period to a relation, and now in the possession of no doubt that he was insensibly furnishing his Mr. John Nichols :

SCHEME FOR THE CLASSES OF A

GRAMMAR SCHOOL.

mind with various knowledge; but I have not discovered that he wrote any thing 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. Walmesley, who ob

"When the introduction, or formation of nouns and verbs, is perfectly mastered, let them learn "Corderius by Mr. Clarke, beginning at the same time to translate out of the introduction, that by this means they may learn the syntax.jected to his having already brought his heroine Then let them proceed to

"Erasmus, with an English translation, by the same author.

"Class II. Learns Eutropius and Cornelius Nepos, or Justin, with the translation.

N.B. 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 Eutropius; 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 III. Ovid's Metamorphoses in the morning, and Cæsar's Commentaries in the after

noon.

"Practice in the Latin rules till they are perfect in them; afterwards in Mr. Leeds's 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 Horace, &c., 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 languages, till you go to the university. The Greek authors I think it best for you to read

are these:

Cebes.
Ælian.

"Thus you will be tolerably skilled in all the dialects, beginning with the Attic, to which the rest must be referred.

into great distress, and asked him, "How can you contrive to plunge her into deeper calamity?" Johnson, in sly allusion to the supposed oppressive proceedings of the court of which Mr. Walmesley was registrar, replied, "Sir, I can put her into the Spiritual Court!"

Mr. Walmesley, however, was well pleased with this proof of Johnson's abilities as a dramatic writer, and advised him to finish the tragedy and produce it on the stage.

CHAPTER III.—1737—1738.

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 intent to complete his education, and follow the profession of the law, from which he was soon diverted by his decided preference for the stage.

This joint expedition of those two eminent men to the metropolis, was many years afterwards noticed in an allegorical poem on Shakspeare's Mulberry-tree, by Mr. Lovibond, the ingenious author of "The Tears of Old May-day."

They were recommended to Mr. Colson,† an eminent mathematician and master of an academy, by the following letter from Mr. Walmesley:

"TO THE REVEREND MR. COLSON. "DEAR SIR, Lichfield, March 2, 1737. "I had 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

Both of them used to talk pleasantly of this their first journey to London. Garrick, evidently meaning to em. "In the study of Latin, it is proper not to read bellish a little, said one day in my hearing, "We rode the latter authors, till you are well versed with and tied." And the Bishop of Killaloe (Dr. Barnard) those of the purest ages; as Terence, Tully, Garrick were dining together in a pretty large company, informed me, that at another time, when Johnson and Cæsar, Sallust, Nepos, Velleius Paterculus, Vir-Johnson humorously ascertaining the chronology of gil, Horace, Phædrus. something, expressed himself thus: "That was the year "The greatest and most necessary task still when I came to London with twopence halfpenny in my remains, to attain a habit of expression, without what do you say; with twopence halfpenny in you pocket." Garrick overhearing him, exclaimed, "Eh which knowledge is of little use. This is neces-pocket ?"-Johnson: "Why, yes; when I came with sary in Latin, and more necessary in English; twopence halfpenny in my pocket, and thou, Davy, with and can only be acquired by a daily imitation of three halfpence in thine."-BOSWELL. the best and correctest authors.

"SAM. JOHNSON."

While Johnson kept his academy, there can be

+ The Reverend John Colson was bred at Emanuel College, Cambridge, and in 1728, when George the Second visited the University, was created Master of Arts. About that time he became First Master of the Free School at Rochester, founded by Sir Joseph

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 will turn out a fine tragedy-writer. If it should in any way lie in your way, doubt not but you would be ready to recommend and assist your countryman.

whom he knew at Birmingham, and who had practised 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 coffeehouse, he might be for some hours every day in very good company; he might dine for sixpence, breakfast on bread and milk for a penny, and do without supper. On clean-shirt-day he went I have heard him more How he employed himself upon his first coming abroad, and paid visits." to London is not particularly known.* I never than once talk of his frugal friend, whom he reheard that he found any protection or encourage-like to have one smile at the recital. "This man," collected with esteem and kindness, and did not ment by the means of Mr. Colson, to whose academy David Garrick went. Mrs. Lucy Porter told me, that Mr. Walmesley gave him a letter of introduction to Lintot, 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.

"G. WALMESLEY."

very

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 eightpence, with good company, at the Pine-Apple, 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 a shilling, for they drank wine; but I had a cut of meat for sixpence, 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 Ofellus, in the "Art of Living in London," I have heard him relate, was an Irish painter,

Williamson. In 1739, he was appointed Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in the University of Cambridge, on the death of Professor Sanderson, and held that office till 1759, when he died. He published Lectures on Experimental Philosophy, translated from the French of l'Abbé Nodet, 8vo, 1732, and some other tracts. Our author, it is believed, was mistaken in stating him to have been Master of an Academy. Garrick, probably, during his short residence at Rochester, lived in his house as a private pupil."-BOSWELL.

said he, 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 returned the horse, and probably the ten pounds West Chester, in order to get to Ireland. He too, after he got home."

the early part of his life, and particularly at the Considering Johnson's narrow circumstances in interesting æra 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 at Lichfield 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 genteel company. Not very long before his death, he mentioned this, among other particulars of his life, which he was kindly communicating to me;

The Honourable Henry Hervey, third son of the first The character of Gelidus, the philosopher, in the Earl of Bristol, quitted the army and took orders. He "Rambler" (No. 24), was meant to represent this gen- married a sister of Sir Thomas Ayston, by whom he got tleman. See Mrs. Piozzi's Anecdotes, &c., p. 49-the Aston Estate, and assumed the name and arms of that family.-BOSWELL.

MALONE.

1

One curious anecdote was communicated by himself to Mr. John Nichols. Mr. Wilcox the bookseller, on being informed by him that his intention was to get his livelihood as an author, eyed his robust frame attentively, and with a significant look, said, "You had better buy a porter's knot." He however added, "Wilcox was one of my best friends."-BOSWELL.

Ofellus was a philosophic countryman, commemorated by Horace, Sat. ii. lib. 2.-BOSWELL.

The Honourable Henry Hervey was nearly of the same age with Johnson, having been born about nine months before him, in the year 1709. He married Catherine, the sister of Sir Thomas Aston, in 1739; and as that lady had seven sisters, she probably succeeded to the Aston estate on the death of her brother under his will. Mr. Hervey took the degree of Master of Arts at Cambridge, at the late age of thirty-five, in 1774; about which time, it is believed, he entered into holy orders.-MALONE

C 2

DEMETRIUS.

A thousand horrid prodigies foretold it;
A feeble government, eluded laws,
A factious populace, luxurious nobles,
And all the maladies of sinking States.
When public villany, 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 despatch the messengers of light,
Or wake the dead, to warn us of its fall?"

[*] MAHOMET (to IRENE). "I have tried thee, and joy to find that thou deservest to be loved by Mahomet, -with a mind 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 colours 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 colours 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 ob

serves,

"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 Lichfield, 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 Lichfield, 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."*

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 patronised 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 Sylvanus Urban, had attracted the notice and esteem of Johnson, in an eminent 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 lustre by the various admirable Essays which he wrote

for it.

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 He now removed to London with Mrs. Johnson; have remembered every one of them, as they but her daughter, who had lived with them at were so numerous, so various, and scattered in Edial, was left with her relations in the country. such a multiplicity of unconnected publications; His lodgings were for some time in Woodstock-nay, several of them published under the names street, near Hanover-square, and afterwards in of other persons, to whom he liberally contributed Castle-street, near Cavendish-square. As some- from the abundance of his mind. We must, thing pleasingly interesting, to many, in tracing so therefore, be content to discover them, partly great a man through all his different habitations, from occasional information given by him to his shall, before this work is concluded, present my friends, and partly from internal evidence.* readers with an exact list of his lodgings and houses, in order of time, which, in placid condescension to my respectful curiosity, he one

'Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides."-BOSWELL.

* While in the course of my narrative I enumerate his left to waver in doubt, between certainty and conjecture, writings, I shall take care that my readers shall not be with regard to their authenticity; and, for that purpose, shall mark with an asterisk [*] those which he acknow