which we commonly see in people afflicted with sickness. He did not hide his head from the world, in solitary abstraction; he did not deny himself to the visits of his friends and acquaintances; but at all times, when he was not overcome by sleep, was ready for conversation as in his best days.

TO MRS. LUCY PORTER, IN LICHFIELD.

'LONDON, Nov. 29, 1783. 'DEAR MADAM,-You may, perhaps, think me negligent that I have not written to you again upon the loss of your brother; but condolences and consolations are such common and such useless things, that the omission of them is no great crime and my own diseases occupy my mind, and engage my care. My nights are miserably restless, and my days, therefore, are heavy. I try, however, to hold up my head as high as I can.

I am sorry that your health is impaired; perhaps the spring and the summer may, in some degree, restore it; but if not, we must submit to the inconveniences of time, as to the other dispensations of Eternal Goodness. Pray for me, and write to me, or let Mr. Pearson write for you.-I am, etc., 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

CHAPTER LIX.

1784.

AND now I am arrived at the last year of the life of SAMUEL JOHNSON; a year in which, although passed in severe indisposition, he nevertheless gave many evidences of the continuance of those wondrous powers of mind, which raised him so high in the intellectual world. His conversation and his letters of this year were in no respect inferior to those of former years.

The following is a remarkable proof of his being alive to the most minute curiosities of literature:

'TO MR. DILLY, BOOKSELLER, IN THE

POULTRY.

'Jan. 6, 1781. 'SIR,-There is in the world a set of books

disappoint friends, and if they are not very good-natured, to disoblige them, is one of the evils of sickness. If you will please to let me know which of the afternoons in this week I shall be favoured with another visit by you and Mrs. Perkins, and the young people, I will take all the measures that I can to be pretty well at that time.-I am, dear sir, your most humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

His attention to the Essex Head Club appears from the following letter to Mr Alderman Clark, a gentleman for whom he deservedly entertained a great regard :

'TO RICHARD CLARK, ESQ.

'Jan. 27, 1784. 'DEAR SIR,--You will receive a requisition, according to the rules of the Club, to be at the house as president of the night. This turn comes once a month, and the member is obliged to attend, or send another in his place. You were enrolled in the Club by my invitation, and I ought to introduce you; but as I am hindered by sickness, Mr. Hoole will very properly supply my place as introductor, or yours as president. I hope in milder weather to be a very constant attendant.-I am, sir, etc.,

'SAM. JOHNSON.

'You ought to be informed that the forfeits began with the year, and that every night of non-attendance incurs the mulct of threepence; that is, ninepence a week.'

On the 8th of January I wrote to him, anxiously inquiring as to his health, and enclosing my Letter to the People of Scotland on the present State of the Nation.

'I trust,' said I, that you will be liberal enough to make allowance for my differing from you on two points (the Middlesex election and the American War), when my general principles of government are according to your own heart, and when, at a crisis of doubtful event, I stand forth with honest zeal as an ancient and faithful Briton. My reason for introducing those two points was, that as my opinions with regard to them had been declared at the periods when

they were least favourable, I might have the credit of a man who is not a worshipper of mini

TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

'TO MR. PERKINS.

'Jan. 21, 1784. 'DEAR SIR,-I was very sorry not to see you when you were so kind as to call on me; but to

'Feb. 11, 1784.

'DEAR SIR,-I hear of many inquiries which your kindness has disposed you to make after me. I have long intended you a long letter, which perhaps the imagination of its length hindered me from beginning. I will therefore content myself with a shorter.

'Having promoted the institution of a new Club in the neighbourhood, at the house of an old servant of Thrale's, I went thither to meet

'Return Sir Alexander Dick my sincere thanks for his kind letter; and bring with you the rhubarb which he so tenderly offers me.

'I hope dear Mrs. Boswell is now quite well, and that no evil, either real or imaginary, now disturbs you.-I am, etc.,

"SAM. JOHNSON.'

I also applied to three of the eminent physicians who had chairs in our celebrated school of medicine at Edinburgh, Drs. Cullen, Hope, and Munro, to each of whom I sent the following letter:

'March 7, 1784.

'DEAR SIR,-Dr. Johnson has been very ill for some time; and in a letter of anxious apprehension he writes to me, "Ask your physicians about my case."

"This, you see, is not authority for a regular consultation: but I have no doubt of your readiness to give your advice to a man so eminent, and who, in his Life of Garth, has paid your profession a just and elegant compliment: "I believe every man has found in physicians great liberality and dignity of sentiment, very prompt effusions of beneficence, and willingness to exert a lucrative art where there is no hope of lucre." 'Dr. Johnson is aged seventy-four. Last summer he had a stroke 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 spasmodic 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 lie 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 oedematous tumours in his legs and thighs. Dr. Brocklesby trusts a good deal to the return of mild weather. Dr. Johnson says that a dropsy gains ground upon him; and he seems to think that a 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, 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 public 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. Munro'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 Munro 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 the one hand, and grateful sense of it on the other, I have great satisfaction in recording.

TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

'LONDON, March 18, 1784. '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 sensation of debility or disease. But I do not yet venture out, having been confined to the house, from the 13th 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 Mr. Pitt will have measure re-established. 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 inte

rest.

'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.

'Please to bring with you Baxter's Anacreon; and if you procure heads of Hector Boëce, 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, '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 country, where I had carried an Ad

dress 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.

'LONDON, March 30, 1784. DEAR SIR,-You could do nothing so proper as to hasten 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 prudence. 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.

'We are, as you may suppose, all busy here.

Mr. Fox resolutely stands for Westminster, and his friends say will carry the election. 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, and what progress you make.

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

'SAM. JOHNSON.'

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

man:

'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 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 author 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 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 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. beyond the equinox, and still there is very little The year has now advanced eighteen days

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,' desiring that I would give you an account

To which Johnson returned this answer:'TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE EARL OF PORTMORE. 'BOLT COURT, FLEET STREET, April 13, 1784. '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.'-BOSWELL.

of my health. You might have had it with less circumduction. I am, by God's blessing, I believe, free from all morbid sensations, except a. cough, which is only troublesome. But I am still weak, and can have no great hope of strength till the weather shall be softer. The summer, if it be kindly, will, I hope, enable me to support the winter. Gon, who has so wonderfully restored me, can preserve me in all

seasons.

'Let me inquire in my turn after the state of your family, great and little. I hope Lady Rothes and Miss Langton are both well. That is a good basis of content. Then how goes George on with his studies? How does Miss Mary? And how does my own Jenny? I think I owe Jenny a letter, which I will take care to pay. In the meantime, tell her that I acknowledge the debt.

'Be pleased to make my compliments to the ladies. If Mrs. Langton comes to London, she will favour me with a visit, for I am not well enough to go out.'

'TO OZIAS HUMPHRY,' ESQ.

'April 5, 1784. 'SIR, Mr. Hoole has told me with what benevolence you listened to a request which I was almost afraid to make, of leave to a young painter to attend you from time to time in your painting-room, to see your operations, and receive your instructions.

'The young man has perhaps good parts, but has been without a regular education. He is my godson, and therefore I interest myself in his progress and success, and shall think myself much favoured if I receive from you a permission to send him.

'My health is, by GOD's blessing, much restored, but I am not yet allowed by my physicians to go abroad; nor, indeed, do I think

1 The eminent painter, representative of the ancient family of Homfrey (now Humphry) in the West of England; who, as appears from their arms which they have invariably used, have been (as I have seen authenticated by the best authority) one of those among the knights and esquires of honour who are represented by Hollingshed as having issued from the Tower of London on coursers apparelled for the justes, accompanied by ladies of honour, leading every one a knight with a chain of gold, passing through the streets of London into Smithfield, on Sunday, at three o'clock in the afternoon, being the first Sunday after Michaelmas, in the fourteenth year of King Richard 11. This family once enjoyed large possessions; but, like others, have lost them in the progress of ages. Their blood, however, remains to them well ascertained; and they may hope, in the revolution of events, to recover that rank in society for which, in modern times, fortune seems to be an indispensable requisite. -BOSWELL.

2 Son of Mr. Samuel Paterson, eminent for his knowledge of books.-BOSWELL.

myself yet able to endure the weather.—I am, sir, your most humble servant,

'SAM. JOHNSON.'

TO THE SAME.

'April 10, 1784. 'SIR,-The bearer is my godson, whom I take the liberty of recommending to your kindness; which I hope he will deserve by his respect to your excellence, and his gratitude for your favours.-I am, sir, your most humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

TO THE SAME.

'May 31, 1784. 'SIR,-I am very much obliged by your civilities to my godson, but must beg of you to add to them the favour of permitting him to see you paint, that he may know how a picture is begun, advanced, and completed.

'If he may attend you in a few of your operations, I hope he will show that the benefit has been properly conferred, both by his proficiency and his gratitude. At least I shall consider you as enlarging your kindness to, sir, your humble servant, 'SAM. JOHNSON.'

'I want every comfort. My life is very solitary and very cheerless. Though it has pleased GOD wonderfully to deliver me from the dropsy, I am yet very weak, and have not passed the door since the 13th of December. I hope for some help from warm weather, which will surely come in time.

'I could not have the consent of the physicians to go to church yesterday: I therefore received the holy sacrament at home, in the room where I communicated with dear Mrs. Williams, a little before her death. O my friend, the approach of death is very dreadful. I am afraid to think on that which I know I cannot avoid. It is vain to look round and round for that help which cannot be had, Yet we hope and hope, and fancy that he who has lived to-day may live to-morrow. But let us learn to derive our hope only from GOD,

In the meantime, let us be kind to one another. I have no friend now living but you'

1 This friend of Johnson's youth survived him some what more than three years, having died Feb. 19, 1788. -MALONE.