Part 3

"'You seem, my lord, to be concerned at the judicious apprehension that while you are sapping the foundations of royalty at home, and propagating here the dangerous doctrine of resistance, the distance of America may secure its inhabitants from your arts, though active. But I will unfold to you the gay prospects of futurity. This people, now so innocent and harmless, shall draw the sword against their mother country, and bathe its point in the blood of their benefactors; this people, now contented with a little, shall then refuse to spare what they themselves confess they could not miss; and these men, now so honest and so grateful, shall, in return for peace and for protection, see their vile agents in the House of Parliament, there to sow the seeds of sedition, and propagate confusion, perplexity, and pain. Be not dispirited, then, at the contemplation of their present happy state: I promise you that anarchy, poverty, and death shall, by my care, be carried even across the spacious Atlantic, and settle in America itself, the sure consequences of our beloved Whiggism.'"

This I thought a thing so very particular that I begged his leave to write it down directly, before anything could intervene that might make me forget the force of the expressions. A trick which I have, however, seen played on common occasions, of sitting steadily down at the other end of the room to write at the moment what should be said in company, either _by_ Dr. Johnson or _to_ him, I never practised myself, nor approved of in another. There is something so ill-bred, and so inclining to treachery in this conduct, that were it commonly adopted all confidence would soon be exiled from society, and a conversation assembly- room would become tremendous as a court of justice. A set of acquaintance joined in familiar chat may say a thousand things which, as the phrase is, pass well enough at the time, though they cannot stand the test of critical examination; and as all talk beyond that which is necessary to the purposes of actual business is a kind of game, there will be ever found ways of playing fairly or unfairly at it, which distinguish the gentleman from the juggler. Dr. Johnson, as well as many of my acquaintance, knew that I kept a common-place book, and he one day said to me good-humouredly that he would give me something to write in my repository. "I warrant," said he, "there is a great deal about me in it. You shall have at least one thing worth your pains, so if you will get the pen and ink I will repeat to you Anacreon's 'Dove' directly; but tell at the same time that as I never was struck with anything in the Greek language till I read _that_, so I never read anything in the same language since that pleased me as much. I hope my translation," continued he, "is not worse than that of Frank Fawkes." Seeing me disposed to laugh, "Nay, nay," said he, "Frank Fawkes has done them very finely."

"Lovely courier of the sky, Whence and whither dost thou fly? Scatt'ring, as thy pinions play, Liquid fragrance all the way. Is it business? is it love? Tell me, tell me, gentle Dove. 'Soft Anacreon's vows I bear, Vows to Myrtale the fair; Graced with all that charms the heart, Blushing nature, smiling art. Venus, courted by an ode, On the bard her Dove bestowed. Vested with a master's right Now Anacreon rules my flight; His the letters that you see, Weighty charge consigned to me; Think not yet my service hard, Joyless task without reward; Smiling at my master's gates, Freedom my return awaits. But the liberal grant in vain Tempts me to be wild again. Can a prudent Dove decline Blissful bondage such as mine? Over hills and fields to roam, Fortune's guest without a home; Under leaves to hide one's head, Slightly sheltered, coarsely fed; Now my better lot bestows Sweet repast, and soft repose; Now the generous bowl I sip As it leaves Anacreon's lip; Void of care, and free from dread, From his fingers snatch his bread, Then with luscious plenty gay, Round his chamber dance and play; Or from wine, as courage springs, O'er his face extend my wings; And when feast and frolic tire, Drop asleep upon his lyre. This is all, be quick and go, More than all thou canst not know; Let me now my pinions ply, I have chattered like a pie.'"

When I had finished, "But you must remember to add," says Mr. Johnson, "that though these verses were planned, and even begun, when I was sixteen years old, I never could find time to make an end of them before I was sixty-eight."

This facility of writing, and this dilatoriness ever to write, Mr. Johnson always retained, from the days that he lay abed and dictated his first publication to Mr. Hector, who acted as his amanuensis, to the moment he made me copy out those variations in Pope's "Homer" which are printed in the "Poets' Lives." "And now," said he, when I had finished it for him, "I fear not Mr. Nicholson of a pin." The fine 'Rambler,' on the subject of Procrastination, was hastily composed, as I have heard, in Sir Joshua Reynolds's parlour, while the boy waited to carry it to press; and numberless are the instances of his writing under immediate pressure of importunity or distress. He told me that the character of Sober in the 'Idler' was by himself intended as his own portrait, and that he had his own outset into life in his eye when he wrote the Eastern story of "Gelaleddin." Of the allegorical papers in the 'Rambler,' Labour and Rest was his favourite; but Scrotinus, the man who returns late in life to receive honours in his native country, and meets with mortification instead of respect, was by him considered as a masterpiece in the science of life and manners. The character of Prospero in the fourth volume Garrick took to be his; and I have heard the author say that he never forgave the offence. Sophron was likewise a picture drawn from reality, and by Gelidus, the philosopher, he meant to represent Mr. Coulson, a mathematician, who formerly lived at Rochester. The man immortalised for purring like a cat was, as he told me, one Busby, a proctor in the Commons. He who barked so ingeniously, and then called the drawer to drive away the dog, was father to Dr. Salter, of the Charterhouse. He who sang a song, and by correspondent motions of his arm chalked out a giant on the wall, was one Richardson, an attorney. The letter signed "Sunday" was written by Miss Talbot; and he fancied the billets in the first volume of the 'Rambler' were sent him by Miss Mulso, now Mrs. Chapone. The papers contributed by Mrs. Carter had much of his esteem, though he always blamed me for preferring the letter signed "Chariessa" to the allegory, where religion and superstition are indeed most masterly delineated.

When Dr. Johnson read his own satire, in which the life of a scholar is painted, with the various obstructions thrown in his way to fortune and to fame, he burst into a passion of tears one day. The family and Mr. Scott only were present, who, in a jocose way, clapped him on the back, and said, "What's all this, my dear sir? Why, you and I and _Hercules_, you know, were all troubled with _melancholy_." As there are many gentlemen of the same name, I should say, perhaps, that it was a Mr. Scott who married Miss Robinson, and that I think I have heard Mr. Thrale call him George Lowis, or George Augustus, I have forgot which. He was a very large man, however, and made out the triumvirate with Johnson and Hercules comically enough. The Doctor was so delighted at his odd sally that he suddenly embraced him, and the subject was immediately changed. I never saw Mr. Scott but that once in my life.

Dr. Johnson was liberal enough in granting literary assistance to others, I think; and innumerable are the prefaces, sermons, lectures, and dedications which he used to make for people who begged of him. Mr. Murphy related in his and my hearing one day, and he did not deny it, that when Murphy joked him the week before for having been so diligent of late between Dodd's sermon and Kelly's prologue, Dr. Johnson replied, "Why, sir, when they come to me with a dead staymaker and a dying parson, what can a man do?" He _said_, however, that "he hated to give away literary performances, or even to sell them too cheaply. The next generation shall not accuse me," added he, "of beating down the price of literature. One hates, besides, ever to give that which one has been accustomed to sell. Would not you, sir," turning to Mr. Thrale, "rather give away money than porter?"

Mr. Johnson had never, by his own account, been a close student, and used to advise young people never to be without a book in their pocket, to be read at bye-times when they had nothing else to do. "It has been by that means," said he to a boy at our house one day, "that all my knowledge has been gained, except what I have picked up by running about the world with my wits ready to observe, and my tongue ready to talk. A man is seldom in a humour to unlock his bookcase, set his desk in order, and betake himself to serious study; but a retentive memory will do something, and a fellow shall have strange credit given him, if he can but recollect striking passages from different books, keep the authors separate in his head, and bring his stock of knowledge artfully into play. How else," added he, "do the gamesters manage when they play for more money than they are worth?" His Dictionary, however, could not, one would think, have been written by running up and down; but he really did not consider it as a great performance; and used to say "that he might have done it easily in two years had not his health received several shocks during the time."

When Mr. Thrale, in consequence of this declaration, teased him in the year 1768 to give a new edition of it, because, said he, there are four or five gross faults: "Alas! sir," replied Johnson, "there are four or five hundred faults instead of four or five; but you do not consider that it would take me up three whole months' labour, and when the time was expired the work would not be done." When the booksellers set him about it, however, some years after, he went cheerfully to the business, said he was well paid, and that they deserved to have it done carefully. His reply to the person who complimented him on its coming out first, mentioning the ill success of the French in a similar attempt, is well known, and, I trust, has been often recorded. "Why, what would you expect, dear sir," said he, "from fellows that eat frogs?" I have, however, often thought Dr. Johnson more free than prudent in professing so loudly his little skill in the Greek language; for though he considered it as a proof of a narrow mind to be too careful of literary reputation, yet no man could be more enraged than he if an enemy, taking advantage of this confession, twitted him with his ignorance; and I remember when the King of Denmark was in England one of his noblemen was brought by Mr. Colman to see Dr. Johnson at our country house, and having heard, he said, that he was not famous for Greek literature, attacked him on the weak side, politely adding that he chose that conversation on purpose to favour himself. Our Doctor, however, displayed so copious, so compendious a knowledge of authors, books, and every branch of learning in that language, that the gentleman appeared astonished. When he was gone home, says Johnson, "Now, for all this triumph I may thank Thrale's Xenophon here, as I think, excepting that _one_, I have not looked in a Greek book these ten years; but see what haste my dear friends were all in," continued he, "to tell this poor innocent foreigner that I know nothing of Greek! Oh, no, he knows nothing of Greek!" with a loud burst of laughing.

When Davies printed the "Fugitive Pieces" without his knowledge or consent, "How," said I, "would Pope have raved, had he been served so!" "We should never," replied he, "have heard the last on't, to be sure; but then Pope was a narrow man. I will, however," added he, "storm and bluster _myself_ a little this time," so went to London in all the wrath he could muster up. At his return I asked how the affair ended. "Why," said he, "I was a fierce fellow, and pretended to be very angry; and Thomas was a good-natured fellow, and pretended to be very sorry; so _there_ the matter ended. I believe the dog loves me dearly. Mr. Thrale," turning to my husband, "what shall you and I do that is good for Tom Davies? We will do something for him, to be sure."

Of Pope as a writer he had the highest opinion, and once when a lady at our house talked of his preface to Shakespeare as superior to Pope's, "I fear not, madam," said he, "the little fellow has done wonders." His superior reverence of Dryden, notwithstanding, still appeared in his talk as in his writings; and when some one mentioned the ridicule thrown on him in the 'Rehearsal,' as having hurt his general character as an author, "On the contrary," says Mr. Johnson, "the greatness of Dryden's reputation is now the only principle of vitality which keeps the Duke of Buckingham's play from putrefaction."

It was not very easy, however, for people not quite intimate with Dr. Johnson to get exactly his opinion of a writer's merit, as he would now and then divert himself by confounding those who thought themselves obliged to say to-morrow what he had said yesterday; and even Garrick, who ought to have been better acquainted with his tricks, professed himself mortified that one time when he was extolling Dryden in a rapture that I suppose disgusted his friend, Mr. Johnson suddenly challenged him to produce twenty lines in a series that would not disgrace the poet and his admirer. Garrick produced a passage that he had once heard the Doctor commend, in which he _now_ found, if I remember rightly, sixteen faults, and made Garrick look silly at his own table. When I told Mr. Johnson the story, "Why, what a monkey was David now," says he, "to tell of his own disgrace!" And in the course of that hour's chat he told me how he used to tease Garrick by commendations of the tomb-scene in Congreve's 'Mourning Bride,' protesting, that Shakespeare had in the same line of excellence nothing as good. "All which is strictly _true_," said he; "but that is no reason for supposing Congreve is to stand in competition with Shakespeare: these fellows know not how to blame, nor how to commend." I forced him one day, in a similar humour, to prefer Young's description of "Night" to the so much admired ones of Dryden and Shakespeare, as more forcible and more general. Every reader is not either a lover or a tyrant, but every reader is interested when he hears that

"Creation sleeps; 'tis as the general pulse Of life stood still, and nature made a pause; An awful pause--prophetic of its end."

"This," said he, "is true; but remember that, taking the compositions of Young in general, they are but like bright stepping-stones over a miry road. Young froths and foams, and bubbles sometimes very vigorously; but we must not compare the noise made by your tea-kettle here with the roaring of the ocean."

Somebody was praising Corneille one day in opposition to Shakespeare. "Corneille is to Shakespeare," replied Mr. Johnson, "as a clipped hedge is to a forest." When we talked of Steele's Essays, "They are too thin," says our critic, "for an Englishman's taste: mere superficial observations on life and manners, without erudition enough to make them keep, like the light French wines, which turn sour with standing awhile for want of _body_, as we call it."

Of a much-admired poem, when extolled as beautiful, he replied, "That it had indeed the beauty of a bubble. The colours are gay," said he, "but the substance slight." Of James Harris's Dedication to his "Hermes," I have heard him observe that, though but fourteen lines long, there were six grammatical faults in it. A friend was praising the style of Dr. Swift; Mr. Johnson did not find himself in the humour to agree with him: the critic was driven from one of his performances to the other. At length, "You _must_ allow me," said the gentleman, "that there are _strong facts_ in the account of 'The Four Last Years of Queen Anne.'" "Yes, surely, sir," replies Johnson, "and so there are in the Ordinary of Newgate's account." This was like the story which Mr. Murphy tells, and Johnson always acknowledged: how Mr. Rose of Hammersmith, contending for the preference of Scotch writers over the English, after having set up his authors like ninepins, while the Doctor kept bowling them down again; at last, to make sure of victory, he named Ferguson upon "Civil Society," and praised the book for being written in a _new_ manner. "I do not," says Johnson, "perceive the value of this new manner; it is only like Buckinger, who had no hands, and so wrote with his feet." Of a modern Martial, when it came out: "There are in these verses," says Dr. Johnson, "too much folly for madness, I think, and too much madness for folly." If, however, Mr. Johnson lamented that the nearer he approached to his own times, the more enemies he should make, by telling biographical truths in his "Lives of the Later Poets," what may I not apprehend, who, if I relate anecdotes of Mr. Johnson, am obliged to repeat expressions of severity, and sentences of contempt? Let me at least soften them a little by saying that he did not hate the persons he treated with roughness, or despise them whom he drove from him by apparent scorn. He really loved and respected many whom he would not suffer to love him. And when he related to me a short dialogue that passed between himself and a writer of the first eminence in the world, when he was in Scotland, I was shocked to think how he must have disgusted him. "Dr. --- asked me," said he, "why I did not join in their public worship when among them? for," said he, "I went to your churches often when in England." "So," replied Johnson, "I have read that the Siamese sent ambassadors to Louis Quatorze, but I never heard that the King of France thought it worth his while to send ambassadors from his court to that of _Siam_." He was no gentler with myself, or those for whom I had the greatest regard. When I one day lamented the loss of a first cousin killed in America, "Prithee, my dear," said he, "have done with canting. How would the world be worse for it, I may ask, if all your relations were at once spitted like larks, and roasted for Presto's supper?" Presto was the dog that lay under the table while we talked. When we went into Wales together, and spent some time at Sir Robert Cotton's, at Lleweny, one day at dinner I meant to please Mr. Johnson particularly with a dish of very young peas. "Are not they charming?" said I to him, while he was eating them. "Perhaps," said he, "they would be so--to a _pig_."

I only instance these replies, to excuse my mentioning those he made to others.

When a well-known author published his poems in the year 1777: "Such a one's verses are come out," said I. "Yes," replied Johnson, "and this frost has struck them in again. Here are some lines I have written to ridicule them; but remember that I love the fellow dearly now, for all I laugh at him:--

"'Wheresoe'er I turn my view, All is strange, yet nothing new; Endless labour all along, Endless labour to be wrong; Phrase that Time has flung away; Uncouth words in disarray, Tricked in antique ruff and bonnet, Ode, and elegy, and sonnet.'"

When he parodied the verses of another eminent writer, it was done with more provocation, I believe, and with some merry malice. A serious translation of the same lines, which I think are from Euripides, may be found in Burney's "History of Music." Here are the burlesque ones:--

"Err shall they not, who resolute explore Time's gloomy backward with judicious eyes; And scanning right the practices of yore, Shall deem our hoar progenitors unwise.

"They to the dome where smoke with curling play Announced the dinner to the regions round, Summoned the singer blithe, and harper gay, And aided wine with dulcet streaming sound.

"The better use of notes, or sweet or shrill, By quivering string, or modulated wind; Trumpet or lyre--to their harsh bosoms chill, Admission ne'er had sought, or could not find.

"Oh! send them to the sullen mansions dun, Her baleful eyes where Sorrow rolls around; Where gloom-enamoured Mischief loves to dwell, And Murder, all blood-boltered, schemes the wound.

"When cates luxuriant pile the spacious dish, And purple nectar glads the festive hour; The guest, without a want, without a wish, Can yield no room to Music's soothing power."

Some of the old legendary stories put in verse by modern writers provoked him to caricature them thus one day at Streatham; but they are already well known, I am sure.

"The tender infant, meek and mild, Fell down upon the stone; The nurse took up the squealing child, But still the child squealed on."

A famous ballad also, beginning 'Rio verde, Rio verde,' when I commended the translation of it, he said he could do it better himself--as thus:

"Glassy water, glassy water, Down whose current clear and strong, Chiefs confused in mutual slaughter, Moor and Christian roll along."

"But, sir," said I, "this is not ridiculous at all." "Why, no," replied he, "why should I always write ridiculously? Perhaps because I made these verses to imitate such a one," naming him:

"'Hermit hoar, in solemn cell Wearing out life's evening grey; Strike thy bosom, sage! and tell What is bliss, and which the way?'

"Thus I spoke, and speaking sighed, Scarce repressed the starting tear, When the hoary sage replied, 'Come, my lad, and drink some beer.'"

I could give another comical instance of caricatura imitation. Recollecting some day, when praising these verses of Lopez de Vega--

"Se acquien los leones vence, Vence una muger hermosa, O el de flaco averguence, O ella di ser mas furiosa,"

more than he thought they deserved, Mr. Johnson instantly observed "that they were founded on a trivial conceit, and that conceit ill-explained and ill-expressed besides. The lady, we all know, does not conquer in the same manner as the lion does. 'Tis a mere play of words," added he, "and you might as well say that

"'If the man who turnips cries, Cry not when his father dies, 'Tis a proof that he had rather Have a turnip than his father.'"

And this humour is of the same sort with which he answered the friend who commended the following line:--

"Who rules o'er freemen should himself be free."

"To be sure," said Dr. Johnson--

"'Who drives fat oxen should himself be fat.'"

This readiness of finding a parallel, or making one, was shown by him perpetually in the course of conversation. When the French verses of a certain pantomime were quoted thus:

"Je suis Cassandre descendue des cieux, Pour vous faire entendre, mesdames et messieurs, Que je suis Cassandre descendue des cieux,"

he cried out gaily and suddenly, almost in a moment--

"I am Cassandra come down from the sky, To tell each bystander what none can deny, That I am Cassandra come down from the sky."

The pretty Italian verses, too, at the end of Baretti's book called "Easy Phraseology," he did all' improviso, in the same manner:

"Viva! viva la padrona! Tutta bella, e tutta buona, La padrona e un angiolella Tutta buona e tutta bella; Tutta bella e tutta buona; Viva! viva la padrona!"