Life of Johnson Volume VI Part 10

'The quant.i.ty of blood taken from you appears to me not sufficient.

Thrale was almost lost by the scrupulosity of his physicians, who never bled him copiously till they bled him in despair; he then bled till he fainted, and the stricture or obstruction immediately gave way and from that instant he grew better.

'I can now give you no advice but to keep yourself totally quiet and amused with some gentle exercise of the mind. If a suspected letter comes, throw it aside till your health is reestablished; keep easy and cheerful company about you, and never try to think but at those stated and solemn times when the thoughts are summoned to the cares of futurity, the only cares of a rational being.

'As to my own health I think it rather grows better; the convulsions which left me last year at Ashbourne have never returned, and I have by the mercy of G.o.d very comfortable nights. Let me know very often how you are till you are quite well.'

This letter, though it is dated 1778, must have been written in 1780.

Thrale's first attack was in June, 1779, when he was in 'extreme danger'

(_ante_, iii. 397, n. 2, 420). Johnson had the remission of the convulsions on June 18, 1779. He recorded on June 18, 1780:--

'In the morning of this day last year I perceived the remission of those convulsions in my breast which had distressed me for more than twenty years. I returned thanks at church for the mercy granted me, which has now continued a year.'--_Prayers and Meditations_, p. 183.

Three days later he wrote to Mrs. Thrale:--

'It was a twelvemonth last Sunday since the convulsions in my breast left me. I hope I was thankful when I recollected it; by removing that disorder a great improvement was made in the enjoyment of life.'

--_Piozzi Letters_, ii. 163. (See _ante_, iii. 397, n. 1.)

He was at Ashbourne on June 18, 1779 (_ante_, iii. 453).

On April 20, 1778, the very day of which this letter bears the date, he recorded:--

'After a good night, as I am forced to reckon, I rose seasonably....

In reviewing my time from Easter, 1777, I found a very melancholy and shameful blank. So little has been done that days and months are without any trace. My health has, indeed, been very much interrupted.

My nights have been commonly not only restless, but painful and fatiguing.

....Some relaxation of my breast has been procured, I think, by opium, which, though it never gives me sleep, frees my breast from spasms.'

--_Prayers and Meditations_, p. 169. See _ante_, iii. 317, n. 1.

For Johnson's advice about bleeding, see _ante_, iii. 152; and for possible occasions for 'suspected letters,' _ante_, i. 472, n. 4; and ii. 202, n. 2.

_Mr. Mason's 'sneering observation in his "Memoirs of Mr. William Whitehead"'_

(Vol. i, p. 31.)

I had long failed to find a copy of these _Memoirs_, though I had searched in the Bodleian, the British Museum, and the London Library, and had applied to the University Library at Cambridge, and the Advocates'

Library at Edinburgh. By the kindness of Mr. R. H. Soden Smith and Mr.

R. F. Sketchley, I have obtained the following extract from a copy in the Dyce and Forster Libraries, in the South Kensington Museum:--

'Conscious, notwithstanding, that to avoid writing what is _unnecessary_ is, in these days, no just plea for silence in a biographer, I have some apology to make for having strewed these pages so thinly with the t.i.ttle-tattle of anecdote. I am, however, too proud to make this apology to any person but my bookseller, who will be the only real loser by the 'Those readers, who believe that I do not write immediately under his pay, and who may have gathered from what they have already read, that I am not so pa.s.sionately enamoured of Dr. Johnson's biographical manner, as to take that for my model, have only to throw these pages aside, and wait till they are new-written by some one of his numerous disciples, who may follow his master's example; and should more anecdote than I furnish him with be wanting (as was the Doctor's case in his life of Mr. Gray), may make amends for it by those acid eructations of vituperative criticism, which are generated by unconcocted taste and intellectual indigestion.'--_Poems by William Whitehead_, York, 1788 (vol. iii, p. 128).

With this 'sneering observation,' which Boswell might surely have pa.s.sed over in silence, the Memoirs close.

_Michael Johnson as a bookseller._

(Vol. i, p. 36, n. 3.)

Mr. R. F. Sketchley kindly informs me that in the Dyce and Forster Libraries at the South Kensington Museum there is a book with the following t.i.tle:--

_S. Shaw's 'Grammatica Anglo--Romana', London, printed for Michael Johnson, bookseller: and are to be sold at his shops in Litchfield and Uttoxiter in Stafford-s.h.i.+re; and Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicesters.h.i.+re, 1687._

Mr. C. E. Doble tells me that in the proposals issued in 1690 by Thomas Bennet, St. Paul's Churchyard, for printing Anthony a Wood's _Athenae Oxonienses_ and _Fasti Oxonienses_, among 'the booksellers who take subscriptions, give receipts, and deliver books according to the proposals' is 'Mr. Johnson in Litchfield.'

_The City and County of Lichfield_.

(Vol. i, p. 36, n. 4.)

'The City of Litchfield is a County of itself, with a jurisdiction extending 10 or 12 miles round, which circuit the Sheriff rides every year on Sept. 8.'--_A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain_, ed. 1769, ii. 419.

Balliol College has a copy of this work containing David Garrick's book-plate, with Shakespeare's head at the top of it, and the following quotation from _Menagiana_ at the foot:--

'_La premiere chose qu'on doit faire quand on a emprunte un livre, c'est de le lire, afin de pouvoir le rendre plutot' (sic)_.

_Felixmarte of Hircania_.

(Vol. i, p. 49.)

'"He that follows is _Florismarte of Hyrcania_" said the barber. "What!

is Signor Florismarte there?" replied the priest; "in good faith he shall share the same fate, notwithstanding his strange birth and chimerical adventures; for his harsh and dry style will admit of no excuse. To the yard with him, therefore." "With all my heart, dear Sir," answered the housekeeper; "and with joyful alacrity she executed the command.'"

--_Don Quixote_, ed. 1820, i. 48.

Boswell speaks of _Felixmarte_ as the old Spanish romance. In the _Bibliografia dei Romanzi e Poeini Cavallereschi Italiani_ (2nd ed., Milan, 1838), p. 351, it is stated that in the Spanish edition it is called a translation from the Italian, and in the Italian edition a translation from the Spanish. The Italian t.i.tle is _Historia di Don Florismante d'Ircania, tradotta dallo Spagnuolo_. Cervantes, in an edition of _Don Quixote_, published in 1605, which I have looked at, calls the book _Florismarte de Hircania_ (not _Florismante_). It should seem that he made his hero read the Italian version.

_Palmerin of England and Don Belianis_.

(Vol. i, p. 49, n. 2; and vol. iii, p. 2.)

'"Let _Palmerin of England_ be preserved," said the licentiate, "and kept as a jewel; and let such another casket be made for it as that which Alexander found among the spoils of Darius appropriated to preserve the works of the poet Homer....Therefore, master Nicholas, saving your better judgment let this and _Amadis de Gaul_ be exempted from the flames, and let all the rest perish without any farther inquiry." "Not so neighbour," replied the barber, "for behold here the renowned _Don Belianis_." The priest replied, "This with the second, third, and fourth parts, wants a little rhubarb to purge away its excessive choler; there should be removed too all that relates to the castle of Fame, and other impertinencies of still greater consequence; let them have the benefit, therefore, of transportation, and as they show signs of amendment they shall hereafter be treated with mercy or justice; in the meantime, friend, give them room in your house; but let n.o.body read them."'

--_Don Quixote_, ed. 1820, i. 50.

_Mr. Taylor, a Birmingham manufacturer_.

(Vol. i, p. 86.)

'John Taylor, Esq. may justly be deemed the Shakspear or Newton of Birmingham. He rose from minute beginnings to s.h.i.+ne in the commercial hemisphere, as they in the poetical or philosophical. To this uncommon genius we owe the gilt b.u.t.ton, the j.a.panned and gilt snuff-box, with the numerous race of enamels; also the painted snuff-box. ... He died in 1775 at the age of 64, after acquiring a fortune of 200,000. His son was a considerable sufferer at the time of the riots in 1791.'

--_A Brief History of Birmingham_, 1797, p. 9.