357) says that he wore 'a brown coat with metal buttons, black waistcoat and worsted stockings, with a flowing bob-wig; they were in perfectly good trim, and with the ladies he had nothing of the slovenly philosopher about him.'
[963] See ante, ii. 432.
[964] Here he either was mistaken, or had a different notion of an extensive sale from what is generally entertained: for the fact is, that four thousand copies of that excellent work were sold very quickly. A new edition has been printed since his death, besides that in the collection of his works. BOSWELL. See ante, ii. 310, note 2.
[965] 'In the neighbourhood of Lichfield [in 1750] the principal gentlemen clothed their hounds in tartan plaid, with which they hunted a fox, dressed in a red uniform.' Mahon's Hist. of England, iv. 10.
[966] So Boswell in his Hebrides (Nov. 8), hoping that his father and Johnson have met in heaven, observes, 'that they have met in a place where there is no room for Whiggism.' See ante, i. 431.
[967] Paradise Lost, bk. i. 263. Butler (Miscellaneous Thoughts, 1. 169) had said:--
'The Devil was the first o' th' name From whom the race of rebels came.'
[968] In the phraseology of Scotland, I should have said, 'Mr. John Spottiswoode the younger, of that ilk.' Johnson knew that sense of the word very well, and has thus explained it in his Dictionary, voce ILK:--'It also signifies "the same;" as, Mackintosh of that ilk, denotes a gentleman whose surname and the title of his estate are the same.' BOSWELL. See ante, ii. 427, note 2.
[969] He wrote to Dr. Taylor on Oct. 19 of the next year:--'There are those still who either fright themselves, or would fright others, with an invasion.... Such a fleet [a fleet equal to the transportation of twenty or of ten thousand men] cannot be hid in a creek; it must be safely [?] visible; and yet I believe no man has seen the man that has seen it. The ships of war were within sight of Plymouth, and only within sight.' Notes and Queries, 6th S. v. 461.
[970] See ante, iii. 42.
[971] It is observed in Waller's Life, in the Biographia Britannica, that he drank only water; and that while he sat in a company who were drinking wine, 'he had the dexterity to accommodate his discourse to the pitch of theirs as it sunk.' If excess in drinking be meant, the remark is acutely just. But surely, a moderate use of wine gives a gaiety of spirits which water-drinkers know not. BOSWELL. 'Waller passed his time in the company that was highest, both in rank and wit, from which even his obstinate sobriety did not exclude him. Though he drank water, he was enabled by his fertility of mind to heighten the mirth of Bacchanalian assemblies; and Mr. Saville said that "no man in England should keep him company without drinking but Ned Waller."' Johnson's Works, vii. 197.
[972] See ante, iii. 41, and Boswell's Hebrides, Oct. 17.
[973] Pope. Satires, Prologue, 1. 283.
[974] As he himself had said in his letter of thanks for his diploma of Doctor of Laws, 'Nemo sibi placens non lactatur' (ante, ii. 333).
[975]
'Who mean to live within our proper sphere, Dear to ourselves, and to our country dear.'
FRANCIS. Horace, Epistles, i. 3. 29.
[976] Johnson recommended this before. Ante, p. 169. Boswell tried abstinence once before. Ante, ii. 436, note 1, and iii. 170, note 1.
[977] Johnson wrote to Boswell in 1775:--'Reynolds has taken too much to strong liquor, and seems to delight in his new character.' Ante, ii. 292.
[978] See ante, p. 170, note 2.
[979] At the Castle of the Bishop of Munster 'there was,' writes Temple, 'nothing remarkable but the most Episcopal way of drinking that could be invented. As soon as we came in the great hall there stood many flagons ready charged; the general called for wine to drink the King's health; they brought him a formal bell of silver gilt, that might hold about two quarts or more; he took it empty, pulled out the clapper, and gave it me who (sic) he intended to drink to, then had the bell filled, drunk it off to his Majesty's health; then asked me for the clapper, put it in, turned down the bell, and rung it out to shew he had played fair and left nothing in it; took out the clapper, desired me to give it to whom I pleased, then gave his bell to be filled again, and brought it to me. I that never used to drink, and seldom would try, had commonly some gentlemen with me that served for that purpose when it was necessary.' Temple's Works, ed. 1757, i. 266.
[980] See ante, ii. 450, note 1, and iii. 79.
[981] The passages are in the Jerusalem, canto i. st. 3, and in Lucretius, i. 935, and again iv. 12. CROKER.
[982] See ante, ii. 247, where Boswell says that 'no man was more scrupulously inquisitive in order to discover the truth;' and iii. 188, 229.
[983] See post, under May 8, 1781.
[984] 'Sir,' said Johnson, 'I love Robertson, and I won't talk of his book.' Ante, ii. 53.
[985] 'I was once in company with Smith,' said Johnson in 1763, 'and we did not take to each other.' Ante, i. 427.