"That literature is not totally forsaking us, and that your favourite language is not neglected, will appear from the book,' which I should have pleased myself more with sending, if I could have presented it bound: but time was wanting. I beg, however, Sir, that you will accept it from a man very desirous of your regard; and that if you think me able to gratify you by anything more important you will employ me.

"I am now going to take leave, perhaps a very long leave, of my dear Mr. Chambers. That he is going to live where you govern may justly alleviate the regard of parting: and the hope of seeing both him and you again, which I am not willing to mingle with doubt, must at present comfort as it can, Sir, your, &c.

"SAM. JOHNSON."

LETTER 394.

TO THE SAME.

"London, Dec. 20, 1774.

"SIR,-Being informed that by the departure of a ship there is now an opportunity of writing to Bengal, I am unwilling to slip out of your memory by my own negligence, and therefore take the liberty of reminding you of my existence by sending you a book which is not yet made public.

"I have lately visited a region less remote and less illustrious than India, which afforded some occasions for speculation. What has occurred to me, I have put into the volume, of which I beg your acceptance.

"Men in your station seldom have presents totally disinterested: my book is received, let me now make my request. There is, Sir, somewhere within your government, a young adventurer, one Chauncey Lawrence, whose father is one of my oldest friends. Be pleased to show the young man what countenance is fit; whether he wants to be restrained by your authority, or encouraged by your favour. His father is now president of the college of physicians; a man venerable for his knowledge, and more venerable for his virtue.

"I wish you a prosperous government, a safe return, and a long enjoyment of plenty and tranquillity. I am, Sir, your, &c.

"SAM JOHNSON."

LETTER 395.

TO THE SAME.

"Jan. 9, 1781.

"SIR,-Amidst the importance and multiplicity of affairs in which your great office engages you, I take the liberty of recalling your attention for a moment to literature, and will not prolong the interruption by an apology which your character makes needless.

"Mr. Hoole, a gentleman long known and long esteemed in the India-house, after having translated Tasso, has undertaken Ariosto. How well he is quali fied for his undertaking he has already shown. He is desirous, Sir, of your

1 Jones's "Persian Grammar."

2 The "Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland."

avour in promoting his proposals, and flatters me by supposing that my testimony may advance his interest.

"It is a new thing for a clerk of the India-house to translate poets;—it is new for a governor of Bengal to patronise learning. That he may find his ingenuity rewarded, and that learning may flourish under your protection, is the wish of, Sir, your, &c.

"SAM. JOHNSON."

I wrote to him in February, complaining of having been troubled by a recurrence of the perplexing question of Liberty and Necessity; and mentioning that I hoped soon to meet him again in London.

LETTER 396.

TO MR. BOSWELL.

"March, 14, 1781.

"DEAR SIR,—I hoped you had got rid of all this hypocrisy of misery. What have you to do with Liberty and Necessity? Or what more than to hold your tongue about it? Do not doubt but I shall be most heartily glad to see you here again, for I love every part about you but your affectation of distress.

"I have at last finished my Lives, and have laid up for you a load of copy, all out of order, so that it will amuse you a long time to to me, my dear Bozzy, and let us be as happy as we can. the Mitre, and talk old times over. I am, dear Sir, yours

1

set it right. Come We will go again to affectionately,

"SAM. JOHNSON."

On Monday, March 19, I arrived in London, and on Tuesday, the 20th, met him in Fleet Street, walking, or rather indeed moving along; for his peculiar march is thus described in a very just and picturesque manner, in a short Life of him published very soon after his death :- "When he walked the streets, what with the constant roll of his head, and the concomitant motion of his body, he appeared to make his way by that motion, independent of his feet." That he was often much stared at while he advanced in this manner may easily be believed; but it was not safe to make sport of one so robust as he was. Mr. Langton saw him one day, in a fit of absence, by a sudden start, drive the load off a porter's back, and

Published by Kearsley, with this well-chosen motto:

"From his cradle

He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one:

And, to add greater honours to his age

Than man could give him, he died fearing Heaven."-SHAKSPEARS.

walk forward briskly, without being conscious of what he had done. The porter was very angry, but stood still, and eyed the huge figure with much earnestness, till he was satisfied that his wisest course was to be quiet, and take up his burthen again.

Our accidental meeting in the street after a long separation was a pleasing surprise to us both. He stepped aside with me into Falcon Court, and made kind inquiries about my family; and as we were in a hurry, going different ways, I promised to call on him next day. He said he was engaged to go out in the morning. "Early, Sir?" said I. JOHNSON. "Why, Sir, a London morning does not go with the sun."

I waited on him next evening, and he gave me a great portion of his original manuscript of his "Lives of the Poets," which he had preserved for me.

I found on visiting his friend, Mr. Thrale, that he was now very ill, and had removed, I suppose by the solicitation of Mrs. Thrale, to a house in Grosvenor Square. I was sorry to see him sadly changed in his appearance.

He told me I might now have the pleasure to see Dr. Johnson drink wine again, for he had lately returned to it. When I mentioned this to Johnson, he said, “I drink it now sometimes, but not socially." The first evening that I was with him at Thrale's, I observed he poured a large quantity of it into a glass, and swallowed it greedily. Everything about his character and manners was forcible and violent; there never was any moderation. Many a day did he fast, many a year did he refrain from wine: but when he did eat, it was voraciously; when he did drink wine, it was copiously. He could practise abstinence, but not temperance.

Mrs. Thrale and I had a dispute whether Shakspeare or Milton had drawn the most admirable picture of a man. 1 I was for Shak

Shakspeare makes Hamlet thus describe his father:

"See what a grace was seated on his brow:
Hyperion's curls, the front of Jove himself,
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command;
A station like the herald, Mercury,
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;
A combination and a form, indeed,

speare, Mrs. Thrale for Milton; and, after a fair hearing, Johnson decided for my opinion.

I told him of one of Mr. Burke's playful sallies upon Dean Marlay :' "I don't like the Deanery of Ferns; it sounds so like a barren title." "Dr. Heath' should have it," said I. Johnson laughed, and, condescending to trifle in the same mode of conceit, suggested

Dr. Moss.

He said, "Mrs. Montagu has dropt me. Now, Sir, there are people whom one should like very well to drop, but would not wish to be dropped by." He certainly was vain of the society of ladies, and could make himself very agreeable to them when he chose it: Sir Joshua Reynolds agreed with me that he could. Mr. Gibbon, with his usual sneer, controverted it, perhaps in resentment of Johnson's having talked with some disgust of his ugliness, which one would think a philosopher would not mind. Dean Marlay wittily observed, "A lady may be vain when she can turn a wolf-dog into a lap-dog."

The election for Ayrshire, my own county, was this spring tried upon a petition before a committee of the house of commons. I was one of the counsel for the sitting member,' and took the liberty of previously stating different points to Johnson, who never failed to

Where every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man."

Milton thus portrays our first parent, Adam:

"His fair large front and eye sublime declared
Absolute rule; and hyacinthin locks

Round from his parted forelock manly hung

Clust'ring, but not beneath his shoulders broad."-B.

The latter part of this description, "but not beneath," &c., may very probably be ascribed to Milton's prejudices in favour of the puritans, who had a great aversion to long hair.—M. It is strange that the picture drawn by the unlearned Shakspeare should be full of classical images, and that by the learned Milton void of them. Milton's description appears to be more picturesque.-KEARNEY.

1 Dr. Richard Marlay, afterwards Lord Bishop of Waterford; a very amiable, benevolent, and ingenious man. He was chosen a member of the Literary Club in 1777, and died in Dublin, July 2, 1802, in his seventy-fifth year.-M.

2 Dr. Benjamin Heath, celebrated for a curious library, which was sold in 1810, at very high prices.-C.

3 Dr. Charles Moss, afterwards Bishop of Bath and Wells. He died in 1802.-C.

4 Hugh Montgomery, Esq. The petitioner, however, William Macdowall, Esq., was declared duly elected.-C.

MEL.

see them clearly, and supply me with some good hints. He dictated to me the following note upon the registration of deeds :

"All laws are made for the convenience of the community. What is legally done should be legally recorded, that the state of things may be known, and that wherever evidence is requisite, evidence may be had. For this reason, the obligation to frame and establish a legal register is enforced by a legal penalty, which penalty is the want of that perfection and plenitude of right which a register would give. Thence it follows that this is not an objection merely legal; for the reason on which the law stands being equitable, makes it an equitable objection."

"This," said he, "you must enlarge on, when speaking to the Committee. You must not argue there as if you were arguing in the schools; close reasoning will not fix their attention: you must say the same thing over and over again in different words. If you say it but once, they miss it in a moment of inattention. It is unjust, Sir, to censure lawyers for multiplying words when they argue; it is often necessary for them to multiply words."

His notion of the duty of a member of parliament, sitting upon an election-committee, was very high; and when he was told of a gentleman upon one of those committees, who read the newspapers part of the time, and slept the rest, while the merits of a vote were examined by the counsel; and as an excuse, when challenged by the chairman for such behaviour, bluntly answered, "I had made up my mind upon that case;" Johnson with an indignant contempt, said, "If he was such a rogue as to make up his mind upon a case without hearing it, he should not have been such a fool as to tell it." "I think," said Mr. Dudley Long,' now North, "the Doctor has pretty plainly made him out to be both rogue and fool."

Johnson's profound reverence for the hierarchy made him expect from bishops the highest degree of decorum; he was offended even at their going to taverns: "A bishop," said he, "has nothing to do at a tippling-house. It is not indeed immoral in him to go to a tavern; neither would it be immoral in him to whip a top in Grosvenor Square: but, if he did, I hope the boys would fall upon him,

1 This ingenious and very pleasant gentleman died in 1829, at the age of eighty after an Ulness which had for some years secluded him from society.-C.