Page images
PDF
EPUB

Thus, 21st July, 1735,1 “I trouble you with the enclosed, because you said you could easily correct what is herein given for Lord C―ld's speech. I beg you will do so as soon as you can for me, because the month is far advanced."

And, 15th July, 1737. "As you remember the Debates so far as to perceive the speeches already printed are not exact, I beg the favour that you will peruse the enclosed, and, in the best manner your memory will serve, correct the mistaken passages, or add anything that is omitted. I should be very glad to have something of the Duke of N-le's speech, which would be particularly of

service.

"A gentleman has Lord Bathurst's speech to add something to." And, July 3, 1744, "You will see what stupid, low, abominable stuff is put upon your noble and learned friend's character, such as I should quite reject, and endeavour to do something better towards doing justice to the character. But as I cannot expect to attain my desires in that respect, it would be a great satisfaction to me, as well as an honour to our work, to have the favour of the genuine speech. It is a method that several have been pleased to take, as I could show, but I think myself under a restraint. I shall say so far, that I have had some by a third hand, which I understood well enough to come from the first; others by penny-post, and others by the speakers themselves, who have been pleased to visit St. John's Gate, and shew particular marks of their being pleased."

It

There is no reason, I believe, to doubt the veracity of Cave. is, however, remarkable, that none of these letters are in the years during which Johnson alone furnished the Debates, and one of I suppose in another compilation of the same kind. b Doubtless, Lord Hardwick.

c Birch's MSS. in the British Museum, 4302.

which Cave, Warren the Birmingham printer, and Dr. James were commercially interested. Mr. Croker professed that he was unable to throw any light on the transaction, but the Rev. Mr. Elwin has pointed out to me a passage in the "Life of Samuel Crompton," where some light is thrown on the matter. Paul had invented a machine for spinning wool and cotton by the use of rollers. A patent was taken out in 1738, to carry out which money was borrowed from James, Warren, Čave, and others. Disputes arose as to the re-payment, in which Johnson acted as umpire, and which seem to have been settled by the inventors, in 1740, granting licences to the

different parties. The most interesting fact, however, is that Miss Swinfen, afterwards the Mrs. Desmoulins of Johnson's household, had become Paul's pupil, for the purpose of learning the process, and contributed 200l. Among Paul's papers was found a draft of a petition to the Duke of Bedford, drawn up by Johnson.-See French's Life of Crompton, p. 249.

1 On reference to the original MS., British Museum, 127, I find that this date should be 1737. The allusion is to a celebrated speech on the Licensing Act, which is certainly very much in Johnson's style.

them is in the very year after he ceased from that labour. Johnson told me, that as soon as he found that the speeches were thought genuine, he determined that he would write no more of them, for "he would not be accessary to the propagation of falshood." And such was the tenderness of his conscience, that a short time before his death he expressed a regret for his having been the authour of fictions, which had passed for realities.1

He nevertheless agreed with me in thinking, that the Debates which he had framed were to be valued as Orations upon questions of publick importance. They have accordingly been collected in volumes, properly arranged, and recommended to the notice of parliamentary speakers by a Preface, written by no inferiour hand." I must, however, observe, that although there is in those Debates a wonderful store of political information, and very powerful eloquence, I cannot agree that they exhibit the manner of each particular speaker, as Sir John Hawkins seems to think. But, indeed, what opinion can we have of his judgement, and taste in publick speaking, who presumes to give, as the characteristicks of two celebrated orators, "the deep-mouthed rancour of Pulteney, and the yelping pertinacity of Pitt."

This year I find that his tragedy of IRENE had been for some time ready for the stage, and that his necessities made him desirous

I am well assured, that the editor is Mr. George Chalmers, whose commercial works are well known and esteemed.

b Hawkins's Life of Johnson, p. 100.

'Johnson would thus seem first to have edited (from 1738 to 1740), then to have entirely written (until 1743), these Parliamentary reports. Though much praised at the time, they are artificial compositions, contain hardly any facts, and, indeed, resemble those exercises on Scotch law which he later wrote for Boswell. This can be seen by comparing them with the Secker notes, given in the collections of parliamentary debates. Thus, on the motion for the removal of Sir R. Walpole, Lord Hardwicke urged that mere rumours and reports were no ground for charges against a public man-a topic which was epitomized in the Secker notes "common fame no ground for, &c.," an exordium of a powerful argument, dealing with instances of improper ap pointments, corruption, and foreign administration. Johnson, however, taking "common fame as a "topic," branched out into an elaborate essay, many pages leng, such as he would have written in

[ocr errors]

as

his Rambler, and which, excepting the four words, "France," "; Spain," "Dale," and "Vienna," does not contain a single name or fact referring to the particular case in hand. But a more curious instance is the well known" Mr. Pitt's reply to Horace Walpole." When this was extolled at one of Foote's dinnerparties, in presence of a large company, as equal to anything Demosthenes ever wrote, Johnson astonished the party by the confession, that "he had written it himself in a garret." One of Cave's emissaries in the house no doubt reported that Walpole had taunted some of the speakers with their youth, and that Pitt had retorted on the defects of old age. These hints Johnson expanded into an imaginary attack and reply as vigorous as he could write them. What really took place is given in Coxe's "Life of Walpole," from the report of Lord Sidney, whose father was present, According to him, Pitt began ironically: "With the greatest reverence for the

of getting as much as he could for it, without delay; for there is the following letter from Mr. Cave to Dr. Birch, in the same volume of manuscripts in the British Museum from whence I copied those above quoted. They were most obligingly pointed out to me by Sir William Musgrave, one of the Curators of that noble repository.

"Sept. 9, 1741.

"I HAVE put Mr. Johnson's play into Mr. Gray's hands, in order to sell it to him, if he is inclined to buy it; but I doubt whether he will or not. He would dispose of the copy, and whatever advantage may be made by acting it. Would your society," or any gentleman or body of men that you know, take such a bargain? He and I are very unfit to deal with theatrical persons. Fleetwood was to have acted it last season, but Johnson's diffidence or prevented it."

[ocr errors]

I have already mentioned that "Irene was not brought into publick notice till Garrick was manager of Drury-lane theatre.

In 1742 he wrote for the Gentleman's Magazine the "Preface," † the "Parliamentary Debates," "Essay on the Account of the Conduct of the Duchess of Marlborough," then the popular topick of conversation. This Essay is a short but masterly performance. We find him in No. 13 of his Rambler, censuring a profligate

A bookseller of London.

It is strange, that a printer who knew so much as Cave, should conceive so ludicrous a fancy as that the Royal Society would purchase a Play.

There is no erasure here, but a mere blank; to fill up which may be an exercise for ingenious conjecture.

Cor. et Ad.-Dele. note marked b, and read as follows:-"Not the Royal Society, but the Society for the encouragement of learning, of which Dr. Birch was a leading member. Their object was, to assist authours in printing expensive works. It existed from about 1735 to 1746, when, having incurred a considerable debt, it was dissolved.'

[ocr errors]

grey hairs of the honourable gentleman,' on which Walpole pulled off his wig and exhibited his white hairs, producing a universal laugh, in which Pitt joined. "Thus all warmth subsided." No wonder therefore that Johnson cautioned Smollett against using any of these valueless materials for his history. He had taken care, too, as he owned at Foote's dinner, that "the WHIG DOGS" should not have the best of it. Later, he wrote, in 1756, the frank confession, that "the speeches have been long known to be fictitious, and produced by men who never heard the debates, nor had any authentic information. We have no design to impose thus grossly on our readers." Finally, a few days before his death, he declared

...

solemnly that "the only part of his writings which then gave him any compunction was his account of the debates in the magazine; but that at the time he wrote them he did not think he was imposing on the world. The mode," he said, "was to fix upon a speaker's name, and then conjure up an answer." -(Nichol's Lit. Anec.) One of the most unfortunate consequences of this literary feat has been that these spurious debates have been included in the parliamentary series of reports by the Hansards, and that they have been repeatedly quoted in historical works, or by foreign

writers.

The "ludicrous fancy" was, therefore, Boswell's own.

sentiment in that "Account;" and again insisting upon it strenuously in conversation." "An Account of the Life of Peter Burman," I believe chiefly taken from a foreign publication; as, indeed, he could not himself know much about Burman; "Additions to his Life of Baretier; "The Life of Sydenham,' afterwards prefixed to Dr. Swan's edition of his works; "Proposals for printing Bibliotheca Harleiana, or a Catalogue of the Library of the Earl of Oxford."* His account of that celebrated collection

[ocr errors]

of books, in which he displays the importance to literature, of what the French call a catalogue raisonnée, when the subjects of it are extensive and various, and it is executed with ability, cannot fail to impress all his readers with admiration of his philological attainments. It was afterwards prefixed to the first volume of the Catalogue, in which the Latin accounts of books were written by him. He was employed in this business by Mr. Thomas Osborne the bookseller, who purchased the library for 13,000l., a sum, which Mr. Oldys says, in one of his manuscripts, was not more than the binding of the books had cost; yet, as Dr. Johnson assured me, the slowness of the sale was such, that there was not much gained by it. It has been confidently related, with many embellishments, that Johnson one day knocked Osborne down in his shop, with a folio, and put his foot upon his neck. The simple truth I had from Johnson himself. Sir, he was impertinent to me, and I beat him. But it was not in his shop: it was in my own chamber." 2

66

A very diligent observer may trace him where we should not easily suppose him to be found. I have no doubt that he wrote the little abridgement entitled " Foreign History," in the Magazine for December. To prove it, I shall quote the introduction. "As this is that season of the year in which Nature may be said to command a suspension of hostilities, and which seems intended, by putting a short stop to violence and slaughter, to afford time for malice to relent, and animosity to subside; we can scarce expect any other accounts than of plans, negociations and treaties, of proposals for peace, and preparations for war." As also this passage: "Let those who despise the capacity of the Swiss, tell Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 3d edit. p. 167.

For the mere binding of the collection Lord Oxford had paid 18,000l.

2 He found Johnson too slow and conscientious in the performance of his task. "Seeing him one day deeply engaged in perusing a book, he reproached him with inattention and delay in such coarse language as few men would use. other, in his justification, asserted some

The

39

what, which Osborne answered by giving him the lie." Then followed the blow, with or without the folio, "with some exclamation, which, as it is differently related, I will not venture to repeat.' -(Sir J. Hawkins.) It is stated that the identical folio was the "Biblia Græca Septuaginta," 1594, Frankfort.-Nich. Literary Anecdotes, v. 8, 445.

us by what wonderful policy, or by what happy conciliation of interests, it is brought to pass, that in a body made up of different communities and different religions, there should be no civil commotions, though the people are so warlike, that to nominate and raise an army is the same."

I am obliged to Mr. Astle for his ready permission to copy the two following letters, of which the originals are in his possession. Their contents shew that they were written about this time, and that Johnson was now engaged in preparing an historical account of the British Parliament.

To Mr. CAVE.

[No date.]

"SIR,-I believe I am going to write a long letter, and have therefore taken a whole sheet of paper. The first thing to be written about is our historical design.

"You mentioned the proposal of printing in numbers, as an alteration in the scheme, but I believe you mistook, some way or other, my meaning; I had no other view than that you might rather print too many of five sheets, than of five and thirty.

"With regard to what I shall say on the manner of proceeding, I would have it understood as wholly indifferent to me, and my opinion only, not my resolution. Emptoris sit eligere. "I think the insertion of the exact dates of the most important events in the margin, or of so many events as may enable the reader to regulate the order of facts with sufficient exactness, the proper medium between a journal which has regard only to time, and a history which ranges facts according to their dependence on each other, and postpones or anticipates according to the convenience of narration. I think the work ought to partake of the spirit of history, which is contrary to minute exactness, and of the regularity of a journal, which is inconsistent with spirit. For this reason, I neither admit numbers or dates, nor reject them.

"I am of your opinion with regard to placing most of the resolutions, &c. in the margin, and think we shall give the most complete account of parliamentary proceedings that can be contrived. The naked papers, without an historical treatise interwoven, require some other book to make them understood. I will date the succeeding facts with some exactness, but I think in the margin. You told me on Saturday that I had received money on this work, and found set down 13l. 2s. 6d. reckoning the half guinea of last Saturday. As you hinted to me that you had many calls for money, I would not press you too hard, and therefore shall desire

« PreviousContinue »