Chapter 13

forty years, and never was interrupted yet.' Baretti, who was a great traveller, says:--'For my part I never met with any robbers in my various rambles through several regions of Europe.' Baretti's _Journey from London to Genoa_, ii. 266.

[674] A year or two before Johnson became acquainted with the Thrales a man was hanged on Kennington Common for robbing Mr. Thrale. _Gent. Mag_. xxxiii. 411.

[675] The late Duke of Montrose was generally said to have been uneasy on that account; but I can contradict the report from his Grace's own authority. As he used to admit me to very easy conversation with him, I took the liberty to introduce the subject. His Grace told me, that when riding one night near London, he was attacked by two highwaymen on horseback, and that he instantly shot one of them, upon which the other galloped off; that his servant, who was very well mounted, proposed to pursue him and take him, but that his Grace said, 'No, we have had blood enough: I hope the man may live to repent.' His Grace, upon my presuming to put the question, assured me, that his mind was not at all clouded by what he had thus done in self-defence. BOSWELL.

[676] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. 22, for a discussion on signing death-warrants.

[677] 'Mr. Dunning the great lawyer,' Johnson called him, _ante_, p. 128. Lord Shelburne says:--'The fact is well known of the present Chief Justice of the Common Pleas (Lord Loughborough, formerly Mr. Wedderburne) beginning a law argument in the absence of Mr. Dunning, but upon hearing him hem in the course of it, his tone so visibly [sic] changed that there was not a doubt in any part of the House of the reason of it.' Fitzmaurice's _Shelburne_, iii. 454.

[678] 'The applause of a single human being,' he once said, 'is of great consequence.' _Post_, 1780, in Mr. Langton's _Collection_.

[679] Most likely Boswell's father, for he answers to what is said of this person. He was known to Johnson, he had married a second time, and he was fond of planting, and entertained schemes for the improvement of his property. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov. 4 and 5, 1773. _Respectable_ was still a term of high praise. It had not yet come down to signify 'a man who keeps a gig.' Johnson defines it as 'venerable, meriting respect.' It is not in the earlier editions of his _Dictionary_. Boswell, in his _Hebrides_ (Oct. 27), calls Johnson the Duke of Argyle's 'respectable guest,' and _post_, under Sept. 5, 1780, writes of 'the _respectable_ notion which should ever be entertained of my illustrious friend.' Dr. Franklin in a dedication to Johnson describes himself as 'a sincere admirer of his _respectable_ talents;' _post_, end of 1780. In the _Gent. Mag_. lv. 235, we read that 'a stone now covers the grave which holds his [Dr. Johnson's] _respectable_ remains.' 'I do not know,' wrote Hannah More (_Memoirs_, i. 43) of Hampton Court, 'a more _respectable_ sight than a room containing fourteen admirals, all by Sir Godfrey.' Gibbon (_Misc. Works_, ii. 487), congratulating Lord Loughborough on becoming Lord Chancellor, speaks of the support the administration will derive 'from so _respectable_ an ally.' George III. wrote to Lord Shelburne on Sept. 16, 1782, 'when the tie between the Colonies and England was about to be formally severed,' that he made 'the most frequent prayers to heaven to guide me so to act that posterity may not lay the downfall of this once _respectable_ empire at my door.' Fitzmaurice's _Shelburne_, iii. 297. Lord Chesterfield (_Misc. Works_, iv. 308) writing of the hour of death says:--'That moment is at least a very _respectable_ one, let people who boast of not fearing it say what they please.'

[680] The younger Newbery records that Johnson, finding that he had a violin, said to him:--'Young man, give the fiddle to the first beggar man you meet, or you will never be a scholar.' _A Bookseller of the Last Century_, pp. 127, 145. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 15.

[681] When I told this to Miss Seward, she smiled, and repeated, with admirable readiness, from _Acis and Galatea_,

'Bring me a hundred reeds of ample growth, To make a pipe for my CAPACIOUS MOUTH.' BOSWELL.

[682] See _post_, June 3, 1784, where Johnson again mentions this. In _The Spectator_, No. 536, Addison recommends knotting, which was, he says, again in fashion, as an employment for 'the most idle part of the kingdom; I mean that part of mankind who are known by the name of the women's-men, or beaus,' etc. In _The Universal Passion_, Satire i, Young says of fame:--

'By this inspired (O ne'er to be forgot!) Some lords have learned to spell, and some to knot.'

Lord Eldon says that 'at a period when all ladies were employed (when they had nothing better to do) in knotting, Bishop Porteous was asked by the Queen, whether she might knot on a Sunday. He answered, "You may not;" leaving her Majesty to decide whether, as _knot_ and _not_ were in sound alike, she was, or was not, at liberty to do so.' Twiss's _Eldon_, ii. 355.

[683] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 23.

[684] See _post_, p. 248.

[685] Martin's style is wanting in that 'cadence which Temple gave to English prose' (_post_, p. 257). It would not be judged now so severely as it was a century ago, as the following instance will show:--'There is but one steel and tinder-box in all this commonwealth; the owner whereof fails not upon every occasion of striking fire in the lesser isles, to go thither, and exact three eggs, or one of the lesser fowls from each man as a reward for his service; this by them is called the Fire-Penny, and this Capitation is very uneasy to them; I bid them try their chrystal with their knives, which, when they saw it did strike fire, they were not a little astonished, admiring at the strangeness of the thing, and at the same time accusing their own ignorance, considering the quantity of chrystal growing under the rock of their coast. This discovery has delivered them from the Fire-Penny-Tax, and so they are no longer liable to it.'

[686] See _ante_, p. 226.

[687] Lord Macartney observes upon this passage, 'I have heard him tell many things, which, though embellished by their mode of narrative, had their foundation in truth; but I never remember any thing approaching to this. If he had written it, I should have supposed some wag had put the figure of one before the three.'--I am, however, absolutely certain that Dr. Campbell told me it, and I gave particular attention to it, being myself a lover of wine, and therefore curious to hear whatever is remarkable concerning drinking. There can be no doubt that some men can drink, without suffering any injury, such a quantity as to others appears incredible. It is but fair to add, that Dr. Campbell told me, he took a very long time to this great potation; and I have heard Dr. Johnson say, 'Sir, if a man drinks very slowly, and lets one glass evaporate before he takes another, I know not how long he may drink.' Dr. Campbell mentioned a Colonel of Militia who sat with him all the time, and drank equally. BOSWELL.

[688] See _ante_, i. 417.

[689] In the following September she is thus mentioned by Miss Burney: --'Mrs. Thrale. "To-morrow, Sir, Mrs. Montagu dines here, and then you will have talk enough." Dr. Johnson began to see-saw, with a countenance strongly expressive of inward fun, and after enjoying it some time in silence, he suddenly, and with great animation, turned to me and cried; "Down with her, Burney! down with her! spare her not! attack her, fight her, and down with her at once! You are a rising wit, and she is at the top; and when I was beginning the world, and was nothing and nobody, the joy of my life was to fire at all the established wits, and then everybody loved to halloo me on."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, i. 117. 'She has,' adds Miss Burney, 'a sensible and penetrating countenance and the air and manner of a woman accustomed to being distinguished and of great parts. Dr. Johnson, who agrees in this, told us that a Mrs. Hervey of his acquaintance says she can remember Mrs. Montagu _trying_ for this same air and manner.' _Ib_. p. 122. See _ante_, ii. 88.

[690] Only one volume had been published; it ended with the sixteenth chapter.

[691] Dr. A. Carlyle (_Auto_. p. 462) says:--'She did not take at Edinburgh. Lord Kames, who was at first catched with her Parnassian coquetry, said at last that he believed she had as much learning as a well-educated college lad here of sixteen. In genuine feelings and deeds she was remarkably deficient. We saw her often in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, and in that town, where there was no audience for such an actress as she was, her natural character was displayed, which was that of an active manager of her affairs, a crafty chaperon, and a keen pursuer of her interest, not to be outdone by the sharpest coal-dealer on the Tyne; but in this capacity she was not displeasing, for she was not acting a part.'

[692] What my friend meant by these words concerning the amiable philosopher of Salisbury, I am at a loss to understand. A friend suggests, that Johnson thought his _manner_ as a writer affected, while at the same time the _matter_ did not compensate for that fault. In short, that he meant to make a remark quite different from that which a _celebrated gentleman_ made on a very eminent physician: 'He is a coxcomb, but a _satisfactory coxcomb_.' BOSWELL. Malone says that the _celebrated gentleman_ was Gerard Hamilton. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov. 3, where Johnson says that 'he thought Harris a coxcomb,' and _ante_, ii. 225.

[693] _Hermes_.

[694] On the back of the engraving of Johnson in the Common Room of University College is inscribed:--'Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in hac camera communi frequens conviva. D.D. Gulielmus Scott nuper socius.' Gulielmus Scott is better known as Lord Stowell. See _ante_, i. 379, note 2, and iii. 42; and _post_, April 17, 1778.

[695] See _ante_, under March 15, 1776.

[696] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 31.

[697] See _ante_, p. 176.

[698] See _ante_, i. 413.

[699] _Eminent_ is the epithet Boswell generally applies to Burke (_ante_, ii. 222), and Burke almost certainly is here meant. Yet Johnson later on said, 'Burke's talk is the ebullition of his mind. He does not talk from a desire of distinction, but because his mind is full.' _Post_, March 21, 1783.

[700] Kames describes it as 'an act as wild as any that superstition ever suggested to a distempered brain.' _Sketches, etc_. iv. 321.

[701] See _ante,_ p. 243.

[702] 'Queen Caroline,' writes Horace Walpole, 'much wished to make Dr. Clarke a bishop, but he would not subscribe the articles again. I have often heard my father relate that he sat up one night at the Palace with the Doctor, till the pages of the backstairs asked if they would have fresh candles, my father endeavouring to persuade him to subscribe again, as he had for the living of St. James's. Clarke pretended he had _then_ believed them. "Well," said Sir Robert, "but if you do not now, you ought to resign your living to some man who would subscribe conscientiously." The Doctor would neither resign his living nor accept the bishopric.' _Journal of the Reign of George III_, i. 8. See _ante_, i. 398, _post_, Dec. 1784, where Johnson, on his death-bed, recommended Clarke's _Sermons_; and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 5.

[703] Boswell took Ogden's _Sermons_ with him to the Hebrides, but Johnson showed no great eagerness to read them. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 15 and 32.

[704] See _ante_, p. 223.

[705] _King Lear_, act iii. sc. 4.

[706] The Duke of Marlborough.

[707] See Chappell's _Popular Music of the Olden Time_, i. 330.

[708] See _ante_, p. 177.

[709] 'The accounts of Swift's reception in Ireland given by Lord Orrery and Dr. Delany are so different, that the credit of the writers, both undoubtedly veracious, cannot be saved but by supposing, what I think is true, that they speak of different times. Johnson's _Works_, viii. 207. See Boswell's _Hebrides_, Sept. Lord Orrery says that Swift, on his return to Ireland in 1714, 'met with frequent indignities from the populace, and indeed was equally abused by persons of all ranks and denominations.' Orrery's _Remarks on Swift_, ed. 1752, p. 60. Dr. Delany says (_Observations_, p. 87) that 'Swift, when he came--to take possession of his Deanery (in 1713), was received with very distinguished respect.'

[710] 'He could practise abstinence,' says Boswell (_post_, March 20, 1781), 'but not temperance.'

[711] 'The dinner was good, and the Bishop is knowing and conversible,' wrote Johnson of an earlier dinner at Sir Joshua's where he had met the same bishop. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 334.

[712] See _post_, Aug 19, 1784.

[713] There is no mention in the _Journey to Brundusium_ of a brook. Johnson referred, no doubt, to Epistle I. 16. 12.

[714]

'Ne ought save Tyber hastning to his fall Remaines of all. O world's inconstancie! That which is firme doth flit and fall away, And that is flitting doth abide and stay.'

Spenser, _The Ruines of Rome_.

[715] Giano Vitale, to give him his Italian name, was a theologian and poet of Palermo. His earliest work was published in 1512, and he died about 1560. _Brunet_, and Zedler's _Universal Lexicon_.

[716]

'Albula Romani restat nunc nominis index, Qui quoque nunc rapidis fertur in aequor aquis. Disce hinc quid possit Fortuna. Immota labascunt, Et quae perpetuo sunt agitata manent.'

Jani Vitalis Panormitani _De Roma_. See _Delicia C.C. Italorum Poetarum_, edit. 1608, p. 1433, It is curious that in all the editions of Boswell that I have seen, the error _labescunt_ remains unnoticed.

[717] See _post_, June 2, 1781.

[718] Dr. Shipley was chaplain to the Duke of Cumberland. CROKER. The battle was fought on July 2, N.S. 1747.

[719]

'Inconstant as the wind I various rove; At Tibur, Rome--at Rome, I Tibur love.'

FRANCIS. Horace, _Epistles_, i. 8. 12. In the first two editions Mr. Cambridge's speech ended here.

[720]

'More constant to myself, I leave with pain, By hateful business forced, the rural scene.'

FRANCIS. Horace, _Epist_., I. 14. 16.

[721] See _ante_, p. 167.

[722] Fox, it should be remembered, was Johnson's junior by nearly forty years.

[723] See _ante_, i. 413, ii. 214, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 2.

[724] See _ante_, i. 478.

[725] 'Who can doubt,' asks Mr. Forster, 'that he also meant slowness of motion? The first point of the picture is _that_. The poet is moving slowly, his tardiness of gait measuring the heaviness of heart, the pensive spirit, the melancholy of which it is the outward expression and sign.' Forster's _Goldsmith_, i. 369.

[726] See _ante_, ii. 5.

[727] _Essay on Man_, ii. 2.

[728] Gibbon could have illustrated this subject, for not long before he had at Paris been 'introduced,' he said, 'to the best company of both sexes, to the foreign ministers of all nations, and to the first names and characters of France.' Gibbon's _Misc. Works_, i. 227. He says of an earlier visit:--'Alone, in a morning visit, I commonly found the artists and authors of Paris less vain and more reasonable than in the circles of their equals, with whom they mingle in the houses of the rich.' _Ib_. p. 162. Horace Walpole wrote of the Parisians in 1765, (_Letters_, iv. 436):--'Their gaiety is not greater than their delicacy--but I will not expatiate. [He had just described the grossness of the talk of women of the first rank.] Several of the women are agreeable, and some of the men; but the latter are in general vain and ignorant. The _savans_--I beg their pardon, the _philosophes_--are insupportable, superficial, overbearing, and fanatic.'

[729] See _post_, under Aug. 29, 1783, and Boswell's _Hebrides_, Oct. 14.

[730] See _post_, April 28, 1783.

[731] See _ante_, p. 191.

[732] [Greek: 'gaerusko d aiei polla didaskomenos.'] 'I grow in learning as I grow in years.' Plutarch, _Solon_, ch. 31.

[733]

''Tis somewhat to be lord of some small ground In which a lizard may at least turn around.'

Dryden, _Juvenal_, iii. 230.

[734] _Modern characters from Shakespeare. Alphabetically arranged_. A New Edition. London, 1778. It is not a pamphlet but a duodecimo of 88 pages. Some of the lines are very grossly applied.

[735] _As You Like it_, act iii. sc. 2. The giant's name is Gargantua, not Garagantua. In _Modern Characters_ (p. 47), the next line also is given:--'Tis a word too great for any mouth of this age's size.' The lines that Boswell next quotes are not given.

[736] _Coriolanus_, act iii. sc. 1.

[737] See vol. i. p. 498. BOSWELL.

[738] See _ante_, ii. 236, where Johnson charges Robertson with _verbiage_. This word is not in his _Dictionary_.

[739] Pope, meeting Bentley at dinner, addressed him thus:--'Dr. Bentley, I ordered my bookseller to send you your books. I hope you received them.' Bentley, who had purposely avoided saying anything about _Homer_, pretended not to understand him, and asked, 'Books! books! what books?' 'My _Homer_,' replied Pope, 'which you did me the honour to subscribe for.'--'Oh,' said Bentley, 'ay, now I recollect--your translation:--it is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope; but you must not call it _Homer_.' Johnson's _Works_, viii. 336, note.

[740] 'It is certainly the noblest version of poetry which the world has ever seen; and its publication must therefore be considered as one of the great events in the annals of Learning.' _Ib_. p. 256. 'There would never,' said Gray, 'be another translation of the same poem equal to it.' Gray's _Works_, ed. 1858, v. 37. Cowper however says, that he and a friend 'compared Pope's translation throughout with the original. They were not long in discovering that there is hardly the thing in the world of which Pope was so utterly destitute as a taste for _Homer_.' Southey's _Cowper_, i. 106.

[741] Boswell here repeats what he had heard from Johnson, _ante_, p. 36.

[742] Swift, in his Preface to Temple's _Letters_, says:--'It is generally believed that this author has advanced our English tongue to as great a perfection as it can well bear.' Temple's _Works_, i. 226. Hume, in his Essay _Of Civil Liberty_, wrote in 1742:--'The elegance and propriety of style have been very much neglected among us. The first polite prose we have was writ by a man who is still alive (Swift). As to Sprat, Locke, and even Temple, they knew too little of the rules of art to be esteemed elegant writers.' Mackintosh says (_Life_, ii. 205):--'Swift represents Temple as having brought English style to perfection. Hume, I think, mentions him; but of late he is not often spoken of as one of the reformers of our style--this, however, he certainly was. The structure of his style is perfectly modern.' Johnson said that he had partly formed his style upon Temple's; _ante_, i. 218. In the last _Rambler_, speaking of what he had himself done for our language, he says:--'Something, perhaps, I have added to the elegance of its construction, and something to the harmony of its cadence.'

[743] 'Clarendon's diction is neither exact in itself, nor suited to the purpose of history. It is the effusion of a mind crowded with ideas, and desirous of imparting them; and therefore always accumulating words, and involving one clause and sentence in another.' _The Rambler_, No. 122.

[744] Johnson's addressing himself with a smile to Mr. Harris is explained by a reference to what Boswell said (_ante_, p. 245) of Harris's analytic method in his _Hermes_.

[745] 'Dr. Johnson said of a modern Martial [no doubt Elphinston's], "there are in these verses too much folly for madness, I think, and too much madness for folly."' Piozzi's _Anec_. p. 61. Burns wrote on it the following epigram:--

'O thou whom Poetry abhors, Whom Prose has turned out of doors, Heard'st thou that groan--proceed no further, 'Twas laurell'd. Martial roaring murder.'

For Mr. Elphinston see _ante_, i. 210.

[746] It was called _The Siege of Aleppo_. Mr. Hawkins, the authour of it, was formerly Professor of Poetry at Oxford. It is printed in his _Miscellanies_, 3 vols. octavo. BOSWELL. 'Hughes's last work was his tragedy, _The Siege of Damascus_, after which a _Siege_ became a popular title.' Johnson's _Works_, vii. 477. See _ante_, i. 75, note 2. Hannah More (_Memoirs_, i. 200) mentions another _Siege_ by a Mrs. B. This lady asked Johnson to 'look over her _Siege of Sinope_; he always found means to evade it. At last she pressed him so closely that he refused to do it, and told her that she herself, by carefully looking it over, would be able to see if there was anything amiss as well as he could. "But, Sir," said she, "I have no time. I have already so many irons in the fire." "Why then, Madame," said he, quite out of patience, "the best thing I can advise you to do is to put your tragedy along with your irons."' Mrs. B. was Mrs. Brooke. See Baker's _Biog. Dram_. iii. 273, where no less than thirty-seven _Sieges_ are enumerated.

[747] That the story was true is shewn by the _Garrick Corres_. ii. 6. Hawkins wrote to Garrick in 1774:--'You rejected my _Siege of Aleppo_ because it was "wrong in the first concoction," as you said.' He added that his play 'was honoured with the _entire_ approbation of Judge Blackstone and Mr. Johnson.'

[748] The manager of Covent Garden Theatre.

[749] Hawkins wrote:--'In short, Sir, the world will be a proper judge whether I have been candidly treated by you.' Garrick, in his reply, did not make the impertinent offer which he here boasts of. Hawkins lived in Dorsetshire, not in Devonshire; as he reminds Garrick who had misdirected his letter. _Garrick Corres_. ii. 7-11.

[750] See _ante_, i. 433.

[751] 'BOSWELL. "Beauclerk has a keenness of mind which is very uncommon." JOHNSON. "Yes, Sir; and everything comes from him so easily. It appears to me that I labour, when I say a good thing." BOSWELL. "You are loud, Sir, but it is not an effort of mind."' Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 21. See _post_, under May 2, 1780.

[752] Boswell seems to imply that he showed Johnson, or at least read to him, a portion of his journal. Most of his _Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides_ had been read by him. Boswell's _Hebrides_, Aug. 18, and Oct. 26.

[753] Hannah More wrote of this evening (_Memoirs_, i. 146):--'Garrick put Johnson into such good spirits that I never knew him so entertaining or more instructive. He was as brilliant as himself, and as good-humoured as any one else.'

[754] He was, perhaps, more steadily under Johnson than under any else. In his own words he was 'of Johnson's school.' (_Ante_, p. 230). Gibbon calls Johnson Reynolds's oracle. Gibbon's _Misc. Works_, i. 149.

[755] Boswell never mentions Sir John Scott (Lord Eldon) who knew Johnson (_ante_, ii. 268), and who was Solicitor-General when the _Life of Johnson_ was published. Boswell perhaps never forgave him the trick that he and others played him at the Lancaster Assizes about the years 1786-8. 'We found,' said Eldon, 'Jemmy Boswell lying upon the pavement--inebriated. We subscribed at supper a guinea for him and half-a-crown for his clerk, and sent him next morning a brief with instructions to move for the writ of _Quare adhæsit pavimento_, with observations calculated to induce him to think that it required great learning to explain the necessity of granting it. He sent all round the town to attornies for books, but in vain. He moved however for the writ, making the best use he could of the observations in the brief. The judge was astonished and the audience amazed. The judge said, "I never heard of such a writ--what can it be that adheres _pavimento_? Are any of you gentlemen at the Bar able to explain this?" The Bar laughed. At last one of them said, "My Lord, Mr. Boswell last night _adhæsit pavimento_. There was no moving him for some time. At last he was carried to bed, and he has been dreaming about himself and the pavement."' Twiss's _Eldon_, i. 130. Boswell wrote to Temple in 1789:--'I hesitate as to going the Spring Northern Circuit, which costs £50, and obliges me to be in rough, unpleasant company four weeks.' _Letters of Boswell_, p. 274. See _ante_, ii. 191, note 2.

[756] 'Johnson, in accounting for the courage of our common people, said (_Works_, vi. 151):--'It proceeds from that dissolution of dependence which obliges every man to regard his own character. While every man is fed by his own hands, he has no need of any servile arts; he may always have wages for his labour, and is no less necessary to his employer than his employer is to him.'

[757] He says of a laird's tenants:--'Since the islanders no longer content to live have learned the desire of growing rich, an ancient dependant is in danger of giving way to a higher bidder, at the expense of domestick dignity and hereditary power. The stranger, whose money buys him preference, considers himself as paying for all that he has, and is indifferent about the laird's honour or safety. The commodiousness of money is indeed great; but there are some advantages which money cannot buy, and which therefore no wise man will by the love of money be tempted to forego.' _Ib_. ix. 83.

[758] 'Every old man complains ... of the petulance and insolence of the rising generation. He recounts the decency and regularity of former times, and celebrates the discipline and sobriety of the age in which his youth was passed; a happy age, which is now no more to be expected, since confusion has broken in upon the world, and thrown down all the boundaries of civility and reverence.' _The Rambler_, No. 50.

[759] Boswell, perhaps, had in mind _The Rambler_, No. 146:--'It is long before we are convinced of the small proportion which every individual bears to the collective body of mankind; or learn how few can be interested in the fortune of any single man; how little vacancy is left in the world for any new object of attention; to how small extent the brightest blaze of merit can be spread amidst the mists of business and of folly.'

[760] See _ante_, ii. 227.

[761]

'Fortunam reverenter habe, quicumque repente Dives ab exili progrediere loco.'

Ausonius, _Epigrammata_, viii. 7.

Stockdale records (_Memoirs_, ii. 186), that Johnson said to him:--'Garrick has undoubtedly the merit of an unassuming behaviour; for more pains have been taken to spoil that fellow than if he had been heir apparent to the Empire of India.'

[762] A lively account of Quin is given in _Humphry Clinker_, in the letters of April 30 and May 6.

[763] See _ante_, i. 216.

[764] A few days earlier Garrick wrote to a friend:--'I did not hear till last night that your friends have generously contributed to your and their own happiness. No one can more rejoice at this circumstance than I do; and as I hope we shall have a bonfire upon the occasion, I beg that you will light it with the inclosed.' The inclosed was a bond for £280. _Garrick Corres_. ii. 297. Murphy says:--'Dr. Johnson often said that, when he saw a worthy family in distress, it was his custom to collect charity among such of his friends as he knew to be affluent; and on those occasions he received from Garrick more than from any other person, and always more than he expected.' _Life of Garrick_, p. 378. 'It was with Garrick a fixed principle that authors were intitled to the emolument of their labours, and by that generous way of thinking he held out an invitation to men of genius.' _Ib_. p. 362. See _ante_, p. 70, and _post_, April 24, 1779.

[765] When Johnson told this little anecdote to Sir Joshua Reynolds, he mentioned a circumstance which he omitted to-day:--'Why (said Garrick) it is as red as blood.' BOSWELL. A passage in Johnson's answer to Hanway's _Essay on Tea_ (_ante_, i. 314) shews that tea was generally made very weak. 'Three cups,' he says, 'make the common quantity, so slightly impregnated that, perhaps, they might be tinged with the Athenian cicuta, and produce less effects than these letters charge upon tea.' _Works_, vi. 24.

[766] To Garrick might be applied what Johnson said of Swift:--'He was frugal by inclination, but liberal by principle.' _Works_, viii. 222.

[767] See _post_, under March 30, 1783. In Fitzmaurice's _Shelburne_,