LETTER 133. TO MRS. THRALE. "Lichfield, June 22. 1771. "Last night I came safe to Lichfield; this day I was visited by Mrs. Cobb. This afternoon I went to Mrs. Ashton, where I found Miss T[urton], and waited on her home. Miss Turton] wears spectacles, and can hardly climb the stiles. I was not tired at all, either last night or to-day. Miss Porter is very kind to me. Her dog and cats are all well. "Ashbourne, July 3. 1771. "Last Saturday I came to Ashbourne- Ashbourne in the Peak. Let not the barren name of the Peak terrify you; I have never wanted strawberries and cream. The great bull has no disease but age. I hope in time to be like the great bull; and hope you will be like him too a hundred years hence. "Ashbourne, July 7. 1771. "Poor Dr. Taylor is ill, and under my government: you know that the act of government is learned by obedience; I hope I can govern very tolerably. The old rheumatism is come again into my face and mouth, but nothing yet to the lumbago; however, having so long thought it gone, I do not like its return. Miss Porter was much pleased to be mentioned in your letter, and is sure that I have spoken better of her than she deserved. She holds that both Frank and his master are much improved. The master, she says, is not half so lounging and untidy as he was; there was no such thing last year as getting him off his chair. "Ashbourne, July 8. 1771. "Dr. Taylor is better, and is gone out in the chaise. My rheumatism is better too. I would have been glad to go to Hagley, in compliance with Mr. Lyttelton's (1) (1) The uncle of Lord Lyttelton, who lived near Hagley. -C. kind invitation, for, beside the pleasure of his company, I should have had the opportunity of recollecting past times, and wandering per montes notos(1) et flumina nota, of recalling the images of sixteen, and reviewing my conversations with poor Ford. (2) But this year will not bring this gratification within my power. I promised Taylor a month. Every thing is done here to please me; and his health is a strong reason against desertion." LETTER 134. TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS, In Leicester Fields. "Ashbourne, July 17. 1771. "DEAR SIR, When I came to Lichfield, I found that my portrait (3) had been much visited, and much admired. Every man has a lurking wish to appear considerable in his native place; and I was pleased with the dignity conferred by such a testimony of your regard. "Be pleased, therefore, to accept the thanks of, Sir, your most obliged, and most humble servant, 66 Compliments to Miss Reynolds." "SAM. JOHNSON." LETTER 135. TO DR. JOHNSON. “Edinburgh, July 27. 1771. "MY DEAR SIR, The bearer of this, Mr. Beattie, professor of moral philosophy at Aberdeen, is desirous of being introduced to your acquaintance. (1) Thus in Mrs. Thrale's book. — C. His genius (2) Cornelius Ford, his mother's nephew. - Piozzi. (3) The second portrait of Johnson, painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds; with his arms raised and his hands bent. It was at this time, it is believed, in the possession of Miss Lucy Porter. -M.-It is now the property of the Duke of Sutherland.-C. and learning, and labours in the service of virtue and religion, render him very worthy of it; and as he has a high esteem of your character, I hope you will give him a favourable reception. I ever am, &c. "JAMES BOSWELL." LETTER 136. TO MRS. THRALE. "Lichfield, Saturday, Aug. 3. 1771. "Having stayed my month with Taylor, I came away on Wednesday, leaving him, I think, in a disposition of mind not very uncommon, at once weary of my stay, and grieved at my departure. My purpose was to have made haste to you and Streatham; and who would have expected that I should have been stopped by Lucy? Hearing me give Francis orders to take in places, she told me that I should not go till after next week. I thought it proper to comply; for I was pleased to find that I could please, and proud of showing you that I do not come an universal outcast. Lucy is likewise a very peremptory maiden; and if I had gone without permission, I am not very sure that I might have been welcome at another time." LETTER 137. TO BENNET LANGTON, ESQ., At Langton. "August 29. 1771. "DEAR SIR, —I am lately returned from Staffordshire and Derbyshire. The last letter mentions two others which you have written to me since you received my pamphlet. Of these two I never had but one, in which you mentioned a design of visiting Scotland, and, by consequence, put my journey to Langton out of my thoughts. My summer wanderings are now over, and, I am engaging in a very great work, the revision of my Dictionary; from which I know not, at present, how to get loose. If you have observed, or been told, any errors or omissions, you will do me a great favour by letting me know them. "Lady Rothes, I find, has disappointed you and herself. Ladies will have these tricks. The Queen and Mrs. Thrale, both ladies of experience, yet both missed their reckoning this summer. I hope, a few months will recompense your uneasiness. "Please to tell Lady Rothes how highly I value the honour of her invitation, which it is my purpose to obey as soon as I have disengaged myself. In the mean time I shall hope to hear often of her ladyship, and every day better news and better, till I hear that you have both the happiness, which to both is very sincerely wished, by, Sir, your most affectionate, and most humble SAM. JOHNSON." servant, In October I again wrote to him, thanking him for his last letter, and his obliging reception of Mr. Beattie; informing him that I had been at Alnwick lately, and had good accounts of him from Dr. Percy. (1) [LETTER 138. TO DAVID GARRICK, ESQ. (2) "Streatham, Dec. 12. 1771. "DEAR SIR, I have thought upon your epitaph (3) but without much effect. An epitaph is no easy thing. (1) In October, 1771, John Bell, Esq. of Hertfordshire, a gentleman with whom he had maintained a long and strict friendship, had the misfortune to lose his wife, and wished Johnson, from the outlines of her character, which he should give him, and his own knowledge of her worth, to compose a monumental inscription for her: he returned the husband thanks for the confidence he placed in him, and acquitted himself of the task in a fine eulogium, now to be seen in the parish church of Watford in Hertfordshire.-HAWKINS. (2) [From the original in Mr. Upcott's collection.] (3) [The Epitaph on Hogarth. See antè, Vol. II. p. 164.] "Of your three stanzas, the third is utterly unworthy of you. The first and third together give no discriminative character. If the first alone were to stand, Hogarth would not be distinguished from any other man of intellectual eminence. Suppose you worked upon something like this: "The Hand of Art here torpid lies That traced the essential form of Grace, "If Genius warm thee, Reader, stay, Great Hogarth's honour'd dust is here." "In your second stanza, pictured morals is a beautiful expression, which I would wish to retain ; but learn and mourn cannot stand for rhymes. Art and nature have been seen together too often. In the first stanza is feeling, in the second feel. Feeling for tenderness or sensibility is a word merely colloquial, of late introduction, not yet sure enough of its own existence to claim a place upon a stone. If thou hast neither, is quite prose, and prose of the familiar kind. Thus easy is it to find faults, but it is hard to make an Epitaph. "When you have reviewed it, let me see it again: you are welcome to any help that I can give, on condition that you make my compliments to Mrs. Garrick. I am, dear Sir, your most, &c., "SAM. JOHNSON."] In his religious record of this year we observe that he was better than usual, both in body and mind, and better satisfied with the regularity of his conduct. But he is still "trying his ways" too rigorously. He charges himself with not rising early enough; yet he mentions what was surely a suffi |