66

had recourse to this device. 'Pray, Sir," said he, "whether do you reckon Derrick or Smart the best poet ?" Johnson at once felt himself roused, and answered, "Sir, there is no settling the point of precedency between a louse and a flea."

Once, when checking my boasting too frequently of myself in company, he said to me, "Boswell, you often vaunt so much as to provoke ridicule. You put me in mind of a man who was standing in the kitchen of an inn with his back to the fire, and thus accosted the person next him, 'Do you know, Sir, who I am?' 'No, Sir,' said the other, I have not that advantage.' Sir,' said he, 'I am the great Twalmley, who invented the New Floodgate Iron.'" The Bishop of Killaloe, on my repeating the story to him, defended TWALMLEY, by observing that he was entitled to the epithet of great; for Virgil, in his group of worthies in the Elysian fields

mentions

66

"Hic manus, ob patriam pugnando vulnera passi,"2 &c.

"Inventas aut qui vitam excoluere per artes."

He was pleased to say to me one morning, when we were left alone in his study, Boswell, I think I am easier with you than with almost anybody."

He would not allow Mr. David Hume any credit for his political principles, though similar to his own; saying of him, "Sir, he was a Tory by chance.'

His acute observation of human life made him remark, "Sir, there is nothing by which a man exasperates most people more, than by displaying a superior ability of brilliancy in conversation. They seem pleased at the time; but their envy makes them curse him at their hearts.'

My readers will probably be surprised to hear that the great Dr. Johnson could amuse himself with so slight and playful a species of composition as a Charade. I have recovered one which he made on Dr. Barnard, now Lord Bishop of Killaloe; who has been pleased for many years to treat me with so much intimacy and social ease, that I may presume to call him not only my right reverend, but my very dear friend. I therefore, with peculiar pleasure, give to the world a just and elegant compliment thus paid to his lordship by Johnson.

CHARADE.

'My first shuts out thieves from your house or your room,

My second 5 expresses a Syrian perfume.

My whole is a man in whose converse is shared,

The strength of a Bar and the sweetness of Nard."

What the great TWALM LEY was so proud of having invented, was neither more nor less than a kind of box-iron for smoothing linen.-BOSWELL.

2 En. vi. 660.

3 Afterwards translated to the see of Limerick.-MALONE.

Bar.

5 Nard.

6 Barnard.--BOSWELL.

Johnson asked Richard Owen Cambridge, Esq., it he had read the Spanish translation of Sallust, said to be written by a Prince of Spain, with the assistance of his tutor, who is professedly the author of a treatise annexed, on the Phoenician language.

Mr. Cambridge commended the work, particularly as he thought the translator understood his author better than is commonly the case with translators; but said, he was disappointed in the purpose for which he borrowed the book; to see whether a Spaniard could be better furnished with inscriptions from monuments, coins, or other antiquities, which he might more probably find on a coast, so immediately opposite to Carthage, than the antiquaries of any other countries. JOHNSON: “I am very sorry you were not gratified in your expectations." CAMBRIDGE: "The language would have been of little use, as there is no history existing in that tongue to balance the partial accounts which the Roman writers have left us." JOHNSON: No, Sir; they have not been partial: they have told their own story, without shame or regard to equitable treatment of their injured enemy; they had no compunction. no feeling for a Carthaginian. Why, Sir, they would never have borne Virgil's description of Æneas's treatment of Dido, if she had not been a Carthaginian."

I aratefully acknowledge this and other communications from Mr. Cambridge, whom, if a beautiful villa on the banks of the Thames, a few miles distant from London, a numerous and excellent library, which he accurately knows and reads, a choice collection of pictures, which he understands and relishes, an easy fortune, an amiable family, an extensive circle of friends and acquaintance, distinguished by rank, fashion, and genius, a literary fame, various elegant and still increasing, colloquial talents rarely to be found, and, with all these means of happiness, enjoying, when well advanced in years, health and vigour of body, serenity and animation of mind-do not entitle to be addressed fortunate senex! I know not to whom, in any age, that expression could with propriety have been used. Long may he live to hear and to feel it !1

Johnson's love of little children, which he discovered upon all occasions, calling them " pretty dears," and giving them sweetmeats, was an undoubted proof of the real humanity and gentleness of his disposition.

His uncommon kindness to his servants, and serious concern, not only for their comfort in this world, but their happiness in the next, was another unquestionable evidence of what all who were intimately acquainted with him, knew to be true.

Nor would it be just under this head, to omit the fondness which he showed for animals which he had taken under his protection. I never shall forget the indulgence with which he treated Hodge his cat: for

'Mr. Cambridge enjoyed all the blessings here enumerated for many years after this passage was written. He died at his seat near Twickenham, Sept. 17, 1802, in his eighty-sixth year -MALONE.

whom he himself used to go out and buy oysters, lest the servants having that trouble should take a dislike to the poor creature. I am, unluckily, one of those who have an antipathy to a cat, so that I am uneasy when in the room with one; and I own, I frequently suffered a good deal from the presence of the same Hodge. I recollect him one day scrambling up Dr. Johnson's breast, apparently with much satisfaction, while my friend, smiling, and half-whistling, rubbed down his back, and pulled him by the tail; and, when I observed he was a fine cat, saying: "Why, yes, Sir; but I have had cats whom I liked better than this;" and then, as if perceiving Hodge to be out of countenance, adding, "but he is a very fine cat, a very fine cat indeed."

66

This reminds me of the ludicrous account which he gave Mr. Langton, of the despicable state of a young gentleman of good family. Sir, when I heard of him last, he was running about town shooting cats. And then, in a sort of kindly reverie, he bethought himself of his own favourite cat, and said, "But Hodge shan't be shot: no, no, Hodge shall not be shot."

He thought Mr. Beauclerk made a shrewd and judicious remark to Mr. Langton, who, after having been for the first time in company with a well known wit about town, was warmly admiring and praising him,— "See him again," said Beauclerk.

His respect for the Hierarchy, and particularly the dignitaries of the Church, has been more than once exhibited in the course of this work. Mr. Seward saw him presented to the Archbishop of York, and described his bow to an Archbishop, as such a studied elaboration of homage, such an extension of limb, such a flexion of body, as have seldom or ever been equalled.

I cannot help mentioning, with much regret, that by my own negligence I lost an opportunity of having the history of my family from its founder, Thomas Boswell, in 1504, recorded and illustrated by Johnson's pen. Such was his goodness to me, that when I presumed to solicit him for so great a favour, he was pleased to say, "Let me have all the materials you can collect, and I will do it both in Latin and English; then let it be printed, and copies of it be deposited in various places for security and preservation." I can now only do the best I can to make up for this loss, keeping my great master steadily in view. Family histories, like the imagines majorum of the arcients, excite to virtue; and I wish that they who really have blood would be more careful to trace and ascertain its course. Some have affected to laugh at the history of the house of Yvery:1 it would be well if many others would transmit their pedigrees to posterity, with the same accuracy and generous zeal, with which the noble lord, who compiled that work, has honoured and perpetuated his ancestry.

On Thursday, April 10, I introduced to him, at his house in Boltcourt, the Honourable and Reverend William Stuart,2 son of the Earl of Bute; a gentleman truly worthy of being known to Johnson; being, with all the advantages of high birth, learning, travel, and elegant manners, an exemplary parish priest in every respect.

66

66

After some compliments on both sides, the tour which Johnson and I had made to the Hebrides was mentioned.-JOHNSON: "I got an acquisition of more ideas by it than by anything that I remember. I saw quite a different system of life." BOSWELL: You would not like to make the same journey again?" JOHNSON: Why no, Sir; not the same it is a tale told. Gravina, an Italian critic, observes, that every man desires to see that of which he has read; but no man desires to read an account of what he has seen : so much does description fall short of reality. Description only excites curiosity: seeing satisfies it. Other people may go and see the Hebrides." BOSWELL: "I should

1 Written by John, Earl of Egmont.-MALONE.

2 At that time Vicar of Luton, in Bedfordshire, where he lived for some years, and fully merited the character given of him in the text; now [1806] Lord Archbishop of Armagh, and Primate of Ireland.-MALONE.

6

wish to go and see some country totally different from what I have been used to; such as Turkey, where religion and everything else are different." JOHNSON: "Yes, Sir; there are two subjects of curiosity,-the Christian world and the Mahometan world. All the rest may be considered as barbarous." BOSWELL: "Pray, Sir, is The Turkish Spy' a genuine book?" JOHNSON: "No, Sir. Mrs. Manley, in her Life, says, that her father wrote the first two volumes: and in another book, 'Dunton's Life and Errors,' we find that the rest was written by one Sault, at two guineas a sheet, under the direction of Dr. Midgeley."1

BOSWELL: "This has been a very factious reign, owing to the too great indulgence of government. JOHNSON: "I think so, Sir. What at first was lenity, grew timidity. Yet this is reasoning à posteriori, and may not be just. Supposing a few had at first been punished, I believe faction would have been crushed; but it might have been said, that it was a sanguinary reign. A man cannot tell à priori what will be best for government to do. This reign has been very unfortunate. We have had an unsuccessful war; but that does not prove that we have been ill governed. One side or other must prevail in war, as one or other must win at play. When we beat Louis, we were not better governed; nor were the French better governed when Louis beat us".

On Saturday, April 12, I visited him, in company with Mr. Windham, of Norfolk, whom, though a Whig, he highly valued. One of the best things he ever said was to this gentleman; who, before he set out for Ireland as secretary to Lord Northington, when Lord Lieutenant, expressed to the sage some modest and virtuous doubts, whether he could bring himself to practise those arts which it is supposed a person in that situation has occasion to employ. "Don't be afraid, Sir," said Johnson, with a pleasant smile, "you will soon make a very pretty rascal."

He talked to-day a good deal of the wonderful extent and variety of London, and observed that men of curious inquiry might see in it such modes of life as very few could even imagine. He in particular recommended to us to explore Wapping, which we resolved to do.

Mr. Lowe, the painter, who was with him, was very much distressed that a large picture which he had painted was refused to be received into

1" The Turkish Spy" was pretended to have been written originally in Arabic; from Arabic translated into Italian, and thence into English. The real author of the work, which was, in fact, originally written in Italian, was I. P. Marana, a Genoese, who died at Paris in 1693.-BOSWELL.

John Dunton, in his life, says, that " Mr. William Bradshaw received from Mr. Midgeley forty shillings a sheet for writing part of 'The Turkish Spy;'" but I do not find that he any where mentions Sault as engaged in that work.-MALONE.

2 We accordingly carried our scheme into execution in October 1792; but whether from that uniformity which has in modern times, in a great degree, spread through every part of the metropolis, or from our want of sufficient exertion, we were disappointed.-BOSWELL.