286

A FINE REBUKE.

JOHNSON: "She is better employed at her toilet than using her pen. It is better she should be reddening her own cheeks, than blackening other people's characters."

Speaking of a certain gentleman, he observed: "He never clarified his notions, by filtrating them through other minds. He had a canal upon his estate, where at one place the bank was too low. I dug the canal deeper,' said he."

Johnson took a man's measure with amazing rapidity, and did not leave the spot either till he had made him a suit of clothes of the closest fit; and, to crown the whole, both man and measure he carried about with him for evermore.

Nor was this mental and moral tailoring confined to the gentlemen whom he met; of the characters and manners of the ladies also he was a severe critic and a stern judge. "I don't like to fly," said Mrs. Thrale once, with a little air of affectation.

JOHNSON: "With your wings, Madam, you must fly; but have a care, there are clippers abroad." Were ever grace and moral dignity more beautifully combined than in that kingly rebuke?

JOHNSON: "Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his Son, I think, might be made a very pretty book. Take out the immorality, and it should be put in the hands of every young gentleman. An elegant manner and easiness of behaviour are acquired gradually and imperceptibly. No man can say, I'll be genteel.' There are ten genteel women for one genteel man, because they are more restrained. A man without some degree of restraint is insufferable; but we are all less restrained than women. Were a woman sitting in company to put out her legs before her as most men do, we should be tempted to kick them in."

On another occasion, speaking of these same Letters, he observed: "Every man of any education would rather be called a rascal than accused of deficiency in the graces." Mr. Gibbon, who was present, turned to a lady who knew Johnson well, and, in his quaint manner, tapping his box, addressed her thus: "Don't you think, Madam (looking towards Johnson), that among all your acquaintance you could find one exception ?" The lady smiled, and seemed to acquiesce.

JOHNSON AND MADAME DE BOUFFLERS. 287

But the truth is, Johnson was not so much deficient in the graces themselves as devoid of instruments to bring them into play; the force of politeness was there, but its functional activity had somehow got deranged; he had the very "soul" of refinement within him, but its "limbs and outward flourishes" were often most primitive and uncouth. Perhaps the richest illustration of all this on record is the description which Beauclerk used to give of the Doctor's extraordinary attempt to do the honours of his house to a grand French lady, who had distinguished him by a visit. We give the description in the wag's own words:" When Madame de Boufflers was first in England, she was desirous to see Johnson. I accordingly went with her to his chambers in the Temple, where she was entertained with his conversation for some time. When our visit was over, she and I left him, and were got into Inner Temple Lane, when all at once I heard a noise like thunder. This was occasioned by Johnson, who, it seems, upon a little recollection, had taken it into his head that he ought to have done the honours of his literary residence to a foreign lady of quality, and, eager to show himself a man of gallantry, was hurrying down the staircase in violent agitation. He overtook us before we reached the Temple-gate, and, brushing in between me and Madame de Boufflers, seized her hand, and conducted her to her coach. His dress was a rusty-brown morning suit, a pair of old shoes by way of slippers, a little shrivelled wig sticking on the top of his head, and the sleeves of his shirt and the knees of his breeches hanging loose. A considerable crowd of people gathered round, and were not a little struck by his singular appearance."

Of General Oglethorpe's talk the Doctor observed: "Oglethorpe, Sir, never completes what he has to say."

He made a similar remark on Patrick Lord Elibank: "Sir, there is nothing conclusive in his talk."

Lord Elibank's judgment of the Doctor's talk was quite the reverse; he once said: "Whatever opinion Johnson maintains, I will not say that he convinces me; but he never fails to show me that he has good reasons for it."

288

JOHNSON A CAPITAL STORY-TELLER.

The Doctor, annoyed at hearing a gentleman ask Mr. Levett a number of questions about him when he himself was sitting by, burst forth: "Sir, you have but two topics, yourself and me. I am sick of both. A man should not talk of himself, nor much of any particular person. He should take care not to be made a proverb; and therefore should avoid having any one topic of which people can say, 'We shall hear him upon it.' There was a Dr. Oldfield, who was always talking of the Duke of Marlborough. He came into a coffee-house one day, and told that his Grace had spoken in the House of Lords for half an hour. Did he indeed speak for half an hour?' said Belchier, the surgeon.-'Yes,'-' And what did he say of Dr. Oldfield?'-'Nothing.'—'Why, then, Sir, he was very ungrateful; for Dr. Oldfield could not have spoken for a quarter of an hour, without saying something of him.""

Mark how admirably Johnson carries his anecdotes; the reader always feels that any story is improved by his telling of it.

--

A

On Monday, April 29th (1776), the Doctor made an excursion from Bath, where he was then residing with the Thrales, to Bristol -that he might inquire on the spot into the authenticity of “Rowley's Poems," as poor Chatterton had styled his forged verses. Bristol pewterer, who was a zealous believer in the real Rowley, called upon our Author at his inn -sure of securing a proselyte. "I'll make Dr. Johnson a convert," he exclaimed, in the simplicity of his heart, and in pure ignorance, we may presume, of the whole Macpherson-Ossian controversy. The Doctor, at the pewterer's request, read aloud some of Chatterton's verses; the admiring enthusiast standing behind his chair all the while, swaying his body to and fro like a pendulum, making his feet keep time to the Doctor's melodious intonations, and every now and then peering into the reader's face to see if any marks of awakening faith were making their appearance there. But the Doctor's scepticism was not to be shaken by all the power of antique versification. He must see the famous chest itself, then, in which the manuscripts were found; that would convince him, if anything might. The Doctor accordingly laboured up a long stair, panting at every step, till he and his conductor reached the sacred spot.

JOHNSON ON CHATTERTON.

289

"There," said the honest pewterer, "there is the very chest itself." The force of logic could no further go; and our Author was graciously permitted to retire after this overwhelming proof of the authenticity of the clever productions.

Johnson afterwards said of Chatterton (not to the faithful pewterer, though): "This is the most extraordinary young man that has encountered my knowledge. It is wonderful how the whelp has written such things."

290

A DANGEROUS EXPERIMENT.

CHAPTER XXXI.

A MOMENTOUS NEGOTIATION--THE DOCTOR AND JOHN WILKESPOLITICS ROUTED BY POLITENESS.

(1776).

SHORTLY after Johnson's return to town, our friend Boswell— always busy-began to concoct a deep and subtle plot which might have resulted in destroying the Doctor's peace of mind effectually.

Of all our Author's political opponents, the one he hated most, and had written against with the greatest fierceness, was John Wilkes, the famous demagogue, who had, some time ago, set the kingdom flaming with pamphlets, libels, satires, and other machinery of political warfare. Of this man the Doctor could never even think but with disgust, or speak but with extreme bitterness. Yet these two-be the consequences what they might-the cunning schemer resolved to bring together: partly from mere curiosity to see the issue, and partly from a real desire to make two famous enemies friends. It was a dangerous experiment: for, although Wilkes was a thoroughly good-humoured fellow, the other was explosive material of the most combustible nature; and the best-tempered man in the world may innocently take a match too near a powder-magazine. Moreover, if this magazine happens to be human, there is always the possibility of self-explosion. Still, the attempt shall be made, and boldly: high Tory and low Radical shall be forced to strike hands like brothers: extremes shall be compelled to meet, and no collision ensue: "if it is only difficult, it is done already-if it is impossible, it shall be done." We must allow Boswell to give an account of his own generalship : he did the deed, let him also tell the story: it is not often that Achilles can be his own Homer.