of the palsy, from which he recovered almost entirely. He had, before that, been troubled with a catarrhous cough. This winter he was seized with a spasmodick asthma, by which he has been confined to his house for about three months. Dr. Brocklesby writes. to me, that upon the least admission of cold, there is such a constriction upon his breast, that he cannot lye down in his bed, but is obliged to sit up all night, and gets rest, and sometimes sleep, only by means of laudanum and syrup of poppies; and that there are œdematous tumours on his legs and thighs.

Dr. Brocklesby trusts Dr. Johnson says, that seems to think that a

a good deal to the return of mild weather. a dropsy gains ground upon him; and he warmer climate would do him good. I understand he is now rather better, and is using vinegar of squills. I am, with great esteem, dear Sir,

"March 7, 1784."

"Your most obedient humble servant,

"JAMES BOSWELL.

All of them paid the most polite attention to my letter, and its venerable object. Dr. Cullen's words concerning him were, "It would give me the greatest pleasure to be of any service to a man whom the publick properly esteem, and whom I esteem and respect as much as I do Dr. Johnson." Dr. Hope's, "Few people have a better claim on me than your friend, as hardly a day passes that I do not ask his opinion about this or that word." Dr. Monro's, “I most sincerely join you in sympathizing with that very worthy and ingenious character, from whom his country has derived much instruction and entertainment."

Dr. Hope corresponded with his friend Dr. Brocklesby. Doctors Cullen and Monro wrote their opinions and prescriptions to me, which I afterwards carried with me to London, and, so far as they were encouraging, communicated to Johnson. The liberality on one hand, and grateful sense of it on the other, I have great satisfaction in recording.

To JAMES BOSWELL, Esq.

"DEAR SIR,-I am too much pleased with the attention which you and your dear lady show to my welfare, not to be diligent in letting you know the progress which I make towards health. The dropsy, by GOD's blessing, has now run almost totally away by natural evacuation; and the asthma, if not irritated by cold, gives me little trouble. While I am writing this, I have not any sensa

Who had written him a very kind letter.

tion of debility or disease. But I do not yet venture out, having been confined to the house from the thirteenth of December, now a quarter of a year.

"When it will be fit for me to travel as far as Auchinleck, I am not able to guess; but such a letter as Mrs. Boswell's might draw any man, not wholly motionless, a great way. Pray tell the dear lady how much her civility and kindness have touched and gratified me.

"Our parliamentary tumults have now begun to subside, and the King's authority is in some measure re-established. Mr. Pitt will have great power; but you must remember, that what he has to give must, at least for some time, be given to those who gave, and those who preserve his power. A new minister can sacrifice little to esteem or friendship; he must, till he is settled, think only of extending his interest.

"If you come hither through Edinburgh, send for Mrs. Stewart, and give from me another guinea for the letter in the old case, to which I shall not be satisfied with my claim, till she gives it me.1

1 Here Mr. Croker has discovered what may be called "a mare's nest connected with this little commission. He fancied that Johnson was anxious to get into his possession some compromising piece of evidence relating to some early fraud, though, he strangely adds, "the contradictions and mystery of the case incline me to suspect that Johnson may have taken some personal share in the disaffected movements of that period (1745)!" This theory is solemnly worked out; but the misapprehension upon which it is founded is so extraordinary, that it is worth while giving the whole passage :

"In 1779, he (Boswell) states that he had, as desired by Johnson, 'discovered the sister of Stuart, and given her a guinea for an old pocket-book of her brother's which Dr. Johnson had retained.' But this must have been a total mistake on the part of Boswell; for it appears that the sister had the pocketbook or letter-case in her own possession, and that it was for obtaining it that Johnson offered the guinea. This matter was probably explained in some letters not given; for in April, 1780 (p. 643), Johnson expresses satisfaction at the success of Boswell's transaction with Mrs. Stuart,' by which it may be inferred that Boswell had obtained the

letter-case from her; but the negotiation was not terminated; for four years after, in 1784 (p. 748), Johnson writes to Boswell, I desire you to see Mrs. Stuart once again, and say that in the letter-case was a letter relating to me for which I will give her, if she is willing to give it to me, another guinea: the letter is of consequence only to me.' (p. 750.) The reader now sees that the retention by Johnson of Stewart's old pocket-book, and the scrupulous honesty of paying a guinea in lieu of it, was a total misapprehension on the part of Boswell; and that Johnson really wanted to obtain the pocket-book, which he seems to have gotten, for the sake of a letter it contained which he seems not to have gotten. But what letter could this be of consequence to Dr. Johnson, when on the verge of the grave, yet so long neglected by him; for Stewart had been dead many years? Boswell's original error and his subsequent silence on the subject are very strange."

There is yet a third passage above, "Send for Mrs. Stewart, and give, from me, another guinea for the letter in the old case, to which I shall not be satisfied with my claim till she gives it to me." It is almost absurd dwelling on such a trifle, but the meaning is plain. The whole is merely evidence of John

"Please to bring with you Baxter's Anacreon; and if you procure heads of Hector Boece, the historian, and Arthur Johnston, the poet, I will put them in my room, or any other of the fathers of Scottish literature.

"I wish you an easy and happy journey, and hope I need not tell you that you will be welcome to, dear Sir, your most affectionate humble servant,

"London, March 18, 1784."

"SAM. JOHNSON

I wrote to him, March 28, from York, informing him that I had a high gratification in the triumph of monarchical principles over aristocratical influence, in that great county, in an address to the King; that I was thus far on my way to him, but that news of the dissolution of Parliament having arrived, I was to hasten back to my own county, where I had carried an address to his Majesty by a great majority, and had some intention of being a candidate to represent the county in Parliament.

To JAMES BOSWELL, Esq.

“Dear Sir,—You could do nothing so proper as to haste back when you found the Parliament dissolved. With the influence which your address must have gained you, it may reasonably be expected that your presence will be of importance, and your activity. of effect.

"Your solicitude for me gives me that pleasure which every man feels from the kindness of such a friend; and it is with delight I relieve it by telling, that Dr. Brocklesby's account is true, and that I am, by the blessing of God, wonderfully relieved.

"You are entering upon a transaction which requires much pru

son's tender scrupulousness. The lettercase of his old assistant he had retained, and paid for. Later, he found a letter relating to himself in the pocket, for which, "if she is willing to give to me," i.e., to allow him to keep, he will pay another guinea. He renews this offer (p. 58)

for the letter in the old case, to which I shall not be satisfied with my claim till she gives it to me," i.e., allows him to retain it. Mr. Croker was deluded by the ambiguity of these words, "gives it to me," into supposing that pocket-book and letter had never left the woman's hands, that Mr. Boswell was 66 under a total misapprehension," and that only some terrible mystery in Johnson's life could make the matter consistent.

1 In the year after Johnson's death the indefatigable Mr. Boswell got up an address from his tenants, which he presented in person. "At the Court at St. James's, June 24, the following address was presented to the King by James Boswell, Esq., being introduced by the Lord-in-Waiting. It was most graciously received, and Mr. Boswell had afterwards the honour to kiss his majesty's hand :

"The humble address of the tenants and others residing upon the estate of James Boswell, Esq, of Auchinleck, Ayrshire."

66

Signed by 289 men all fit to bear arms in defence of their king and country."

dence. You must endeavour to oppose without exasperating; to practise temporary hostility, without producing enemies for life. This is, perhaps, hard to be done; yet it has been done by many, and seems most likely to be effected by opposing merely upon general principles, without descending to personal or particular censures or objections. One thing I must enjoin you, which is seldom observed in the conduct of elections ;-I must entreat you to be scrupulous in the use of strong liquors. One night's drunkenness may defeat the labours of forty days well employed. Be firm, but not clamorous; be active, but not malicious; and you may form such an interest, as may not only exalt yourself, but dignify your family.

Mr. Fox resolutely carry the election.

"We are, as you may suppose, all busy here. stands for Westminster, and his friends say will However that be, he will certainly have a seat. Mr. Hoole has just told me, that the city leans towards the King.

"Let me hear, from time to time, how you are employed,1 and what progress you make.

"Make dear Mrs. Boswell, and all the young Boswells, the sincere compliments of, Sir, your affectionate humble servant,

"London, March 30, 1784."

"SAM. JOHNSON.

To Mr. Langton he wrote with that cordiality which was suitable to the long friendship which had subsisted between him and that gentleman.

March 27. Since you left me, I have continued in my own opinion, and in Dr. Brocklesby's, to grow better with respect to all my formidable and dangerous distempers; though to a body battered and shaken as mine has lately been, it is to be feared that weak attacks may be sometimes mischievous. I have, indeed, by standing carelessly at an open window, got a very troublesome cough, which it has been necessary to appease by opium, in larger quantities than I like to take, and I have not found it give way so readily as I expected; its obstinacy, however, seems at last disposed to submit to the remedy, and I know not whether I should then have

1 How Mr. Boswell was employed will be seen from what follows:-"I intend," he wrote to Percy, March 8, 1784, "to be in London about the end of this month, chiefly to attend upon Dr. Johnson with respectful attention. I wish to publish, as a regale to him, a neat little volume, 'The Praises of Dr. Johnson by contemporary Writers.'

It will be

about the size of Selden's Table Talk,' of which your Lordship made me a present, with an inscription on the blank leaf in front, which does me honour. It is placed in the library at Auchinleck. Will your Lordship take the trouble to send me a note of the writers you recollect have praised our much respected friend?"

a right to complain of any morbid sensation. My asthma is, I am afraid, constitutional and incurable; but it is only occasional, and unless it be excited by labour or by cold, gives me no molestation, nor does it lay very close siege to life; for Sir John Floyer, whom the physical race consider as authour of one of the best books upon it, panted on to ninety, as was supposed; and why were we content with supposing a fact so interesting, of a man so conspicuous, because he corrupted, at perhaps seventy or eighty, the register, that he might pass for younger than he was? He was not much less than eighty, when to a man of rank who modestly asked him his age, he answered, 'Go look;' though he was in general a man of civility and elegance.

"The ladies, I find, are at your house all well, except Miss Langton, who will probably soon recover her health by light suppers. Let her eat at dinner as she will, but not take a full stomach to bed. Pay my sincere respects to the two principal ladies in your house; and when you write to dear Miss Langton in Lincolnshire, let her know that I mean not to break our league of friendship, and that I have a set of Lives for her, when I have the means of sending it."

April 8. "I am still disturbed by my cough; but what thanks have I not to pay, when my cough is the most painful sensation that I feel? and from that I expect hardly to be released, while winter continues to gripe us with so much pertinacity. The year has now advanced eighteen days beyond the equinox, and still there is very little remission of the cold. When warm weather comes, which surely must come at last, I hope it will help both me and your young lady.

"The man so busy about addresses is neither more nor less than our own Boswell, who had come as far as York towards London, but turned back on the dissolution, and is said now to stand for some place. Whether to wish him success, his best

friends hesitate.

"Let me have your prayers for the completion of my recovery ; I am now better than I ever expected to have been. May God add to his mercies the grace that may enable me to use them according to his will. My compliments to all." April 13.

"I had this evening a note from Lord Portmore,"

To which Johnson returned this answer:

To the Right Honourable Earl of PORTMORE.

"DR. JOHNSON acknowledges with great respect the honour of Lord Portmore's notice. He is better than he was; and will, as his Lordship directs, write to Mr. Langton.

"Bolt-court, Fleet-street, Apr. 13, 1784."