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liquors a practice to which he rigidly conformed for many years together, at different periods of his life.'

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His Ofellus in the art of living in London, I have heard him relate, was an Irish painter, 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 eighteenpence 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 coffee-house, 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 abroad,

'At this time his abstinence from wine may, perhaps, be attributed to poverty, but in his subsequent life he was restrained from that indulgence by, as it appears, moral, or rather medical considerations. He found by experience that wine, though it dissipated for a moment, yet eventually aggravated the hereditary disease under which he suffered; and perhaps it may have been owing to a long course of abstinence, that his mental health seems to have been better in the latter than in the earlier portion of his life. He says, in his Prayers and Meditations (Aug. 17th, 1767), “By abstinence from wine and suppers, I obtained sudden and great relief, and had freedom of mind restored to me; which I have wanted for all this year, without being able to find any means of obtaining it." See also post, Sept. 16th, 1773. These remarks are important, because depression of spirits is too often treated on a contrary system, from ignorance of, or inattention, to what may be its real cause.-Croker.

2 Both Boswell and Croker spell the name Ofellus, instead of Ofella. Neither is Croker right when, in a note on this passage, he calls Ofella, a Roman rustic. Horace (Sat. ii. 2. 133) informs us that, in his youth, Ofella was the owner of an estate near Venusia, which was taken from him and conferred on a veteran named Umbrenus.

Nunc ager Umbreni sub nomine, nuper Ofellæ
Dictus"

and that as "colonus," he rented a farm on the estate which had been formerly his own.-Editor.

and paid visits." I have heard him more than once talk of his frugal friend, whom he recollected with esteem and kindness, and did not like to have one smile at the recital. "This man," 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 West Chester, in order to get to Ireland. He returned the horse, and probably the ten pounds too, after he had got home."

Considering Johnson's narrow circumstances in the early part of his life, and particularly at the interesting era 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,

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The Hon. Henry Hervey, third [fourth] son of the first Earl of Bristol [born 1700], quitted the army and took orders. He married [in 1730, Catherine the eldest] sister of Sir Thomas Aston, by whom he got the Aston Estate, and assumed the name and arms of that family. Vide Collins' Peerage, third ed., vol. iii., p. 384.

Mr. Hervey's acquaintance and kindness Johnson owed, no doubt, to his friend Mr. Walmsley; who, it will be recollected, married Mrs. Hervey's sister, Margaret Aston. But I doubt whether Mr. Boswell does not antedate this intimacy with Hervey and Johnson's love of that name by a couple of years-for the first edition of London contained a sneer at Lord Hervey (Henry's brother), for whose name that of Clodio was afterwards substituted.-Croker.

Mr. Croker in the preceding note questions the existence of any inti

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; and he described this early friend "Harry Hervey," thus: "He was a vicious man,1 but very kind to me. If you call a dog Hervey,' I shall love him." He told me he had now written only three acts of his 'Irene," and that he retired for some time to lodgings at Greenwich, where he proceeded in it somewhat further, and used to compose, walking in the Park; but did not stay long enough at that place to finish it.

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At this period we find the following letter from him to Mr. Edward Cave, which, as a link in the chain of his literary history, it is proper to insert:

macy between Johnson and Hervey in or before 1738, because of the sneer at Lord Hervey, Henry Hervey's brother, which occurs in the poem London, published May, 1738.

"And strive in vain to laugh at H-y's jest,"

and seems to imply that when his intimacy with Henry Hervey was formed, Johnson for Hy substituted Clodio, which we find in the collected editions of Johnson's works. But Hy occurs not only in the first edition, but in the fourth edition of London, 1739. In the poem, also, as printed in Dodsley's collection, second edition, 1748, vol. i., p. 192, it is still H--y; in an edition published 1765 H――y again, and in the 1782 edition, still H―y. In the Poetical Works of Johnson, first collected in one volume, Lond. 1785, we find the same reading. Nor can we trace when Hy gives place to Clodio; not, we believe, in any edition published in Johnson's lifetime. Clodio appears in Hawkins', 1787, in Murphy's, 1792, and in all subsequent editions. The charming series of letters of young David to Captain Garrick, his father, Fitzgerald's Life of Garrick, vol. i., chap. ii., pp. 10-28, abundantly confirms the fact of Hervey's regiment being quartered at Lichfield.-Editor.

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1 For the excesses which Dr. Johnson justly characterizes as vicious, Mr. Hervey, was, perhaps, as much to be pitied as blamed. He was very eccentric. His eldest brother was the celebrated Lord Hervey, Pope's Sporus; the next, Thomas, of whom we shall see more hereafter (Oct., 1766), was also very clever but very mad.-Croker.

“SIR,

TO MR. CAVE.

"Greenwich, next door to the Golden Heart, Church Street, July 12. 1737.

"Having observed in your papers very uncommon offers of encouragement to men of letters, I have chosen, being a stranger in London, to communicate to you the following design, which, I hope, if you join in it, will be of advantage to both of us.

"The History of the Council of Trent having been lately translated into French, and published with large notes by Dr. Le Courayer, the reputation of that book is so much revived in England, that, it is presumed, a new translation of it from the Italian, together with Le Courayer's notes from the French, could not fail of a favourable reception.

"If it be answered, that the History is already in English, it must be remembered that there was the same objection against Le Courayer's undertaking, with this disadvantage, that the French had a version by one of their best translators, whereas you cannot read three pages of the English history without discovering that the style is capable of great improvements; but whether those improvements are to be expected from this attempt, you must judge from the specimen, which, if you approve the proposal, I shall submit to your examination.

"Suppose the merit of the versions equal, we may hope that the addition of the notes will turn the balance in our favour, considering the reputation of the annotator.

"Be pleased to favour me with a speedy answer, if you are not willing to engage in this scheme; and appoint me a day to wait upon you, if you are. I am, Sir, your humble servant,

"SAM. JOHNSON."

It should seem from this letter, though subscribed with his own name, that he had not yet been introduced to Mr. Cave. We shall presently see what was done in consequence of the proposal which it contains.

In the course of the summer he returned to Lichfield, where he had left Mrs. Johnson, and there he at last finished his tragedy, which was not executed with his rapidity of composition upon other occasions, but was slowly and painfully elabo

rated. A few days before his death, while burning a great mass of papers, he picked out from among them the original unformed sketch of this tragedy, in his own handwriting, and gave it to Mr. Langton, by whose favour a copy of it is now in my possession. It contains fragments of the intended plot, and speeches for the different persons of the drama, partly in the raw materials of prose, partly worked up into verse; as also a variety of hints for illustration, borrowed from the Greek, Roman, and modern writers. The handwriting is very difficult to be read, even by those who were best acquainted with Johnson's mode of penmanship, which at all times was very particular. The King having graciously accepted of this manuscript as a literary curiosity, Mr. Langton made a fair and distinct copy of it, which he ordered to be bound up with the original and the printed tragedy; and the volume is deposited in the King's library. His Majesty was pleased to permit Mr. Langton to take a copy of it for himself.

The whole of it is rich in thought and imagery, and happy expressions; and of the disjecta membra scattered throughout, and as yet unarranged, a good dramatic poet might avail himself with considerable advantage. I shall give my readers some specimens of different kinds, distinguishing them by the italic character.

"Nor think to say, here will I stop,
Here will I fix the limits of transgression,
Nor farther tempt the avenging rage of heaven.
When guilt like this once harbours in the breast,
Those holy beings, whose unseen direction
Guides through the maze of life the steps of man,
Fly the detested mansions of impiety,

And quit their charge to horror and to ruin.”

A small part only of this interesting admonition is preserved in the play, and is varied, I think, not to advantage:

"The soul once tainted with so foul a crime,

No more shall glow with friendship's hallow'd ardour,
Those holy beings whose superior care

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