came hither in ships, and were not ignorant certainly of the arts of life. This proves also the stones not to be factitious; for they that could mould such durable masses could do much more than make mortar, and could have continued the transverse from the upright part with the same paste. You have doubtless seen Stonehenge; and if you have not, I should think it a hard task to made an adequate description. It is, in my opinion, to be referred to the earliest habitation of the island, as a druidical monument of, at least, two thousand years; probably the most ancient work of man upon the island. Salisbury cathedral and its neighbour Stonehenge are two eminent monuments of art and rudeness, and may show the first essay and the last perfection in architecture. LETTER 507. TO THE SAME. London, Nov. 13. 1783. Since you have written to me with the attention and tenderness of ancient time (1), your letters give me a great part of the pleasure which a life of solitude admits. You will never bestow any share of your good-will on one who deserves better. Those that have loved longest love best. A sudden blaze of kindness may by a single blast of coldness be extinguished; but that fondness which length of time has connected with many circumstances and occasions, though it may for a while be depressed by disgust or resentment, with or without a cause, is hourly revived by accidental recollection. To those that have lived long together, every thing heard and every thing seen recalls some pleasure communicated or some benefit conferred, some petty quarrel or some slight endearment. Esteem of great powers, or amiable qualities newly discovered, may embroider a day or a week, but a friendship of twenty years is interwoven with the texture of life. A friend may be often found and lost; but an old friend never can be found, and nature has provided that he cannot easily be lost. - You seem (1) This is the first letter in which we perceive a serious coldness towards Mrs. Thrale; but it is clear that it had existed some time prior to this date, though not perhaps a long as Mr. Boswell supposed. - C. to mention Lord Kilmurrey (1) as a stranger. We were at his house in Cheshire; and he one day dined with Sir Lynch. What he tells of the epigram is not true, but perhaps he does not know it to be false. Do not you remember how he rejoiced in having no park? — he could not disoblige his neighbours by sending them no venison. LETTER 508. TO MRS. LUCY PORTER. 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. Bolt Court, March 10. 1784. MY DEAREST Love, I will not suppose that it is for want of kindness that you did not answer my last letter; and I therefore write again to tell you that I have, by God's great mercy, still continued to grow better. My asthma is seldom troublesome, and my dropsy has ran itself almost away, in a manner which my physician says is very uncommon. I have been confined from the 14th of December, and shall not soon venture abroad: but I have this day dressed myself as I was before my sickness. If it be inconvenient to you to write, desire Mr. Pearson to let me know how you do, and how you I am now not without hopes nave passed this long winter. LETTER 510. TO MRS. THRALE. London, March 20. 1784. MADAM,- Your last letter had something of tenderness. The accounts which you have had of my danger and distress were I suppose not aggravated. I have been confined ten weeks with an asthma and dropsy. But I am now better. God has in his mercy granted me a reprieve; for how much time his mercy must determine. When you -in fear of soon On the 19th of last month I evacuated twenty pints of water, and I think I reckon exactly. From that time the tumour has subsided, and I now begin to move with some freedom. You will easily believe that I am still at a great distance from health; but I am, as my chirurgeon expressed it, amazingly better. Heberden seems to have great hopes. Write to me no more about dying with a grace. feel what I have felt in approaching eternity hearing the sentence of which there is no revocation — you will know the folly: my wish is that you may know it sooner. The distance between the grave and the remotest part of human longevity is but a very little; and of that little no path is certain. You know all this, and I thought that I knew it too; but I know it now with a new conviction. May that new conviction not be vain! I am now cheerful. I hope this approach to recovery is a token of the Divine mercy. - My friends continue their kindness. I give a dinner to-morrow. April 15. - Yesterday I had the pleasure of giving another dinner to the remainder of the old club. We used to meet weekly about the year 1750, and we were as cheerful as in former times: only I could not make quite so much noise; for since the paralytic affliction, my voice is sometimes weak. Metcalf and Crutchley, without knowing each other, are both members of parliament for Horsham, in Sussex. Mr. Cator is chosen for Ipswich. But a sick man's thoughts soon turn back upon himself. I am still very weak, though my appetite is keen, and my digestion potent; and I gratify myself more at table than ever I did at my own cost before. I have now an inclination to luxury which even your table did not excite; for till now my talk was more about the dishes than my thoughts. I remember you commended me for seeming pleased with my dinners when you had reduced your table. I am able to tell you with great veracity that I never knew when the reduction began, nor should have known that it was made had not you told me. I now think and consult to-day what I shall eat to-morrow. This disease will likewise, I hope, be cured. For there are other things- how different! - which ought to predominate in the mind of such a man as I: but in this world the body will have its part; and my hope is, that it shall have no more - my hope, but not my confidence; I have only the timidity of a Christian to determine, not the wisdom of a stoic to secure me. April 19. I received this morning your magnificent fish, and in the afternoon your apology for not sending it. I have invited the Hooles and Miss Burney to dine upon it tomorrow. The club which has been lately instituted is at Sam's; and there was I when I was last out of the house. But the people whom I mentioned in my letter are the remnant of a little club (2) that used to meet in Ivy-lane, about hree and thirty years ago, out of which we have lost Hawkesworth and Dyer the rest are yet on this side the grave. April 21. I make haste to send you intelligence, which, if I do not flatter myself, you will not receive without some degree of pleasure. After a confinement of one hundred and twenty-nine days, more than the third part of a year, and no inconsiderable part of human life, I this day returned thanks (1) This friend of Johnson's youth survived him somewhat more than three years, having died February 19. 1788. — M. (2) See antè, Vol. 1, p. 163.-C. to God in St. Clement's church for my recovery; a recovery, in my seventy-fifth year, from a distemper which few in the vigour of youth are known to surmount; a recovery, of which neither myself, my friends, nor my physicians, had any hope; for though they flattered me with some continuance of life, they never supposed that I could cease to be dropsical. The dropsy, however, is quite vanished; and the asthma so much mitigated, that I walked to-day with a more easy respiration than I have known, I think, for perhaps two years past. I hope the mercy that lightens my days will assist me to use them well. The Hooles, Miss Burney, and Mrs. Hall (Wesley's sister), feasted yesterday with me very cheerfully on your noble salmon. Mr. Allen could not come, and I sent him a piece, and a great tail is still left. Dr. Brocklesby forbids the club at present, not caring to venture the chilness of the evening; but I purpose to show myself on Saturday at the academy's feast. (1) I cannot publish my return to the world more effectually; for, as the Frenchman says, tout le monde s'y trouvera. For this occasion I ordered some clothes; and was told by the tailor, that when he brought me a sick dress, he never expected to make me any thing of any other kind. My recovery is indeed wonderful. April 26. On Saturday I showed myself again to the living world at the Exhibition: much and splendid was the company, but, like the doge of Genoa at Paris, I admired nothing but myself. I went up all the stairs to the pictures without stopping to rest or to breathe, " in all the madness of superfluous health." The Prince of Wales had promised to be there; but when we had waited an hour and a half, sent us word that he could not come. Mrs. Davenant called to pay me a guinea, but I gave two for you. Whatever reasons you have for frugality, it is not worth while to save a guinea a year by withdrawing it from a public charity. Mr. Howard called on me a few days |