Part 6

On his return to London, Boswell found that his admiration of his hero's "extraordinary mind" was "increased and confirmed," and when, a few years later, he was about to be married, he promised himself a great deal of instructive conversation with Johnson "on the conduct of the married state," but Johnson (who said once that marriages in general would be as happy, and often more so, if they were all made by the Lord Chancellor) "did not say much upon that topick."

When Johnson went to stay with his friend in Scotland, Mrs Boswell found his visit quite long enough:

"The truth is, that his irregular hours and uncouth habits, such as turning the candles with their heads downwards, when they did not burn bright enough, and letting the wax drop upon the carpet, could not but be disagreeable to a lady. Besides, she had not that high admiration of him which was felt by most of those who knew him; and what was very natural to a female mind, she thought he had too much influence over her husband. She once in a little warmth, made, with more point than justice, this remark upon that subject: 'I have seen many a bear led by a man; but I never before saw a man led by a bear.'"

It is delightful to note Boswell's pride as each fresh link is formed in the chain of friendship. Johnson, as we have seen, was a devout Christian and encouraged his friend to join him in his devotions:

"On the 9th of April [1773], being Good Friday, I breakfasted with him on tea and cross-buns; _Doctor_ Levet, as Frank called him, making the tea. He carried me with him to the Church of St Clement Danes, where he had his seat; and his behaviour was, as I had imaged to myself, solemnly devout. I never shall forget the tremulous earnestness with which he pronounced the awful petition in the Litany: 'In the hour of death, and at the day of judgement, good LORD deliver us.' We went to church both in the morning and evening. In the interval between the two services we did not dine; but he read in the Greek New Testament, and I turned over several of his books."

Two days later he had his first dinner at Johnson's house:

"I had ... great curiosity to dine with DR SAMUEL JOHNSON, in the dusky recess of a court in Fleet-street. I supposed we should scarcely have knives and forks, and only some strange, uncouth, ill-drest dish: but I found every thing in very good order. We had no other company but Mrs Williams and a young woman whom I did not know. As a dinner here was considered as a singular phænomenon, and as I was frequently interrogated on the subject, my readers may perhaps be desirous to know our bill of fare.... We had a very good soup, a boiled leg of lamb and spinach, a veal pye, and a rice pudding."

Boswell was made still prouder when shortly afterwards he was admitted to the Club:

"On Friday, April 30, I dined with him at Mr Beauclerk's, where were Lord Charlemont, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and some more members of the LITERARY CLUB, whom he had obligingly invited to meet me, as I was this evening to be balloted for as candidate for admission into that distinguished society. Johnson had done me the honour to propose me, and Beauclerk was very zealous for me...."

"The gentlemen went away to their club, and I was left at Beauclerk's till the fate of my election should be announced to me. I sat in a state of anxiety which even the charming conversation of Lady Di Beauclerk could not entirely dissipate. In a short time I received the agreeable intelligence that I was chosen. I hastened to the place of meeting, and was introduced to such a society as can seldom be found.... Upon my entrance, Johnson placed himself behind a chair, on which he leaned as on a desk or pulpit, and with humorous formality gave me a _Charge_, pointing out the conduct expected from me as a good member of this club."

When they were travelling together in Scotland Johnson frankly told him a little more about the election, and Boswell as frankly tells us:

"He told me, 'Sir, you got into our club by doing what a man can do. Several of the members wished to keep you out. Burke told me, he doubted if you were fit for it: but, now you are in, none of them are sorry. Burke says, that you have so much good humour naturally, it is scarce a virtue.' BOSWELL. 'They were afraid of you, Sir, as it was you who proposed me.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, they knew, that if they refused you, they'd probably never have got in another. I'd have kept them all out.'"

Perhaps the boldest thing Boswell did in the course of his friendship with Johnson was to arrange a meeting between him and John Wilkes. The story of Wilkes belongs to the history-books. Himself a member of parliament, he had in 1763 violently attacked the king and his minister, Lord Bute, in a famous issue of _The North Briton_. For this he was imprisoned in the Tower and expelled from the House of Commons. But outside Parliament there was much sympathy with him, especially in London, and he quickly became a popular hero. "Wilkes and Liberty for ever" was the cry. He was three times re-elected as member for Middlesex, but each time Parliament refused to let him take his seat. Finally, after being made Lord Mayor of London in 1774, he had a great triumph in the House of Commons in the following year, when all the previous resolutions against him were annulled.

It is not difficult to imagine how Dr Johnson, with his principles of loyalty to king and government, felt towards this hero of popular liberty.

Boswell realised this quite well:

"My desire of being acquainted with celebrated men of every description, had made me, much about the same time, obtain an introduction to Dr Samuel Johnson and to John Wilkes, Esq. Two men more different could perhaps not be selected out of all mankind. They had even attacked one another with some asperity in their writings; yet I lived in habits of friendship with both. I could fully relish the excellence of each.... I conceived an irresistible wish, if possible, to bring Dr Johnson and Mr Wilkes together. How to manage it, was a nice and difficult matter."

Boswell went tactfully to work. After getting Johnson's consent to dine at Mr Dilly's, he hinted at strange company:

"'Provided, Sir, I suppose, that the company which he is to have, is agreeable to you.' JOHNSON. 'What do you mean, Sir? What do you take me for? Do you think I am so ignorant of the world, as to imagine that I am to prescribe to a gentleman what company he is to have at his table?' BOSWELL. 'I beg your pardon, Sir ... I should not be surprized to find Jack Wilkes there.' JOHNSON. 'And if Jack Wilkes _should_ be there, what is that to _me_, Sir?'"

"Upon the much-expected Wednesday, I called on him about half an hour before dinner, as I often did when we were to dine out together, to see that he was ready in time, and to accompany him. I found him buffeting his books, as upon a former occasion, covered with dust, and making no preparation for going abroad. 'How is this, Sir? (said I.) Don't you recollect that you are to dine at Mr Dilly's?' JOHNSON. 'Sir, I did not think of going to Dilly's: it went out of my head. I have ordered dinner at home with Mrs Williams.' BOSWELL. 'But, my dear Sir, you know you were engaged to Mr Dilly, and I told him so. He will expect you, and will be much disappointed if you don't come.' JOHNSON. 'You must talk to Mrs Williams about this.'"

Here, as Boswell says, was a sad dilemma. There was nothing for it but to approach Mrs Williams. She was difficult at first, but "gradually softened" and finally gave her consent that the Doctor should go.

"I flew back to him, still in dust, and careless of what should be the event, 'indifferent in his choice to go or stay'; but as soon as I had announced to him Mrs Williams' consent, he roared 'Frank, a clean shirt,' and was very soon drest. When I had him fairly seated in a hackney-coach with me, I exulted as much as a fortune-hunter who has got an heiress into a post-chaise with him to set out for Gretna-Green. When we entered Mr Dilly's drawing-room, he found himself in the midst of a company he did not know.... 'And who is the gentleman in lace?'--'Mr Wilkes, Sir.' This information confounded him still more; he had some difficulty to restrain himself, and taking up a book, sat down upon a window-seat and read, or at least kept his eye upon it intently for some time, till he composed himself...."

"The cheering sound of 'Dinner is upon the table,' dissolved his reverie, and we _all_ sat down without any symptom of ill humour.... Mr Wilkes placed himself next to Dr Johnson, and behaved to him with so much attention and politeness, that he gained upon him insensibly. No man eat more heartily than Johnson, or loved better what was nice and delicate. Mr Wilkes was very assiduous in helping him to some fine veal. 'Pray give me leave, Sir:--It is better here--A little of the brown--Some fat, Sir--A little of the stuffing--Some gravy--Let me have the pleasure of giving you some butter--Allow me to recommend a squeeze of this orange;--or the lemon, perhaps, may have more zest.'--'Sir, Sir, I am obliged to you, Sir,' cried Johnson, bowing, and turning his head to him...."

The good fare provided by Mr Dilly and the tact of John Wilkes himself soon made things easier. Johnson was before long talking in his usual domineering way about poets and players, and eventually he and Wilkes found at least one "bond of union"--a common prejudice against Scotland. So they "amused themselves with persevering in the old jokes."

"JOHNSON (to Mr Wilkes). 'You must know, Sir, I lately took my friend Boswell and shewed him genuine civilised life in an English provincial town. I turned him loose at Lichfield, my native city, that he might see for once real civility: for you know he lives among savages in Scotland, and among rakes in London.' WILKES. 'Except when he is with grave, sober, decent people like you and me.' JOHNSON (smiling). 'And we ashamed of him.'"

Boswell did not mind this kind of chaff. He was too pleased with his "successful negociation."

Once or twice Johnson went too far, even for Boswell's humble devotion:

"On Saturday, May 2, [1778] I dined with him at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, where there was a very large company ... less attention was paid to him than usual, which put him out of humour; and upon some imaginary offence from me, he attacked me with such rudeness, that I was vexed and angry.... I was so much hurt, and had my pride so much roused, that I kept away from him for a week...."

"On Friday, May 8, I dined with him at Mr Langton's. I was reserved and silent, which I suppose he perceived, and might recollect the cause. After dinner when ... we were by ourselves, he drew his chair near to mine, and said, in a tone of conciliating courtesy, 'Well, how have you done?' BOSWELL. 'Sir, you have made me very uneasy by your behaviour to me when we were last at Sir Joshua Reynolds's. You know, my dear Sir, no man has a greater respect and affection for you, or would sooner go to the end of the world to serve you. Now to treat me so--.' He insisted that I had interrupted him, which I assured him was not the case; and proceeded--'But why treat me so before people who neither love you nor me?' JOHNSON. 'Well, I am sorry for it. I'll make it up to you twenty different ways, as you please.' BOSWELL. 'I said to-day to Sir Joshua, when he observed that you _tossed_ me sometimes--I don't care how often, or how high he tosses me, when only friends are present, for then I fall upon soft ground: but I do not like falling on stones, which is the case when enemies are present.'"

But these tiffs were rare. "My regard for you" Johnson told Boswell with a sincerity we cannot doubt "is greater almost than I have words to express; but I do not choose to be always repeating it."

He did so, however, in many a letter to his friend:

"My dear Boswell," he wrote "do not neglect to write to me; for your kindness is one of the pleasures of my life, which I should be sorry to lose."

Boswell's reply was no less sincere:

"Be assured, my dear Sir, that my affection and reverence for you are exalted and steady. I do not believe that a more perfect attachment ever existed in the history of mankind."

_David Garrick_

Except for the part he played in Johnson's _Irene_, we have heard little of David Garrick since he came to London in 1737 "with three-halfpence in his pocket."

He at first entered Lincoln's Inn to study the law, but he had a passion for the stage and made his first appearance in the part of a harlequin. Unlike Johnson, he did not have to face a long period of poverty and 'cold obscurity'; he received a legacy of £1000 and before he had spent it all, his acting of the part of _Richard III_ in 1741 quickly made him famous.

Mr Pope declared: "That young man never had his equal as an actor and he never will have a rival," and there were "a dozen dukes of a night" at the theatre in Goodman's Fields.

He made large sums of money and in a few years' time became manager of Drury Lane theatre, where he tried hard, but in vain, to make Johnson's tragedy a success.

In the bitterness of his early struggle Johnson was no doubt a little jealous of his old pupil.

"His being outstripped by his pupil" says Boswell "in the race of immediate fame, as well as of fortune, probably made him feel some indignation, as thinking that whatever might be Garrick's merits in his art, the reward was too great when compared with what the most successful efforts of literary labour could attain.... His schoolfellow and friend, Dr Taylor, told me a pleasant anecdote of Johnson's triumphing over his pupil David Garrick. When that great actor had played some little time at Goodman's fields, Johnson and Taylor went to see him perform, and afterwards passed the evening at a tavern with him and old Giffard[22]. Johnson ... after censuring some mistakes in emphasis which Garrick had committed in the course of that night's acting, said, 'the players, Sir, have got a kind of rant, with which they run on, without any regard to accent or emphasis.' Both Garrick and Giffard were offended at this sarcasm, and endeavoured to refute it; upon which Johnson rejoined, 'Well now, I'll give you something to speak, with which you are little acquainted, and then we shall see how just my observation is. That shall be the criterion. Let me hear you repeat the ninth Commandment, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."' Both tried at it, said Dr Taylor, and both mistook the emphasis, which should be upon _not_ and _false witness_. Johnson put them right, and enjoyed his victory with great glee."

Whether Johnson was right or not may still be argued, but he loved to get Davy back at school again. Garrick, too, retained some of his school-boy tricks of mimicry:

"He could imitate Johnson very exactly.... I recollect his exhibiting him to me one day, as if saying, 'Davy has some convivial pleasantry about him, but 'tis a futile fellow;' which he uttered perfectly with the tone and air of Johnson."

Johnson's provincial accent (he pronounced _once_ as _woonse_) gave Garrick another opening:

"Garrick sometimes used to take him off, squeezing a lemon into a punch-bowl, with uncouth gesticulations, looking round the company, and calling out, 'Who's for _poonsh_?'"

Johnson, for his part, never quite got rid of his feeling of contempt for the actor's profession. He often discussed it with Boswell:

"BOSWELL. 'Sir ..., you never will allow merit to a player.' JOHNSON. 'Merit, Sir! what merit? Do you respect a rope-dancer, or a ballad-singer?' BOSWELL. 'No, Sir: but we respect a great player, as a man who can conceive lofty sentiments and can express them gracefully.' JOHNSON. 'What, Sir, a fellow who claps a hump on his back, and a lump on his leg, and cries "_I am Richard the Third?_"' ... BOSWELL. 'My dear Sir! you may turn anything into ridicule ... a great player does what very few are capable to do: his art is a very rare faculty. _Who_ can repeat Hamlet's soliloquy, "To be, or not to be," as Garrick does it?' JOHNSON. 'Anybody may. Jemmy, there (a boy about eight years old, who was in the room), will do it as well in a week.' BOSWELL. 'No, no, Sir: and as a proof of the merit of great acting, and of the value which mankind set upon it, Garrick has got a hundred thousand pounds.' JOHNSON. 'Is getting a hundred thousand pounds a proof of excellence? That has been done by a scoundrel commissary.'"

Poor Bozzy! "I was _sure_, for once," he says, "that I had the best side of the argument." As if that made any difference to Johnson when he was "talking for victory"!

Both Garrick and Johnson were lovers of books--but in a different way. Johnson was "born to grapple with whole libraries," as Boswell's uncle said, but he did not treat a rare volume with the tender care of a collector. When he was putting his books in order, he wore a pair of large gloves "such as hedgers use," and "buffeted" them so that clouds of dust flew round him. When he was reading a new book it was said that "he tore out the heart of it"; when he was tidying his old ones it is to be feared that he sometimes tore off the covers of them. Garrick had some old and valued editions, and seems to have offended Johnson by hesitating to lend them to him. Even Boswell admits that "considering the slovenly and careless manner in which books were treated by Johnson, it could not be expected that scarce and valuable editions should have been lent to him."

Garrick, moreover, had learnt by experience. Here is the story as he told it to Miss Burney:

"'David!' said Johnson, 'will you lend me your _Petrarca_[23]?' 'Y-e-s, Sir!' 'David! you sigh?' 'Sir--you shall have it certainly.' Accordingly the book, stupendously bound, I sent to him that very evening. But scarcely had he taken it in his hands, when, as Boswell tells me, he poured forth a Greek ejaculation and a couplet or two from Horace, and then in one of those fits of enthusiasm which always seem to require that he should spread his arms aloft, he suddenly pounces my poor _Petrarca_ over his head upon the floor. And then, standing for several minutes lost in abstraction, he forgot probably that he had ever seen it."

As his old schoolmaster, Johnson took good care that Garrick should not suffer from swelled head:

"Not very long after the institution of our club, Sir Joshua Reynolds was speaking of it to Garrick. 'I like it much, (said he,) I think I shall be of you.' When Sir Joshua mentioned this to Dr Johnson, he was much displeased with the actor's conceit. '_He'll be of us_, (said Johnson) how does he know we will _permit_ him? The first Duke in England has no right to hold such language.' However, when Garrick was regularly proposed some time afterwards, Johnson, though he had taken a momentary offence at his arrogance, warmly and kindly supported him, and he was accordingly elected, was a most agreeable member, and continued to attend our meetings to the time of his death."

Each of them, indeed, was ready to help the other when he could. When the advertisement of Johnson's _Dictionary_ appeared in _The Gentleman's Magazine_, there was printed beneath it a complimentary ode, written by Garrick, and ending with the lines:

And Johnson, well arm'd like a hero of yore, Has beat forty French, and will beat forty more![24]

When Drury Lane theatre was first opened under the management of Garrick, the prologue (one of the two decent prologues in the language, according to Byron) was written by Johnson. It is a fine appeal to the public to support Garrick in ennobling the stage by the revival of Shakespeare:

Ah! let not censure term our fate our choice, The stage but echoes back the public voice; The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give, For we that live to please, must please to live.

The truth was, as Sir Joshua Reynolds said:

"Johnson considered Garrick to be as it were his _property_. He would allow no man either to blame or to praise Garrick in his presence, without contradicting him."

Boswell discovered this, as we have seen, at the famous meeting in Tom Davies's back parlour.

Garrick died in 1779 and was buried with great pomp in Westminster Abbey. His death provoked one of the most famous of all Johnson's sentences:

"That stroke of death" he wrote, "has eclipsed the gaiety of nations."

Of his personal character Johnson said even finer things and when Boswell tried to press him, he retired, as usual, defeated:

"JOHNSON. 'Garrick was a very good man, the cheerfullest man of his age; a decent liver in a profession which is supposed to give indulgence to licentiousness; and a man who gave away, freely, money acquired by himself. He began the world with a great hunger for money; the son of a half-pay officer, bred in a family, whose study was to make four-pence do as much as others made four-pence halfpenny do. But, when he had got money, he was very liberal....'

[BOSWELL] 'You say, Sir, his death eclipsed the gaiety of nations.' JOHNSON. 'I could not have said more nor less. It is the truth; _eclipsed_, not _extinguished_; and his death _did_ eclipse; it was like a storm.' BOSWELL. 'But why nations? Did his gaiety extend farther than his own nation?' JOHNSON. 'Why, Sir, some exaggeration must be allowed. Besides, nations may be said--if we allow the Scotch to be a nation, and to have gaiety,--which they have not. _You_ are an exception, though. Come, gentlemen, let us candidly admit that there is one Scotchman who is cheerful.' BEAUCLERK. 'But he is a very unnatural Scotchman.'"

Oliver Goldsmith once wrote a series of playful epitaphs for his friends. These were his first two lines on Garrick:

Here lies David Garrick, describe him who can, An abridgment of all that was pleasant in man.

FOOTNOTES:

[22] The manager of Goodman's Fields theatre.

[23] The author whom Johnson had first discovered on the apple-shelf at Lichfield. See p. 7.

[24] See p. 28.

_Oliver Goldsmith_

Oliver Goldsmith, known best to us as the author of _The Vicar of Wakefield_, and described by Boswell as "one of the brightest ornaments of the Johnsonian school" was, like his master, an adventurer in literature.

The son of a poor Irish clergyman, he went, after an unhappy time at school, where he was teased by the boys on account of his disfigurement by small pox, to Trinity College, Dublin.

Here, like Johnson at Oxford, he was a "lounger at the college-gate" and, in spite of his poverty, a leading spirit in college riots, such as the ducking of a bailiff and the gathering of a dancing party "of humblest sort" in his college room.

However, he worked hard enough to get the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and learnt, besides, to write ballads and to play the flute. After three years of idleness he went to Edinburgh to study medicine, the money being provided by a generous uncle. But more of this bounty was spent on fine clothes than on medical books and his restlessness soon drove him abroad to the university of Leyden, where he studied little except in what Johnson calls "the great book of mankind."

With the true spirit of the Irish adventurer he now began his wanderings on foot through Flanders, France, Switzerland and Italy. Sometimes he had to depend on the tunes of his flute to get him food and lodging; sometimes he earned a few shillings "by demanding at Universities to enter the lists as a disputant." Having thus disputed his passage through Europe, as Boswell says, he landed in England at the age of 28 without a shilling in his pocket.

For him, as for Johnson, there was only one kind of life possible--the life of "Grub Street." Here are a few lines from his own _Description of an Author's Bedchamber_: