming. He was, I think, a religious man, and therefore that his end was happy.

'Death has likewise visited my mournful habitation. Last month died Mrs. Williams, who had been to me for thirty years in the place of a sister her knowledge was great, and her conversation pleasing. I now live in cheerless solitude.

'My two last years have passed under the pressure of successive diseases. I have lately had the gout with some severity. But I wonderfully escaped the operation which I mentioned, and am upon the whole restored to health beyond my own expectation.

'As we daily see our friends die around us, we that are left must cling closer, and, if we can do nothing more, at least pray for one another; and remember, that as others die we must die too, and prepare ourselves diligently for the last great trial.—I am, madam, yours affectionately,

*SAM. JOHNSON.'

A pleasing instance of the generous attention of one of his friends has been discovered by the publication of Mrs. Thrale's collection of Letters. In a letter to one of the Miss Thrales, he writes, 'A friend, whose name I will tell, when your mamma has tried to guess it, sent to my physician to inquire whether this long train of illness had brought me into difficulties for want of money, with an invitation to send to him for what occasion required. I shall write this night to thank him, having no need to borrow.' And afterwards, in a letter to Mrs. Thrale, 'Since you cannot guess, I will tell you that the generous man was Gerard Hamilton. I returned him a very thankful and respectful letter.'

I applied to Mr. Hamilton by a common friend, and he has been so obliging as to let me have Johnson's letter to him upon this occasion, to adorn my collection :-

'TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE WILLIAM GERARD HAMILTON.

'November 19, 1783. 'DEAR SIR,-Your kind inquiries after my

Johnson, will be infinitely superior to any advantage that may arise from the benefit; as I am, with the profoundest respect, sir, your most obedient humble servant, 'G. A. BELLAMY.'

I am happy in recording these particulars, which prove that my illustrious friend lived to think much

affairs, and your generous offers, have been communicated to me by Dr. Brocklesby. I return thanks with great sincerity, having lived long enough to know what gratitude is due to your friendship; and entreat that my refusal may not be imputed to sullenness or pride. I am, indeed, in no want. Sickness is, by the generosity of my physicians, of little expense to me. But if any unexpected exigence should press me, you shall see, dear sir, how cheerfully I can be obliged to so much liberality.-I am, sir, your most obedient and most humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

I find in this, as in former years, notices of his kind attention to Mrs. Gardiner, who, though in the humble station of a tallow-chand

ler upon Snow Hill, was a woman of excellent she had been introduced to him by Mrs. Masters, good sense, pious and charitable. She told me the poetess, whose volumes he revised, and it is said, illuminated here and there with a ray of his own genius. Mrs. Gardiner was very zealous for the support of the Ladies' Charity School in the parish of St. Sepulchre. It is confined to females; and, I am told, it afforded a hint for the story of Betty Broom, in the Idler. Johnson this year, I find, obtained for it a sermon from the late Bishop of St. Asaph, Dr. Shipley, whom he, in one of his letters to Mrs. Thrale, characterizes as 'knowing and conversable;' and whom all who knew his Lordship, even those who differed from him in politics, remember with much respect.

The Earl of Carlisle having written a tragedy, entitled 'THE FATHER'S REVENGE,' some of his

Lordship's friends applied to Mrs. Chapone, to prevail on Dr. Johnson to read and give his opinion of it, which he accordingly did, in a letter to that lady. Sir Joshua Reynolds having informed me that this letter was in Lord Carlisle's possession, though I was not fortunate enough to have the honour of being known to his Lordship, trusting to the general courtesy of literature, I wrote to him, requesting the favour of a copy of it, and to be permitted to insert it in my Life of Dr. Johnson. 'His Lordship was so good as to comply with my request, and has thus enabled me to enrich my work with a very fine piece of writing, which displays both the critical skill and politeness of my illustrious friend; and perhaps the curiosity which it will excite may induce the noble and elegant author to gratify the world by the publication of a performance, of which Dr. Johnson has spoken in such terms:

more favourably of players than he appears to have done in the early part of his life.-BOSWELL.

In his will, Dr. Johnson left her a book 'at her election, to keep as a token of remembrance.'-MALONE. 2 A few copies only of this tragedy have been printed, and given to the author's friends.-BOSWELL.

'TO MRS. CHAPONE.

'Nov. 28, 1783. 'MADAM,-By sending the tragedy to me a second time, I think that a very honourable distinction has been shown me, and I did not delay the perusal, of which I am now to tell the

effect.

"The construction of the play is not completely regular; the stage is too often vacant, and the scenes are not sufficiently connected. This, however, would be called by Dryden only a mechanical defect; which takes away little from the power of the poem, and which is seen rather than felt.

A rigid examiner of the diction might perhaps wish some words changed, and some lines more vigorously terminated. But from such petty imperfections what writer was ever free? "The general form and force of the dialogue is of more importance. It seems to want that quickness of reciprocation which characterizes the English drama, and is not always sufficiently

fervid or animated.

'Of the sentiments, I remember not one that I wish omitted. In the imagery I cannot for bear to distinguish the comparison of joy succeeding grief to light rushing on the eye accustomed to darkness. It seems to have all that can be desired to make it please. It is new, just, and delightful."

'With the characters, either as conceived or preserved, I have no fault to find; but was much inclined to congratulate a writer who, in defiance of prejudice and fashion, made the Archbishop a good man, and scorned all thoughtless applause, which a vicious churchman would have brought him.

'The catastrophe is affecting. The father and daughter, both culpable, both wretched, and both penitent, divide between them our pity and

tional influence exercised by the Peers of Scotland in the election of the representatives of the Commons, by means of fictitious qualifications, ought not to be resisted; the other, What, in propriety and humanity, should be done with old horses unable to labour. I gave him some account of my life at Auchinleck; and expressed my satisfaction that the gentlemen of the county had, at two public meetings, elected me their Præses, or Chairman.

'TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

'LONDON, Dec. 24, 1783. 'DEAR SIR,-Like all other men who have

great friends, you begin to feel the pangs of neglected merit; and all the comfort that I can give you is, by telling you that you have probably more pangs to feel, and more neglect to suffer. You have, indeed, begun to complain too soon; and I hope I am the only confidant of your discontent. Your friends have not yet had leisure to gratify personal kindness; they have hitherto

been busy in strengthening their ministerial interest. If a vacancy happens in Scotland, give them early intelligence; and as you can serve Government as powerfully as any of your probable competitors, you may make in some sort a warrantable claim.

'Of the exaltations and depressions of your mind you delight to talk, and I hate to hear. Drive all such fancies from you.

'On the day when I received your letter, I

think, the foregoing page was written, to which

one disease or another has hindered me from But sickness and solitude press me very heavily. making any additions. I am now a little better.

I could bear sickness better, if I were relieved from solitude.

"The present dreadful confusion of the public ought to make you wrap yourself up in your hereditary possessions, which though less than you may wish, are more than you can want; and in an hour of religious retirement, return thanks to GOD, who has exempted you from any strong temptation to faction, treachery, plunder, and disloyalty.

'As your neighbours distinguish you by such honours as they can bestow, content yourself with your station, without neglecting your profession. Your estate and the courts will find you full employment, and your mind well occupied will be quiet.

"The usurpation of the nobility-for they apparently usurp all the influence they gain by fraud and misrepresentation-I think it certainly lawful, perhaps your duty, to resist. What is not their own, they have only by robbery.

'Your question about the horses gives me more perplexity. I know not well what advice to give you. I can only recommend a rule which you do not want-Give as little pain as you can. I suppose that we have a right to their service while their strength lasts; what we can do with

than one innocent person suffer;' and were answered by Dr. Johnson with great power of reasoning and eloquence. I am very sorry that I have no record of that day; but I well recollect my illustrious friend's having ably shown that, unless civil institutions ensure protection to the innocent, all the confidence which mankind should have in them would be lost. I shall here mention what, in strict chrono

'A happy and pious Christmas; and many happy years to you, your lady, and children.'

The late ingenious Mr. Mickle, some time before his death, wrote me a letter concerning Dr. Johnson, in which he mentions, 'I was upwards of twelve years acquainted with him, was frequently in his company, always talked with ease to him, and can truly say, that I never received from him one rough word.'

-

In this letter he relates his having, while engaged in translating the Lusiad, had a dispute of considerable length with Johnson, who, as usual, declaimed upon the misery and corruption of a sea life, and used this expression: 'It had been happy for the world, sir, if your hero Gama, Prince Henry of Portugal, and Columbus, had never been born, or that their schemes had never gone further than their own imaginations.''This sentiment,' says Mr. Mickle, which is to be found in his Introduction to the World Displayed, I, in my Dissertation prefixed to the Lusiad, have controverted; and though authors are said to be bad judges of their own works, I am not ashamed to own to a friend, that that Dissertation is my favourite above all that I ever attempted in prose. Next year, when the Lusiad was published, I waited on Dr. Johnson, who addressed me with one of his good-humoured smiles: "Well, you have remembered our dispute about Prince Henry, and have cited me too. You have done your part very well indeed: you have made the best of your argument; but I am not convinced yet."

'Before publishing the Lusiad, I sent Mr. Hoole a proof of that part of the introduction in which I make mention of Dr. Johnson, yourself, and other well-wishers to the work, begging it might be shown to Dr. Johnson. This was accordingly done; and in place of the simple mention of him which I had made, he dictated to Mr. Hoole the sentence as it now stands.

'Dr. Johnson told me, in 1772, that, about twenty years before that time, he himself had a design to translate the Lusiad, of the merit of which he spoke highly, but had been prevented by a number of other engagements.'

Mr. Mickle reminds me, in this letter, of a conversation at dinner one day at Mr. Hoole's with Dr. Johnson, when Mr. Nicol, the King's bookseller, and I, attempted to controvert the maxim, 'Better that ten guilty should escape,

my account of last year; but may more properly be introduced here, the controversy having not been closed till this. The Rev. Mr. Shaw, a native of one of the Hebrides, having entertained doubts of the authenticity of the poems ascribed to Ossian, divested himself of national bigotry; and having travelled in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, and also in Ireland, in order to furnish himself with materials for a Gaelic Dictionary, which he afterwards compiled, was so fully satisfied that Dr. Johnson was in the right upon the question, that he candidly published a pamphlet, stating his conviction, and the proofs and reasons on which it was founded. A person at Edinburgh, of the name of Clark, answered this pamphlet with much zeal, and much abuse of its author. Johnson took Mr. Shaw under his protection, and gave him his assistance in writing a reply, which has been admired by the best judges, and by many been considered as conclusive. A few paragraphs, which sufficiently mark their great author, shall be selected :

'My assertions are, for the most part, purely negative: I deny the existence of Fingal, because in a long and curious peregrination through the Gaelic regions I have never been able to find it. What I could not see myself, I suspect to be equally invisible to others; and I suspect with the more reason, as among all those who have seen it no man can show it.

'Mr. Clark compares the obstinacy of those who disbelieve the genuineness of Ossian to a blind man, who should dispute the reality of colours, and deny that the British troops are clothed in red. The blind man's doubt would be rational, if he did not know by experience that others have a power which he himself wants; but what perspicacity has Mr. Clark which Nature has withheld from me or the rest of mankind?

'The true state of the parallel must be this. Suppose a man, with eyes like his neighbours, was told by a boasting corporal, that the troops, indeed, wore red clothes for their ordinary dress, but that every soldier had likewise a suit of black velvet, which he puts on when the King reviews them. This he thinks strange, and desires to see the fine clothes, but finds nobody in forty thousand men that can produce either coat or waistcoat. One, indeed, has left them in his chest at Port Mahon; another has always heard that he ought to have velvet clothes somewhere; and a

third has heard somebody say that soldiers ought to wear velvet. Can the inquirer be blamed if he goes away believing that a soldier's red coat is all that he has?

'But the most obdurate incredulity may be shamed or silenced by facts. To overpower contradictions, let the soldier show his velvet coat, and the Fingalist the original of Ossian.

'The difference between us and the blind man is this: the blind man is unconvinced, because he cannot see; and we, because, though we can see, we find that nothing can be shown.'

Notwithstanding the complication of disorders under which Johnson now laboured, he did not resign himself to despondency and discontent, but with wisdom and spirit endeavoured to console and amuse his mind with as many innocent enjoyments as he could procure. Sir John Hawkins has mentioned the cordiality with which he insisted that such of the members of the old club in Ivy Lane as survived, should meet again and dine together, which they did, twice at a tavern, and once at his house; and in order to ensure himself society in the evening for three days in the week, he instituted a club at the Essex Head, in Essex Street, then kept by Samuel Greaves, an old servant of Mr. Thrale's.

TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

'Dec. 4, 1783. 'DEAR SIR,-It is inconvenient to me to come out ; should else have waited on you with an account of a little evening club which we are establishing in Essex Street, in the Strand, and of which you are desired to be one. It will be held at the Essex Head, now kept by an old servant of Thrale's. The company is numerous, and, as you will see by the list, miscellaneous. The terms are lax, and the expenses light. Mr. Barry was adopted by Dr. Brocklesby, who joined with me in forming the plan. We meet thrice a week, and he who misses forfeits threepence.

'If you are willing to become a member, draw a line under your name. Return the list. We meet for the first time on Monday at eight. I am, etc., 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

It did not suit Sir Joshua to be one of this club. But when I mention only Mr. Daines Barrington, Dr. Brocklesby, Mr. Murphy, Mr. John Nichols, Mr. Cooke, Mr. Joddrel, Mr. Paradise, Dr. Horsley, Mr. Windham,' I shall

I was in Scotland when this Club was founded, and during all the winter. Johnson, however, declared I should be a member, and invented a word upon the 'occasion; 'Boswell,' said he, 'is a very clubable man.' When I came to town, I was proposed by Mr. Barrington, and chosen. I believe there are few societies where there is better conversation or more decorum. Several of us resolved to continue it after our great founder was removed by death. Other members were added; and now, above eight years since that loss, we go on happily.-BOSWELL.

sufficiently obviate the misrepresentation of it by Sir John Hawkins, as if it had been a low │ alehouse association, by which Johnson was i degraded. Johnson himself, like his namesake Old Ben, composed the rules of his Club.1

In the end of this year he was seized with a spasmodic asthma of such violence, that he was confined to the house in great pain, being sometimes obliged to sit all night in his chair, a recumbent posture being so hurtful to his respiration, that he could not endure lying in bed; and there came upon him, at the same time, that oppressive and fatal disease, a dropsy. It was a very severe winter, which probably aggravated his complaints; and the solitude in which Mr. Levett and Mrs. Williams left him, rendered his life very gloomy. Mrs Desmoulins, who still lived, was herself so very ill, that she could contribute very little to his relief. He, however, had none of that unsocial shyness

'To-day deep thoughts with me resolve to drench In mirth, which after no repenting draws.' -MILTON.

"The Club shall consist of four-and-twenty. "The meetings shall be on the Monday, Thursday, and Saturday of every week; but in the week before Easter there shall be no meeting.

'Every member is at liberty to introduce a friend once a week, but not oftener.

'Two members shall oblige themselves to attend in their turn every night from eight to ten, or to procure two to attend in their room.

Every member present at the Club shall spend at least sixpence; and every member who stays away shall forfeit threepence.

"The master of the house shall keep an account of the absent members; and deliver to the president of the night a list of the forfeits incurred.

'When any member returns after absence, he shall immediately lay down his forfeits; which if he omits to do, the president shall require.

There shall be no general reckoning, but every man shall adjust his own expenses.

"The night of indispensable attendance will come to every member once a month. Whoever shall for three months together omit to attend himself, or by substi tution, nor shall make any apology in the fourth month, shall be considered as having abdicated the Club.

'When a vacancy is to be filled, the name of the candidate, and of the member recommending him, shall stand in the Club-room three nights. On the fourth he may be chosen by ballot; six members at least being present, and two-thirds of the ballot being in his favour; or the majority, should the numbers not be divisible by three.

'The master of the house shall give notice, six days before, to each of those members whose turn of necessary attendance is come.

'The notice may be in these words :-"Sir, Onthe of, will be your turn of presiding at the Essex Head. Your company is therefore earnestly requested."

One penny shall be left by each member for the