 Section 5 of The Life of Samuel Johnson. Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Read by Gesina. The Life of Samuel Johnson. Volume 1 by James Boswell. Section 5. He very early began to attempt keeping notes or memorandums by way of a diary of his life. I find in a parcel of loose leaves the following spirited resolution to contend against his natural indolence. October 1729. I bid farewell to Sloth, being resolved henceforth not to listen to her siren strains. I have also in my possession a few leaves of another libellus, or little book, entitled, Annals, in which some of the early particulars of his history are registered in Latin. I do not find that he formed any close intimacies with his fellow collegians. But Dr Adams told me that he contracted a love and regard for Pembroke College, which he retained to the last. A short time before his death he sent to that college a present of all his works to be deposited in their library, and he had thoughts of leaving to it his house at Litchfield, but his friends, who were about him, very properly dissuaded him from it, and he bequeased it to some poor relations. He took a pleasure in boasting of the many eminent men who had been educated at Pembroke. In this list I found the names of Mr Hawkins, the poetry professor, Mr Shenstone, Sir William Blackstone, and others. Not forgetting the celebrated popular preacher, Mr George Whitefield, of whom, though Dr Johnson did not think very highly, it must be acknowledged that his eloquence was powerful, his views pious and charitable, his assiduity almost incredible, and that since his death the integrity of his character has been fully vindicated. Being himself a poet, Johnson was peculiarly happy in mentioning how many of the sons of Pembroke were poets, adding with a smile of sportive triumph, Sir, we are a nest of singing birds. He was not, however, blind to what he thought the defects of his own college, and I have from the information of Dr Taylor a very strong instance of that rigid honesty which he ever inflexibly preserved. Taylor had obtained his father's consent to be entered of Pembroke, that he might be with his school fellow Johnson, with whom, though some years older than himself, he was very intimate. This would have been a great comfort to Johnson. But he fairly told Taylor that he could not, in conscience, suffer him to enter where he knew he could not have an able tutor. He then made inquiry all round the university, and having found that Mr Bateman of Christchurch was the tutor of highest reputation, Taylor was entered of that college. Mr Bateman's lectures were so excellent that Johnson used to come and get them at second hand from Taylor, till his poverty being so extreme that his shoes were worn out, and his feet appeared through them. He saw that this humiliating circumstance was perceived by the Christchurch men, and he came no more. He was too proud to accept of money, and somebody having set a pair of new shoes at his door, he threw them away with indignation. How must we feel when we read such an anecdote of Samuel Johnson? His spirited refusal of an elliomossinary supply of shoes arose no doubt from a proper pride. But considering his eschetic disposition at times, as acknowledged by himself in his meditations, and the exaggeration with which some have treated the peculiarities of his character, I should not wonder to hear described to a principle of superstitious mortification, as we are told by Tassilinus, in his life of Saint Ignatius Loyola, that this intrepid founder of the Order of Jesuits, when he arrived at Goa after having made a severe pilgrimage through the eastern deserts, persisted in wearing his miserable shattered shoes, and when new ones were offered him rejected them as non-suitable indulgence. The Rez and Gastadomi prevented him from having the advantage of a complete academical education. The friend to whom he had trusted for support had deceived him. His debts in college, though not great, were increasing, and his scanty remittances from Litchfield, which had all along been made with great difficulty, could be supplied no longer, his father having fallen into a state of insolvency. Compelled, therefore, by irresistible necessity, he left the college in autumn 1731, without a degree, having been a member of it little more than three years. Dr. Adams, the worthy and respectable master of Pembroke College, has generally had the reputation of being Johnson's tutor. The fact, however, is that in 1731 Mr. Jordan quitted the college and his pupils were transferred to Dr. Adams, so that had Johnson returned, Dr. Adams would have been his tutor. It is to be wished that this connection had taken place. His equal temper, mild disposition, and politeness of manners might have insensibly softened the harshness of Johnson and infused into him those more delicate charities, those petit moral in which it must be confessed our great moralist was more deficient than his best friends could fully justify. Dr. Adams paid Johnson this high compliment. He said to me at Oxford in 1776, I was his nominal tutor, but he was above my mark. When I repeated it to Johnson, his eyes flashed with grateful satisfaction and he exclaimed, that was liberal and noble. And now, I had almost said poor, Samuel Johnson returned to his native city, destitute, and not knowing he should gain even a decent livelihood. His father's misfortunes in trade rendered him unable to support his son and for some time there appeared no means by which he could maintain himself. In the December of this year his father died. The state of poverty in which he died appears from a note in one of Johnson's little diaries of the following year, which strongly displays his spirit and virtuous dignity of mind. 1732, Uly E. 15. In the December of this year he had a good-for-nothing and a good-for-nothing personal benefit, which was accepted by the skilled and free. I am fortunate to see that he is one of the people of England. I laid by eleven guineas on this day, when I received twenty pounds, being all that I have reason to hope for out of my father's effects, previous to the death of my mother, an event which I pray God may be very remote. I now therefore see that I must make my own fortune. Meanwhile, let me take care that the powers of my mind may not be debilitated by poverty and that indigents do not force me into any criminal act. Johnson was so far fortunate that the respectable character of his parents, and his own merit, had from his earliest years secured him a kind reception in the best families at Litchfield. Among these I can mention Mr. Howard, Mr. Swinfan, Mr. Simpson, Mr. Levitt, Captain Garrick, father of the great ornament of the British stage, but above all Mr. Gilbert Wormsley, register of the prerogative court of Litchfield, whose character long after his decease Dr. Johnson has in his life of Edmund Smith, thus drawn in the glowing colours of gratitude. Of Gilbert Wormsley, thus presented to my mind, let me indulge myself in the remembrance. I knew him very early. He was one of the first friends that literature procured me, and I hope that at least my gratitude may be worthy of his notice. He was of an advanced age, and I was only not a boy, yet he never received my notions with contempt. He was a wig, with all the virulence and malevolence of his party, yet difference of opinion did not keep us apart. I honoured him and he endured me. He had mingled with the gay world without exemption from its vices or its follies, but had never neglected the cultivation of his mind. His belief of revelation was unshaken. His learning preserved his principles. He grew first regular and then pious. His studies had been so various that I am not able to name a man of equal knowledge. His acquaintance with books was great, and what he did not immediately know he could at least tell where to find. Such was his amplitude of learning and such his copiousness of communication that it may be doubted whether a day now passes in which I have not some advantage from his friendship. At this man's table I enjoyed many cheerful and instructive hours, with companions such as are not often found, with one who has lengthened and one who has gladdened life, with Dr. James, whose skill in physics will be long remembered, and with David Garrick, whom I hoped to have gratified, with this character of our common friend. But what are the hopes of man? I am disappointed by the stroke of death, which has eclipsed the gaiety of nations and impoverished the public stock of harmless pleasure. In these families he passed much time in his early years. In most of them he was in the company of ladies, particularly at Mr. Wormsley's, whose wife and sisters-in-law, in the name of Aston, and daughters of a baronet, were remarkable for good breeding, so that the notion which has been industriously circulated and believed that he never was in good company till late in life, and consequently had been confirmed in coarse and ferocious manners by long habits, is wholly without foundation. Some of the ladies have assured me they recollected him well when a young man, as distinguished for his complacence, and that this politeness was not merely occasional and temporary, or confined to the circles of Litchfield, is ascertained by the testimony of a lady who, in a paper with which I have been favoured, by a daughter of his intimate friend and physician, Dr. Lawrence, thus describes Dr. Johnson some years afterwards. As the particulars of the former part of Dr. Johnson's life do not seem to be very accurately known, a lady hopes that the following information may not be unacceptable. She remembers Dr. Johnson on a visit to Dr. Taylor at Ashbourne some time between the end of the year 37 and the middle of the year 40. She rather thinks it to have been after he and his wife were removed to London. During his stay at Ashbourne he made frequent visits to Mr. Maynell at Bradley, where his company was much desired by the ladies of the family, who were perhaps in point of elegance and accomplishments inferior to few of those with whom he was afterwards acquainted. Mr. Maynell's eldest daughter was afterwards married to Dr. Fitzherbert, father of Mr. Elaine Fitzherbert, lately ministered to the Court of Russia. Of her, Dr. Johnson said in Dr. Lawrence's study that she had the best understanding he ever met with in any human being. At Mr. Maynell's he also commenced that friendship with Mrs. Hill Boothby, sister to the present Sir Brooke Boothby, which continued till her death. The young woman whom he used to call Molly Aston was sister to Sir Thomas Aston and daughter to a baronet. She was also sister to the wife of his friend Mr. Gilwood Wormsley. Besides his intimacy with the above-mentioned persons, who were surely people of rank and education, while he was yet at Lichfield he used to be frequently at the house of Mr. Swindman, a gentleman of a very ancient family in Staffordshire, from which after the death of his elder brother he inherited a good estate. He was, besides a physician of very extensive practice, but for want of due attention to the management of his domestic concerns, left a very large family in indigence. One of his daughters, Mrs. de Moulin, afterwards found an asylum in the house of her old friend, whose doors were always open to the unfortunate, and who well observed the precept of the gospel, for he was kind to the unthankful and to the evil. In the full-on state of his circumstance he accepted an offer to be employed as Usher in the School of Market Bossworth in Leicestershire, to which it appears from one of his little fragments of a diary that he went on foot on the 16th of July, Uly E. XVI. But it is not true, as has been erroneously related, that he was assistant to the famous Anthony Blackwall, whose merit has been honoured by the testimony of Bishop Hurd, who was his scholar, for Mr. Blackwall died on the 8th of April, 1730, more than a year before Johnson left the university. This employment was very irksome to him in every respect, and he complained grievously of it in his letters to his friend Mr. Hector, who was now settled as a surgeon at Birmingham. The letters are lost, but Mr. Hector recollects his writing that the poet had described the dull sameness of his existence in these words. One day contains the whole of my life, that it was unverified as the note of the cuckoo, and that he did not know whether it was more disagreeable for him to teach or the boys to learn the grammar rules. His general aversion to this painful drudgery was greatly enhanced by a disagreement between him and Mr. Walston Dixie, the patron of the school, in whose house I have been told he officiated as a kind of domestic chaplain, so far at least as to say grace at the table, and was treated with what he represented as intolerable harshness. And after suffering for a few months such complicated misery he relinquished a situation which all his life afterwards he recollected with the strongest aversion, and even a degree of horror. But it is probable that at this period, whatever uneasiness he may have endured, he laid the foundation of much future eminence by application to his studies. End of section 5, read by Gazine in April 2007. Section 6 of The Life of Samuel Johnson Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please go to LibriVox.org. This selection read by Patty Brugman. The Life of Samuel Johnson Volume 1 by James Boswell. Section 6. Being now again totally unoccupied, he was invited by Mr. Hector to pass some time with him in Birmingham as his guest at the house of Mr. Warren with whom Mr. Hector lodged and boarded. Mr. Warren. Mr. Warren was the first established bookseller in Birmingham and was very attentive to Johnson, who he soon found could be of much service to him in his trade by his knowledge of literature. And he even obtained the assistance of his pen in furnishing some numbers of a periodical essay printed in the newspaper of which Warren was proprietor. After very diligent inquiry, I have not been able to recover those early specimens of that particular mode of writing by which Johnson afterwards so greatly distinguished himself. He continued to live as Mr. Hector's guest for about six months and then hired lodgings in another part of the town, finding himself as well situated at Birmingham as he supposed he could be anywhere. Well, he had no settled plans of life and a very scanty means of subsistence. He made some valuable acquaintances there amongst whom were Mr. Porter, a Mercer, whose widow he afterwards married, and Mr. Taylor, who by his ingenuity in mechanical inventions and his success in trade, acquired an immense fortune, but the comfort of being near Mr. Hector, his old school fellow and intimate friend, was Johnson's chief inducement to continue here. In what manner he employed his pen at this period, or whether he derived from it any pecuniary advantage, I have not been able to ascertain. He probably got a little money from Mr. Warren, and we are certain that he executed here one piece of literary labor of which Mr. Hector has favored me with a minute account. Having mentioned that he had read at Pembroke College, a voyage to Absinia by Lobo, a part Portuguese Jesuit, and that he thought an abridgment and translation of it from the French into English might be a useful profitable publication, Mr. Warren and Mr. Hector joined in urging him to undertake it. He accordingly agreed, and the book not being to be found in Birmingham, he borrowed it, of Pembroke College, a part of the work being very soon done. One Osborn, who was Mr. Warren's printer, was set to work with what was ready, and Johnson engaged to supply the press with copy as it should be wanted. But his constitutional indolence soon prevailed, and the work was at a stand. Mr. Hector, who knew that a motive of humanity would be the most prevailing argument with his friend, went to Johnson and represented to him that the printer could have no other employment until this undertaking was finished, and that the poor man and his family were suffering. Johnson upon this exerted the powers of his mind, though his body was relaxed. He lay in bed with the book, which was a quarto before him, and dictated while Hector wrote. Mr. Hector carried the sheets to the press, and corrected almost all the proof sheets, very few of which were ever seen by Johnson. In this manner, with the aid of Mr. Hector's active friendship, the book was completed, and was published in 1735 with London upon the title page, though it was in reality printed at Birmingham, a device too common with provincial publishers, for this work he had, for Mr. Warren, only the sum of five guineas. This being the first work of prose for Johnson, it is a curious object of inquiry how much may be traced in it of that style which marks his subsequent writings with such peculiar excellence. With so happy a union of force, vivacity, and precipacity, I have perused the book with this view and have found that here, as I believe in every other translation, there is in the work itself no vestige of the translator's own style, for the language of translation being adapted to the thoughts of another person insensibly follows their cast, and as it were, runs into a mould that is ready prepared. Thus, for instance, taking the first sentence that occurs at the opening of the book, page four. I lived here above a year and completed my studies in divinity, in which time some letters were received from the Fathers of Ethiopia, which in account to that sultan's sain, Emperor of Apasinia, was converted to the Church of Rome. That many of his subjects had followed his example, and that there was a great want of missionaries to improve these prosperous beginnings. Everybody was desirous of seconding the zeal of our fathers, and of sending them the assistance they requested, to which we were the more encouraged because the Emperor's letter informed our provincial that we might easily enter his dominions by the way of Dancala. But unhappily the secretary wrote Gaelia for Dancala, which cost two of our fathers their lives. Everyone acquainted with Johnson's manner will be sensitive that there is nothing of it here, but that this sentence might have been composed by any other man. But in the preface the Johnsonian style begins to appear, and though use had not yet taught his wing a prominent and equitable flight, there are parts of it which exhibit his best manner in full vigor. I had once the pleasure of examining it with Mr. Edmund Burke, who confirmed me in this opinion, by his superior critical sagacity and was, I remember, much delighted with the following specimen. Quote, The Portuguese traveler, contrary to the general vein of his countryman, has amused his reader with no romantic absurdity or credible fictions. Whatever he relates, whether true or not, is at least probable. And he, who tells nothing exceeding the bounds of probability, has a right to demand that they should believe him who cannot contradict him. He appears by his modest and unaffected narration to have described things as he saw them, to have copied nature from the life and to have consulted his senses, not his imagination. He meets with no basilics that destroyed with their eyes. His crocodiles devour their prey without tears, and his cataracts fall from the rocks without deafening the neighboring inhabitants. The reader will find here no regions cursed with irremedial barrenness or blessed with spontaneous fecundity, no perpetual gloom or unceasing sunshine, nor are the nations here described either devoid of all sense of humanity or consummate in all private or social virtues. Here are no hotentots without religions, polity or articulate language, no Chinese perfectly polite and completely skilled in all sciences. He will discover what will always be discovered by a diligent and impartial inquirer, that wherever human nature is to be found, there is a mixture of vice and virtue, a contest of passion and reason, and that the Creator doth not appear partial in his distributions, but has balanced, in most countries, their particular inconveniences by particular favors. Here we have an early example of that brilliant and energetic expression which, upon innumerable occasions in his subsequent life, justly impressed the world with the highest admiration. Nor can anyone, conversant with the writings of Johnson, fail to discern his hand in this passage of that dedication to John Warren ESQ of Pembrokeshire, though it is ascribed to Warren the bookseller. Quote, It is reasonable to suppose that his having been thus accidentally led to a particular study of the history and manners of Abyssinia was the remote occasion of his writing many years afterwards, his admirable philosophical tale, the principle scene of which is laid in that country. Johnson returned to Lichfield early in 1734, and in August that year he made an attempt to procure some little subsistence by his pen, for he published proposals for printing by subscription the Latin Poems of Polition. Quote, Note, the book was to contain more than 30 sheets, the prize to be two shillings and sixpence at the time of subscribing, and two shillings and sixpence at the delivery of the perfect book in queries. Quote, Note, it appears that his brother Nathaniel had taken up his father's trade, for it is mentionable that subscriptions are taken in by the editor of N. Johnson bookseller of Lichfield. Notwithstanding the merit of Johnson and the cheap price at which this book was offered, there were not subscribers enough to ensure sufficient sale, so the work never appeared and probably never was executed. We find him again this year at Birmingham, and there is preserved the following letter from him to Mr. Edward Cave, the original compiler and editor of the Gentleman's Magazine. To Mr. Cave, November 15, 1734. Sir, as you appear no less sensible than your readers to the defects of your poetical article, you will not be displeased if in order to the improvement of it I communicate to you the sentiments of a person who will undertake unreasonable terms sometimes to fill a column. His opinion is that the public would not give you a bad reception if, beside the current width of the month, which a critical examination would generally reduce to a narrow compass, you admitted not only poems, inscriptions, etc., never printed before, which he will sometimes supply with you, but likewise short literary dissertations in Latin or English. Critical remarks on authors ancient or modern, forgotten poems that deserve revival or loose pieces like flowers worth preserving. By this method, your literary article for so it be called will, he thinks, be better recommended to the public than by low jests, awkward buffoonery, or the dull surilities of either party. If such a correspondence will be agreeable to you, be pleased to inform me in two posts what the conditions are on which you shall expect it. Your late offer gives me no reason to distrust your generosity. If you engage in any literary projects besides this paper, I have other designs to impart, if it could be secure from having others reap the advantage of what I should hint. Your letter, by being directed to S. Smith, to be left at the castle in Birmingham Warwickshire will reach your humble servant." Mr. Cave has put a note on this letter. Answered December 2nd, but whether anything was done in consequence of it we are not informed. Johnson had from his early youth been sensible to the influence of the female charms. While at the Stourbridge School he was much enamored of Olivia Lloyd, a young Quaker to whom he wrote a copy of verses which I have not been able to recover. But with what facility and elegance he could warm all the amorous lay will lay from the following lines which he wrote for his friend Mr. Edmund Hector. Verses to a lady on receiving from her a sprig of myrtle. Quote, What hopes, what terrors does this gift create, ambiguous emblem of uncertain fate, the myrtle ensign of supreme command consigned by Venus to Melissa's hand, not less capricious than a reigning fair, now grants and now rejects a lover's prayer. In myrtle shades oft sings the happy swain, in myrtle shades despairing ghosts complain, the myrtle crowns the happy lover's heads, the unhappy lover's grave the myrtle spreads. O then the meaning of thy gift impart, and ease the throbbing of an anxious heart. Soon must this bow, as you shall fix his doom, adorn Philander's head or grace his tomb." Note, Mrs. Pozzi gives the following account of this little composition from Dr. Johnson's own relation to her on her inquiring whether it was rightly attributed to him. Quote, I think it is now just forty years ago that a young fellow had a sprig of myrtle given to him by a girl he courted and asked me to write him some verses that he might present her in return. I promised, but forgot, and when he called for his lines at the time, agreed on, sit a moment, says I, dear Mund, see Poet, May 7th, 1773, for Johnson's way of contracting the names of his friends, and I'll fetch them thee. So stepped aside for five minutes and wrote the nonsense you now keep such a stir about. Unquote, Annick, page 34. In my first edition I was induced to doubt the authenticity of this account by the following circumstantial statement in a letter to me from Ms. Siward of Litchfield. Quote, I know those verses were addressed to Lucy Porter when he was enamored of her in his boyish days two and three years before he had seen her mother. His future wife. He wrote them at my grandfathers and gave them to Lucy in the presence of my mother, to whom he showed them on the instant. She used to repeat them to me when I asked her for the verses Dr. Johnson gave her on a sprig of myrtle which he had stolen or begged from her bosom. We all know, Annas Lucy Porter, to have been incapable of the mean vanity of applying to herself a compliment not intended for her. Such was this lady's statement, which I make no doubt she's supposed to be correct, but it shows how dangerous it is to trust too implicitly to traditional testimony and ingenious inference. For Mr. Hector was lately assured me that the person for whom Johnson wrote those verses which have been erroneously ascribed to Mr. Hammond. I am obliged in so many instances to notice Mrs. Piozzi's incorrectness of relation that I gladly seize this opportunity of acknowledging that however often she is not always inaccurate. The author having been drawn into a controversy with Ms. Anna Seward in consequence of the preceding statement which may be found in the Gentleman's Magazine Volume 53 and 54, received the following letter from Mr. Edmund Hector on the subject. Dear sir, I'm sorry to see you are engaged in altercation with a lady who seems unwilling to be convinced of her errors. Surely it would be more ingenuous to acknowledge than to persevere. Lately in looking over some papers I meant to burn, I found the original manuscript of The Myrtle and the date on it 1731 which I have enclosed. The true history which I could swear to is as follows. Mr. Morgan Graves, the elder brother of a worthy clergyman near Bath with whom I was acquainted, waded upon a lady in this neighborhood who at parting presented him the branch. He showed it to me and wished much to return the compliment in verse. I applied to Johnson who was with me and in about half an hour dictated the verses which I sent to my friend. I most solemnly declare at that time Johnson was an entire stranger to the Porter family and was almost two years after that I introduced him to the acquaintances of Porter whom I bought my clothes of. If you intend to convince this obstinate woman to the exhibit of the public the truth of your narrative you are liberty to make what use you please at this statement. I hope you will pardon me for taking up so much of your time wishing you motos e felicianos. I shall subscribe myself your obliged humble servant E. Hector Birmingham January 9th 1794. End of note. His juvenile attachments to the fair sex were however very transient and it is certain that he formed no criminal connection whatsoever. Mr. Hector who lived with him in his younger days in the utmost intimacy and social freedom has assured me that even at that ardent season his conduct was strictly virtuous in that respect and that though he loved to exhilarate himself with wine he never knew him intoxicated but once. End of Section 6. Of the Life of Samuel Johnson. Volume 1. Read by Patti Brugman. Section 7 of The Life of Samuel Johnson. Volume 1. This is a Librebox recording. All Librebox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer visit Librebox.org. Read by Jason Isbell. www.shabamdevelopment.com The Life of Samuel Johnson. Volume 1. By James Boswell. Section 7. In a man whom religious education has secured from licentious indulgences the passion of love when once it has seized him is exceedingly strong. Being unimpaired by dissipation and totally concentrated in one object. This was experienced by Johnson when he became the fervent admirer of Mrs. Porter after her first husband's death. Miss Porter told me that when he was first introduced to her mother his appearance was very foreboding. He was then lean and lank so that his immense structure of bones was hideously striking to the eye and the scars of the scapula were deeply visible. He also wore his hair which was straight and stiff and separated behind. And he had seemingly convulsive starts and odd gesticulations which tended to excite at once surprise and ridicule. Mrs. Porter was so much engaged by his conversation that she overlooked all these external disadvantages and said to her daughter, This is the most sensible man that I ever saw in my life. Though Mrs. Porter was double the age of Johnson and her person and manner has described to me by the late Mr. Garrick, where by no means pleasing to others she must have had a superiority of understanding and talents, as she certainly inspired him with a more than ordinary passion. And she, having signified her willingness to accept of his hand, he went to Litchfield to ask his mother's consent to marriage. Which he could not but be conscious was a very imprudent scheme, both on account of their disparity of years and her want of fortune. But Mrs. Johnson knew too well the ardor of her son's temper and was too tender apparent to oppose his inclinations. I know not for what reason the marriage ceremony was not performed at Birmingham, but a resolution was taken that it should be at Derby, for which place the bride and bridegroom set out on a horseback, I suppose in very good humor. But though Mr. Topham Buchler used archly to mention Johnson's having told him with much gravity, Sir, it was a love marriage on both sides. I have had from my illustrious friend the following curious account of their journey to church upon the nuptial morn. Ninth of July Sir, she had read the old romances and had got into her head the fanatical notion that a woman of spirit should use her lover like a dog. So, Sir, at first she told me that I rode too fast and she could not keep up with me, and when I rode a little slower she passed me and complained that I lagged behind. I was not to be made the slave of Caprice, and I resolved to begin as I meant to end. I therefore pushed on briskly till I was fairly out of her sight. The road lay between two hedges, so I was sure she could not miss it, and I contrived that she should soon come up on me. When she did I observed her to be in tears. This, it must be allowed, was a singular beginning of cannubial felicity, but there is no doubt that Johnson, though he thus should a manly firmness, proved a most affectionate and indulgent husband to the last moment of Mrs. Johnson's life. And in his prayers and meditations we find very remarkable evidence that his regard and fondness for her never seized, even after her death. He now set up a private academy for which purpose he hired a large house, well situated near his native city. In the Gentleman's Magazine for 1736 there is the following advertisement. At Eddiel near Litchfield in Staffordshire, young gentlemen are boarded and taught the Latin and Greek languages by Samuel Johnson. But the only pupils that were put under his care were the celebrated David Garrick and his brother George, and a Mr. Offley, a young gentleman of good fortune who died early, as yet his name had nothing of that celebrity which afterwards commanded the highest attention and respect of mankind. Had such an advertisement appeared after the publication of his London, or his Rambler, or his Dictionary, how would it have burst upon the world? With what eagerness would the great and the wealthy have embraced an opportunity of putting their sons under the learned tuition of Samuel Johnson? The truth, however, is that he was not so well qualified for being a teacher of elements, and a conductor in learning by regular graduations as men of inferior powers of mind. His own acquisitions had been made by fits and starts, by violent eruptions into the regions of knowledge, and it could not be expected that his impatience would be subdued, and his impetuousity restrained so as to fit him for a quiet guide to novices. The art of communicating instruction of whatever kind is much to be valued, and I have ever thought that those who devote themselves to this employment, and do their duty with diligence and success, are entitled to very high respect from the community, as Johnson himself often maintained. Yet I am of opinion that the greatest abilities are not only not required for this offers, but render a man less fit for it. While he acknowledges the justness of Thompson's beautiful remark, delightful task to rear the tender thought and teach the young idea how to shoot. We must consider that this delight is perceptible only by a mind at ease, a mind at once calm and clear, but that a mind gloomy and impetuous like that of Johnson cannot be fixed for any length of time in my new detention, and must be so frequently irritated by unavoidable slowness and error in the advances of scholars as to perform the duty with little pleasure to the teacher and no great advantage to the pupil. Good temper is a most essential requisite in a preceptor. Horace paints the character as bland. Ut pyrus ulem dant crustula blandi, doctoris elementa vellent ut teschire. Johnson was not more satisfied with his situation as the master of an academy than with that of the usher of a school. We need not wonder, therefore, that he did not keep his academy above a year and a half. From Mr. Garrick's account he did not appear to have been profoundly reverenced by his pupils. His oddities of manner and uncouth justiculations could not but be the subject of merriment to them, and in particular the young rogues used to listen at the door of his bedchamber and peep through the keyhole that they might turn into ridicule his tumultuous and awkward fondness for Mrs. Johnson, whom he used to name by the familiar appellations of Teddy or Tetsy, which, like Betty or Betsy, is provincially used as a contraction for Elizabeth, her Christian name, but which to us seem ludicrous when applied to a woman of her age and appearance. Mr. Garrick described her to be as very fat with her bosom of more than ordinary perturbance, with swilled cheeks of a florid red produced by thick painting and increased by the liberal use of cordials, flaring and fantastic in her dress and affected both in her speech and her general behavior. I have seen Garrick exhibit her by his exquisite talent of mimicry, so as to excite the hardiest bursts of laughter, but he probably, as is the case in all such representations, considerably aggravated the picture. That Johnson well knew the most proper course to be pursued in the instruction of youth is authentically ascertained by the following paper in his own handwriting. Given about this period to a relation and now in the possession of Mr. John Nichols. Scheme for the classes of a grammar school. When the introduction or formation of nouns and verbs is perfectly mastered, let them learn. Chordius by Mr. Clark, beginning at the same time to translate out of the introduction, that by this means they may learn the syntax. Then let them proceed to Eremis with an English translation by the same author. Class 2 learns Utropius and Cornelius Nepos or Justin with the translation. NB. The first class gets for their part every morning the rules which they have learned before and in the afternoon learns the Latin rules of the nouns and verbs. They are examined in the rules which they have learned every Thursday and Saturday. The second class does the same whilst they are in Utropius. Afterwards their part is in the irregular nouns and verbs and in the rules for making and scanning verses. They are examined as the first. Class 3. Ovid's Metamorphosis in the Morning and Caesar's Commentaries in the Afternoon. Practice in the Latin rules till they are perfect in them afterwards in Mr. Leeds Greek Grammar. Examined as before. Afterwards they proceed to Virgil. Beginning at the same time to write themes and verses and to learn Greek. From thence passing on to Horus etc. as shall seem most proper. I know not well what books to direct you to because you have not informed me what study you will apply yourself to. I believe it will be most for your advantage to apply yourself wholly to the language till you go to the university. The Greek authors I think it best for you to read are these. Cebus. Halion. Lucean by Leeds. Xenophon. Homer. The Rocketes and Euripides. Thus you will be tolerably skilled in all the dialects beginning with the attic to which the rest must be referred. In the study of Latin it is proper not to read the latter authors. Till you are well versed in those of the purest ages. Hesterans. Tully. Caesar. Solis. Nepos. Velius. Petricolis. Virgil. Horus. Fedris. The greatest and most necessary task still remains to attain a habit of expression without which knowledge is of little use. This is necessary in Latin and most necessary in English and can only be acquired by a daily imitation of the best and correctest authors. Sam Johnson. While Johnson kept his academy there can be no doubt that he was insensibly furnishing his mind with various knowledge. But I have not discovered that he wrote anything except a great part of his tragedy of Irene. Mr. Peter Garrick, the elder brother of David, told me that he remembered Johnson's borrowing the Turkish history of him in order to form his play from it. When he had finished some part of it he read what he had done to Mr. Walmsley who objected to his having already brought his heroine into great distress and asked him, How can you possibly contrive to plunge her into deeper calamity? Johnson in sly illusion to the supposed oppressive proceedings of the court of which Mr. Walmsley was registered replied, Sir I can put her into the spiritual court. Mr. Walmsley however was well pleased with this proof of Johnson's ability as a dramatic writer and advised him to finish the tragedy and produce it on the stage. Johnson now thought of trying his fortune in London, the great field of genius and exertion, where talents of every kind have the fullest scope and the highest encouragement. It is a memorable circumstance that his pupil David Garrick went thither at the same time with intention to complete his education and follow the profession of the law, from which he was soon diverted by his decided preference for the stage. Note, both of them used to talk pleasantly of this their first journey to London. Garrick evidently meeting to embellish a little said one day in my hearing, We rode and tied, and the Bishop of Killillow informed me that another time, when Johnson and Garrick were dining together in a pretty large company, Johnson humorously ascertained the chronology of something expressed himself thus. That was the year when I came to London with two pints half-penny in my pocket. Garrick overhearing him exclaimed, A. What do you say with two pints half-penny in your pocket, Johnson? Well, yes, when I came with two pints half-penny in my pocket and thou, Davy, with three pints and thine, end of note. This joint expedition of those two eminent men to the Metropolis was many years afterwards noticed in the allegorical poem on Shakespeare's Mulberry Tree by Mr. Lovabond, the ingenious author of The Tears of Old May Day. They were recommended to Mr. Coulson, an eminent mathematician and master of the Academy, by the following letter from Mr. Walmsley, to the Reverend Mr. Coulson, Litchfield, March 2, 1737. Dear sir, I have the favour of yours, and am extremely obliged to you, but I cannot say I had a greater affection for you upon it than I had before, being long since so much endeared to you, as well by an early friendship as by your many excellent and valuable qualifications. And had I a son of my own, it would be my ambition, instead of sending him to the university, to dispose of him as this young gentleman is. He and another neighbour of mine, one Mr. Samuel Johnson, set out this morning for London together. Davy Garrick is to be with you early the next week, and Mr. Johnson to try his fate with a tragedy, and to see to get himself employed in some translation, either from the Latin or the French. Johnson is a very good scholar and poet, and I have great hopes we'll turn out a fine tragedy writer. If it should any way lie in your way, doubt not, but you would be ready to recommend and assist your countrymen. G. Walmsley. End of Section 7. Section 8 of The Life of Samuel Johnson, Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox.org. Read by Michael Yorshaw. The Life of Samuel Johnson, Volume 1 by James Boswell. Section 8. How he employed himself upon his first coming to London is not particularly known. I never heard that he found any protection or encouragement by the means of Mr. Coulson, to whose Academy David Garrick went. Mrs. Lucy Porter told me that Mr. Walmsley gave him a letter of introduction to Lintott, his bookseller, and that Johnson wrote some things for him. But I imagine this to be a mistake, for I have discovered no trace of it, and I am pretty sure he told me that Mr. Cave was the first publisher by whom his pen was engaged in London. He had a little money when he came to town, and he knew how he could live in the cheapest manner. His first lodgings were at the house of Mr. Norris, a staymaker, in Exeter Street adjoining Catherine Street in the Strand. I dined, said he, very well for eight pence, with very good company at the pineapple in New Street just by. Several of them had travelled. They expected to meet every day, but did not know one another's names. It used to cost the rest of shilling, for they drank wine. But I had a cut of meat for six pence, and bread for a penny, and gave the waiter a penny so that I was quite well served. Nay, better than the rest, for they gave the waiter nothing. He, at this time, I believe, abstained entirely from fermented liquors, a practice to which he rigidly conformed for many years together at different periods of his life. His ophelas in the art of living in London, I have heard him relate, was an Irish painter whom he knew at Birmingham, and who had practiced his own precepts of economy for several years in the British capital. He assured Johnson, who I suppose was then meditating to try his fortune in London, but was apprehensive of the expense, that thirty pounds a year was enough to enable a man to live there without being contemptible. He allowed ten pounds for clothes and linen. He said a man might live in a garret at eighteen pence a week. Few people would inquire where he lodged, and if they did it was easy to say, Sir, I am to be found at such a place. By spending three pence in a coffee house, he might be for some hours every day in very good company. He might dine for six pence, breakfast on bread and milk for a penny, and do without supper. On clean shirt day he went abroad and paid visits. I have heard him more than once talk of this frugal friend whom he recollected with esteem and kindness, and did not like to have one smile at the recital. This man, he said gravely, was a very sensible man who perfectly understood common affairs, a man of a great deal of knowledge of the world, fresh from life, not strained through books. He borrowed a horse and ten pounds at Birmingham. Finding himself master of so much money, he set off for Westchester in order to get to Ireland. He returned the horse and probably the ten pounds too after he got home. Considering Johnson's narrow circumstances in the early part of his life, and particularly at the interesting era of his launching into the ocean of London, it is not to be wondered at that an actual instance, proved by experience of the possibility of enjoying the intellectual luxury of social life upon a very small income, should deeply engage his attention and be ever recollected by him as a circumstance of much importance. He amused himself, I remember, by computing how much more expense was absolutely necessary to live upon the same scale with that which his friend described when the value of money was diminished by the progress of commerce. It may be estimated that double the money might now with difficulty be sufficient. Amidst this cold obscurity there was one brilliant circumstance to cheer him. He was well acquainted with Mr. Henry Hervey, one of the branches of the noble family of that name, who had been quartered in Litchfield as an officer of the army and had at this time a house in London, where Johnson was frequently entertained and had an opportunity of meeting gentile company. Not very long before his death, he mentioned this, among other particulars of his life, which he was kindly communicating to me, and he described this early friend, Harry Hervey thus, He was a vicious man, but very kind to me. If you call a dog Hervey, I shall love him. He told me he had now written only three acts of his Irene and that he retired for some time to lodgings at Greenwich, where he proceeded in it somewhat further and used to compose walking in the park, but did not stay long enough at that place to finish it. At this period we find the following letter from him to Mr. Edward Cave, which, as a link in the chain of his literary history, it is proper to insert. To Mr. Cave, Greenwich, next door to the Golden Heart, Church Street, July 12, 1737, Sir, having observed in your papers very uncommon offers of encouragement to men of letters, I have chosen, being a stranger in London, to communicate to you the following design, which, I hope, if you join in it, will be of advantage to both of us. The history of the Council of Trent, having been lately translated into French and published with large notes by Dr. Le Corriere, the reputation of that book is so much revived in England that, it is presumed, a new translation of it from the Italian, together with Le Corriere's notes from the French, could not fail of a favourable reception. If it be answered that the history is already in English, it must be remembered that there was the same objection against Le Corriere's undertake with this disadvantage that the French had a version by one of their best translators, whereas you cannot read three pages of the English history without discovering that the style is capable of great improvements. But whether those improvements are to be expected from the attempt, you must judge from the specimen, which, if you approve the proposal, I shall submit to your examination. Suppose the merits of the versions equal. We may hope that the addition of the notes will turn the balance in our favour, considering the reputation of the annotator. Be pleased to favour me with a speedy answer if you are not willing to engage in this scheme, and appoint me a day to wait upon you if you are. I am, sir, your humble servant, Sam Johnson. It should seem from this letter, though subscribed with his own name, that he had not yet been introduced to Mr. Cave. We shall presently see what was done in consequence of the proposal which it contains. In the course of the summer he returned to Litchfield, where he had left Mrs. Johnson, and there he at last finished his tragedy, which was not executed with his rapidity of composition upon other occasions, but was slowly and painfully elaborated. A few days before his death, while burning a great mass of papers, he picked out from among them the original, unformed sketch of this tragedy in his own handwriting and gave it to Mr. Langton, by whose favour a copy of it is now in my possession. It contains fragments of the intended plot and speeches for the different persons of the drama, partly in the raw materials of prose, partly worked up into verse, as also a variety of hints for illustration, borrowed from the Greek, Roman, and modern writers. The handwriting is very difficult to be read, even by those who were best acquainted with Johnson's mode of penmanship, which at all times was very particular. The king, having graciously accepted of this manuscript as a literary curiosity, Mr. Langton made a fair and distinct copy of it, which he ordered to be bound up with the original and the printed tragedy, and the volume is deposited in the king's library. His majesty was pleased to permit Mr. Langton to take a copy of it for himself. The whole of it is rich in thought and imagery and happy expressions. And of the disyecto membra scattered throughout, and as yet unarranged, a good dramatic poet might avail himself with considerable advantage. I shall give my readers some specimens of different kinds, distinguishing them by the italic character. Nor think to say, here will I stop. Here will I fix the limits of transgression, nor farther tempt the avenging rage of heaven. When guilt like this once harbors in the breast, those holy beings whose unseen direction guides through the maze of life the steps of man, fly the detested mansions of impiety, and quit their charge to horror and to ruin. A small part only of this interesting admonition is preserved in the play, and is varied, I think, not to advantage. The soul once tainted with so foul a crime, no more shall glow with friendship's hallowed ardour. Those holy beings whose superior care guides airing mortals to the paths of virtue, affrighted at impiety like thine, resign their charge to baseness and to ruin. I feel the soft infection flush in my cheek, and wander in my veins. Teach me the Grecian arts of soft persuasion. Sure, this is love, which heretofore I conceived the dream of idle maids and wanton poets. Though no comets or prodigies foretold the ruin of Greece, signs which heaven must by another miracle enable us to understand, yet it might be foreshown, by tokens no less certain, by the vices which always bring it on. This last passage is worked up in the tragedy itself as follows. Leontius. That power that kindly spreads the clouds, a signal of impending showers to warn the wandering linnet to the shade, beheld without concern expiring Greece, and not one prodigy foretold our fate. Demetrius. A thousand hard prodigies foretold it. A feeble government eluded laws, a factious populace, luxurious nobles, and all the maladies of sinking states. When public villainy, too strong for justice, shows his bold front the harbinger of ruin, can brave Leontius call for airy wonders which cheats interpret and which fools regard? When some neglected fabric nods beneath the weight of years and totters to the tempest, must heaven dispatch the messengers of light, or wake the dead to warn us of its fall? Mohammed to Irene. I have tried thee and joy to find that thou deservedest to be loved by Mohammed, with a mind as great as his own. Sure thou art an error of nature and an exception to the rest of thy sex and art immortal. For sentiments like thine were never to sink into nothing. I thought all the thoughts of the fair had been to select the graces of the day, dispose the colors of the flaunting, flowing robe, tune the voice and roll the eye, place the gem, choose the dress, and add new roses to the fading cheek, but sparkling. Thus in the tragedy, illustrious maid, new wonders fix me thine, thy soul completes the triumphs of thy face. I thought, forgive my fair, the noblest aim, the strongest effort of a female soul, was but to choose the graces of the day, to tune the tongue, to teach the eyes to roll, dispose the colors of the flowing robe, and add new roses to the faded cheek. I shall select one other passage on account of the doctrine which it illustrates. Irene observes that the supreme being will accept of virtue whatever outward circumstances it may be accompanied with and may be delighted with varieties of worship, but is answered that variety cannot affect that being who infinitely happy in his own perfections wants no external gratifications, nor can infinite truth be delighted with falsehood, that though he may guide or pity those he leaves in darkness, he abandons those who shut their eyes against the beams of day. Johnson's residence at Litchfield, on his return to it at this time, was only for three months, and as he had as yet seen but a small part of the wonders of the metropolis, he had little to tell his townsmen. He related to me the following minute anecdote of this period. In the last age, when my mother lived in London, there were two sets of people, those who gave the wall and those who took it, the peaceable and the quarrelsome. When I returned to Litchfield after having been in London, my mother asked me whether I was one of those who gave the wall or those who took it. Now it is fixed that every man keeps to the right, or if one is taking the wall another yields it, and it is never a dispute. He now removed to London with Mrs. Johnson, but her daughter, who had lived with them at Eddiel, was left with her relations in the country. His lodgings were for some time in Woodstock Street near Hanover Square, and afterwards in Castle Street near Cavendish Square. As there is something pleasingly interesting to many in tracing so great a man through all his different habitations, I shall, before this work is concluded, present my readers with an exact list of his lodgings and houses in order of time, in placid condescension to my respectful curiosity, he one evening dictated to me, but without specifying how long he lived at each. In the progress of his life, I shall have occasion to mention some of them as connected with particular incidents or with the writing of particular parts of his works. To some this minute attention may appear trifling, but when we consider the punctilious exactness with which the different houses in which Milton resided have been traced by the writers of his life, a similar enthusiasm may be pardoned in the biographer of Johnson. His tragedy being by this time, as he thought, completely finished and fit for the stage, he was very desirous that it should be brought forward. Mr. Peter Garrick told me that Johnson and he went together to the fountain tavern and read it over, and that he afterwards solicited Mr. Fleetwood, the patentee of Drury Lane Theatre, to have it acted at his house. But Mr. Fleetwood would not accept it, probably because it was not patronized by some man of high rank, and it was not acted till 1749 when his friend David Garrick was manager of that theatre. The gentleman's magazine, begun and carried on by Mr. Edward Cave, under the name of Sylvannus Urban, had attracted the notice and esteem of Johnson in an imminent degree before he came to London as an adventurer in literature. He told me that when he first saw St. John's Gate, the place where that deservedly popular miscellany was originally printed, he beheld it with reverence. I suppose indeed that every young author has had the same kind of feeling for the magazine or periodical publication which has first entertained him and in which he has first had an opportunity to see himself in print without the risk of exposing his name. I myself recollect such impressions from the Scots magazine, which was begun at Edinburgh in the year 1739 and has been ever conducted with judgment, accuracy, and propriety. I yet cannot help thinking of it with an affectionate regard. Johnson has dignified the gentleman's magazine by the importance with which he invests the life of Cave, but he has given it still greater luster by the various admirable essays which he wrote for it. End of Section 8. Recording by Michael Yorshaw, Los Angeles, California. Section 9 of The Life of Samuel Johnson, Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox.org. Read by Michael Yorshaw. The Life of Samuel Johnson, Volume 1 by James Boswell. Section 9. Though Johnson was often solicited by his friends to make a complete list of his writings and talked of doing it, I believe with a serious intention that they should all be collected on his own account, he put it off from year to year and at last died without having done it perfectly. I have one in his own handwriting which contains a certain number. I indeed doubt if he could have remembered every one of them, as they were so numerous, so various, and scattered in such a multiplicity of unconnected publications. Nay, several of them published under the names of other persons through whom he liberally contributed from the abundance of his mind. We must therefore be content to discover them, partly from information given to him by his friends and partly from internal evidence. Note, while in the course of my narrative I enumerate his writings, I shall take care that my readers shall not be left to waver in doubt between certainty and conjecture with regard to their authenticity. And for that purpose shall mark with an asterisk those which he acknowledged to his friends and with a dagger those which are ascertained to be his by internal evidence. When any other pieces are ascribed to him, I shall give my reasons. End of note. His first performance in the Gentleman's Magazine, which for many years was his principal source for employment and support, was a copy of Latin Verses in March 1738 addressed to the editor in so happy a style of compliment that cave must have been destitute both of taste and sensibility had he not felt himself highly gratified. Ad urbanum. Urbane, nulis fese laborebus. Urbane, nulis victe calumniis. Cui fronte certum in erudita, perpetuo viret et virabit. Quid moleator gens imilantium. Quid et minator solicitus parum. Wakare solis perge musis. Yuksta animus dudiiske felix. Lingui procacus plumbia spicula. Fidens superbo frangae silentio. Ritrix perubstantes caterwa sedulitas animosa tendet. Intende nervos fortis inanibus risuris olemnicibus emuli. Intende yam nervos habibis. Partisipes operai camoenas. Non olemusis pagina gratior. Quam quais sewareis ludicra yungere. Novit fadigam quae nugis. Utilibus recriare mentem. Texente nimfis serta licoride. Rosae ruborem sicwiola adiuat. Yemista siciris refuget. Atheris variata fukis. S.J. Note, a translation of this ode by an unknown correspondent appeared in the magazine for the month of May following. Hail urban, indefagatable man, unwearied yet by all thy useful toil, whom numerous slanderers assault in vain, whom no base calumny can put to foil, but still the laurel on thy learned brow flourishes fair and shall forever grow. What mean the servile imitating crew, what their vain blustering and their empty noise, ne'er seek but still thy noble ends pursue, unconquered by the rabble's venal voice. Still to the muse thy studious mind apply, happy in temper as in industry. The senseless sneerings of an oughty tongue, unworthy thy attention to engage, unheeded pass, and though they mean thee wrong, by manly silence disappoint their rage. Aciduous diligence confounds its foes, resistless though malicious crowds oppose. Exert thy powers, nor slacken in the course, thy spotless fame shall quash all false reports. Exert thy powers, nor fear a rival's force, but thou shalt smile at all his vain efforts. Thy labors shall be crowned with large success. The muse's aid thy magazine shall bless. No page more grateful to the harmonious nine than that wherein thy labors we survey, where solemn themes in fuller splendor shine, delightful mixture blended with the gay, where in improving various joys we find, a welcome respite to the wearied mind. Thus when the nymphs in some fair verdant mead of various flowers a beautyous wreath compose, the lovely violets as your painted head adds luster to the crimson blushing rose. Thus splendid iris with her varied dye shines in the ether and adorns the sky. Britain. End of note. It appears that he was now enlisted by Mr. Cave as a regular co-agitor in his magazine, by which he probably obtained a tolerable livelihood. At what time, or by what means, he had acquired a competent knowledge of both French and Italian, I do not know. But he was so well skilled in them as to be sufficiently qualified for a translator. That part of his labor which consisted in emendation and improvement of the production of other contributors, like that employed in leveling ground, can be perceived only by those who had an opportunity of comparing the original with the altered copy. What we certainly know to have been done by him in this way was the debates in both houses of parliament under the name of the Senate of Lilliput, sometimes with feigned denominations of the several speakers, sometimes with denominations formed of the letters of their real names in the manner of what is called anagram so that they might easily be deciphered. Parliament then kept the press in a kind of mysterious awe which made it necessary to have recourse to such devices. In our time, it has acquired an unrestrained freedom so that the people in all parts of the kingdom have a fair, open and exact report of the actual proceedings of their representatives and legislators, which in our Constitution is highly to be valued, though unquestionably there has of late been too much reason to complain of the petulance with which obscure scribblers have presumed to treat men of the most respectable character and situation. This important article of the Gentleman's Magazine was, for several years, executed by Mr. William Guthrie, a man who deserves to be respectively recorded in the literary annals of this country. He was descended of an ancient family in Scotland, but having a small patrimony and being an adherent of the unfortunate house of Stuart, he could not accept of any office in the state. He therefore came to London and employed his talents and learning as an author by profession. His writings in history, criticism and politics had considerable merit. He was the first English historian who had recourse to that authentic source of information, in his parliamentary journals, and such was the power of his political pen that at an early period, government thought it worth their while to keep it quiet by a penchant which he enjoyed till his death. Johnson esteemed him enough to wish that his life should be written. The debates in Parliament, which were brought home and digested by Guthrie, whose memory those surpassed by others who have since followed him in the same department, were sent by Cave to Johnson for his revision. And after some time, when Guthrie had attained a greater variety of employment and the speeches were more and more enriched by the accession of Johnson's genius, it was resolved that he should do the whole himself from the scanty notes furnished by persons employed to attend in both houses of Parliament. Sometimes, however, as he himself told me, he had nothing more communicated to him than the names of the several speakers and the part which they had taken in the debate. Note how much poetry he wrote I know not, but he informed me that he was the author of the beautiful little piece The Eagle and Robin Redbreast in the collection of poems entitled The Union, though it is there said to be written by Archibald Scott before the year 1600. End of note. Thus was Johnson employed during some of the best years of his life as a mere literary laborer for gain not glory, solely to obtain an honest support. He, however, indulged himself in occasional little sallies which the French so happily expressed by the term Joe de Spree, and which will be noticed in their order in the progress of this work. But what first displayed his transcendent powers and gave the world assurance of the man was his London, a poem in imitation of the third satire of juvenile which came out in May this year and burst forth with a splendor the rays of which will forever encircle his name. While Low had imitated the same satire with great success, applying it to Paris, but an attentive comparison will satisfy every reader that he is much excelled by the English juvenile. Oldham had also imitated it and applied it to London, all which performances concur to prove that great cities in every age and in every country will furnish similar topics of satire. Whether Johnson had previously read Oldham's imitation, I do not know. But it is not a little remarkable that there is scarcely any coincidence found between the two performances, though upon the very same subject. The only instances are in describing London the sink of foreign worthlessness, the common shore where France does all her filth and odor poor, Oldham, the common shore of Paris and of Rome, Johnson, and no calling or profession comes amiss a needy Monsour can be what he please, Oldham. All sciences a fasting Monsour knows, Johnson. The particulars which Oldham has collected, both as exhibiting the horrors of London and of the times contrasted with better days are different from those of Johnson and in general well chosen and well expressed. Note, I own it pleased me to find amongst them one trait of the manners of the age in London in the last century to shield from the sneer of English ridicule which was some time ago too common a practice in my native city of Edinburgh. If what I've said can't consider other dangers of the night when brick bats are from upper stories thrown and empty chamber pots come pouring down from Garrett windows. End of note. There are in Oldham's imitation many prosaic verses and bad rhymes and his poem sets out with a strange inadvertent blunder. Though much concerned to leave my dear old friend, I must, however, find command of fixing in the country. It is plain he was not going to leave his friend. His friend was going to leave him. A young lady at once corrected this with good critical sagacity too. Though much concerned to lose my dear old friend. There is one passage in the original better transfused by Oldham than by Johnson. Nill Hobbett in Felix Papertas Durius in Se Quam quote ridiculous Hominez Fakid which is an exquisite remark on the galling meanness and contempt annexed to poverty. Johnson's imitation is of all the griefs that harass the distressed, sure the most bitter is a scornful jest. Oldham's though less elegant is more just. Nothing in poverty so ill is born as it's exposing men to grinning scorn. Or in what manner this poem was composed I am sorry that I neglected to ascertain with precision from Johnson's own authority. He has marked upon his corrected copy of the first edition of it written in 1738 and as it was published in the month of May in that year it is evident that much time was not employed in preparing it for the press. The history of its publication I am enabled to give in a very satisfactory manner and judging from myself and many of my friends I trust that it will not be uninteresting to my readers. We may be certain though it is not expressly named in the following letters to Mr. Cave in 1738 that they all relate to it. To Mr. Cave, Castle Street Wednesday morning no date 1738. Sir when I took the liberty of writing to you a few days ago it was a repetition of the same pleasure so soon. For a pleasure I shall always think it to converse in any manner with an ingenious and candid man. With having the enclosed poem in my hands to dispose of for the benefit of the author of whose abilities I shall say nothing since I send you his performance I believed I could not procure more advantageous terms from any person than from you who have so much distinguished yourself with generous encouragement of poetry and whose judgment of that art nothing but your commendation of my trifle can give me any occasion to call in question. I do not doubt but you will look over this poem with another I and reward it in a different manner from a mercenary bookseller who counts the lines he is to purchase and considers nothing but the bulk. I cannot help taking notice that besides what the author may hope for out of his abilities he has likewise another claim to your regard as he lies at present under very disadvantageous circumstances of fortune. I beg therefore that you will favor me with a letter tomorrow that I may know what you can afford to allow him that he may either part with it to you or find out which I do not expect some other way more to his satisfaction. I have only to add that as I am sensible I have transcribed it very coarsely which after having altered it I was obliged to do. I will if you pleased to transmit the sheets from the press correct it for you and take the trouble of altering any stroke of satire which you may dislike. By exerting on this occasion your usual generosity you will not only encourage learning and relieve distress but though it be in comparison of the other motives of very small account obliged in a very sensible manner sir your very humble servant Sam Johnson. To Mr. Cave, Monday No. 6 Castle Street Sir, I am to return you thanks for the present you were so kind as to send by me and to entreat that you will be pleased to inform me by the penny post whether you resolve to print the poem. If you pleased to send it me by the post with a note to Doddsley I will go and read the lines to him that we may have his consent to put his name on the title page. As to the printing if it can be set immediately about I will be so much the author's friend as not to content myself with mere solicitations in his favor. I propose if my calculation be near the truth to engage for the reimbursement of all that you shall lose by an impression of 500 provided as you very generously propose that the profit if any be set aside for the author's use accepting the present you made which if he be a gainer it is fit he should repay. I beg that you will let one of your servants write an exact account of the expense of such an impression and send it with the poem that I may know what I engage for. I am very sensible from your generosity on this occasion of your regard to learning even in its unhappiest state I cannot but think such a temper deserving of the gratitude of those who suffer so often from a contrary disposition. I am, sir, your most humble servant Sam Johnson. To Mr. Cave, no date. Sir, I waited on you to take the copy to Dozzly's as I remember the number of lines which it contains it will be no longer than Eugenio with the quotations which must be subjoined at the bottom part of the beauty of the performance if any beauty be allowed it consisting in adapting juvenile's sentiments to modern facts and persons it will with those additions very conveniently make five sheets and since the expense will be no more I shall contentedly ensure it as I mentioned in my last if it be not therefore gone to Dozzly's I beg it may be sent to me by the penny post that I may have it in the evening I have composed a Greek epigram to Eliza and think she ought to be celebrated in as many different languages as Louis LeGrand Pray send me word when you will begin upon the poem for it is a long way to walk. I would leave my epigram but have not daylight to transcribe it. I am, sir, yours etc. Sam Johnson. To Mr. Cave, no date. Sir, I am extremely obliged by your kind letter and will not fail to attend you tomorrow with Irene, who looks upon you as one of her best friends. I was today with Mr. Dozzly who declares very warmly in favor of the paper you sent him which he desires to have a share in it being, as he says a creditable thing to be concerned in. I knew not what answer to make till I had consulted you nor what do I stand on the author's part but I'm very willing that if you please he should have a part in it as he will undoubtedly be more diligent to disperse and promote it. If you can send me word tomorrow what I shall say to him I will settle matters and bring the poem with me for the press which as the town empties we cannot be too quick with. I am, sir, yours etc. Sam Johnson. To us who have long known manly force, bold spirit and masterly versification of this poem, it is a matter of curiosity to observe the diffidence with which its author brought it forward into public notice while he is so cautious as not to avow it to be his own production and with what humility he offers to allow the printer to alter any stroke of satire which he might dislike. That any such alteration was made we do not know. If we did we would not but feel an indignant regret. But how painful is it to see that a writer of such vigorous powers of mind was actually in such distress that the small profit which so short a poem, however excellent, could yield was courted as a relief. End of section 9 Recorded by Michael Yorshaw, Los Angeles, California