Rasselas was written when he was living in Gough-square, and not in Staple Inn, as has been asserted. Ante, i. 516.] 13. Staple Inn. 14. Gray's Inn. [In Croker's Boswell, p. 118, is a letter dated 'Gray's Inn, Dec. 17, 1759.'] 15. Inner Temple-lane, No. 1. [He was here in June 1760, ante, i. 350, note 1; and on Jan. 13, 1761, as is shewn by a letter in Croker's Boswell, p. 122. Johnson Buildings now stand where his house stood.] 16. Johnson's-court, No. 7. [See i. 518 for a letter dated 'Johnson's-court, Oct. 17, 1765.'] 17. Bolt-court, No. 8. [He was here on March 15, 1776 (ante, ii. 427). From about 1765 (ante, i. 493) to Oct. 7, 1782 (post), he had moreover 'an apartment' at Streatham, and from about 1765 to about the end of 1780, one at Southwark (ante, i. 493). From about the beginning of 1781 to the spring of 1783 he had a room either in Grosvenor-square or Argyll-street (post, March 20, 1781 and March 21, 1783.)]
[1236] See ante, ii. 55.
[1237] If, as seems to be meant, the 'gentleman supposed the case' on this occasion, he must have been Boswell, for no one else was present with Johnson.
[1238] A crime that he would have restrained by 'severe laws steadily enforced.' Ante, iii. 18.
[1239] See ante, ii. 105.
[1240] Lord Newhaven was one of a creation of eighteen Irish peers in 1776. 'It was a mob of nobility,' wrote Horace Walpole. 'The King in private laughed much at the eagerness for such insignificant honours.' Journal of the Reign of George III, ii. 58.
[1241] Now the Lady of Sir Henry Dashwood, Bart. BOSWELL.
[1242] See ante, ii. 111.
[1243] The False Alarm. See ante, ii. 111.
[1244] See Collins's Peerage, i. 636, and Hume's England, ed. 1802, iv. 451, for an account, how Henry VIII. once threatened to cut off the head of Edward Montagu, one of the members (not the Speaker as Mr. Croker says), if he did not get a money bill passed by the next day. The bill, according to the story, was passed. Mr. P. Cunningham informed Mr. Croker that Johnson was here guilty of an anachronism, for that heads were first placed on Temple Bar in William III's time.
[1245] Horace Walpole thus describes public affairs in February of this year:--'The navy disgusted, insurrections in Scotland, Wales mutinous, a rebellion ready to break out in Ireland where 15,000 Protestants were in arms, without authority, for their own defence, many of them well-wishers to the Americans, and all so ruined that they insisted on relief from Parliament, or were ready to throw off subjection; Holland pressed by France to refuse us assistance, and demanding whether we would or not protect them: uncertainty of the fate of the West Indian Islands; and dread at least that Spain might take part with France; Lord North at the same time perplexed to raise money on the loan but at eight per cent., which was demanded--such a position and such a prospect might have shaken the stoutest king and the ablest administration. Yet the king was insensible to his danger. He had attained what pleased him most --his own will at home. His ministers were nothing but his tools-- everybody called them so, and they proclaimed it themselves.' Walpole's Journal of the Reign of George III, ii. 339. In this melancholy enumeration he passes over the American War.
[1246] See ante, i. 78, note 2.
[1247] Wesley himself recorded in 1739 (Journal, i. 177):--'I have been all my life (till very lately) so tenacious of every point relating to decency and order, that I should have thought the saving of souls almost a sin if it had not been done in a church.'
[1248] Horace Walpole (Letters, viii. 131) talks of some one 'riding on three elephants at once like Astley.' On p. 406 he says:--'I can almost believe that I could dance a minuet on a horse galloping full speed, like young Astley.'
[1249] See ante, i. 458.
[1250] A friend of Wilkes, as Boswell was, might well be supposed to have got over such scruples.
[1251] Mr. Croker says that the '"celebrated friend" was no doubt Burke.' Burke, however, is generally described by Boswell as 'eminent.' Moreover Burke was not in the habit of getting drunk, as seems to have been the case with 'the celebrated friend.' Boswell (ante, p. 245, note 1) calls Hamilton 'celebrated,' but then Boswell and Hamilton were not friends, as is shewn, post, Nov. 1783.
[1252] Corinthians. xv, 33.
[1253] See ante, ii. 121.
[1254] 'Prince Gonzaga di Castiglione, when dining in company with Dr. Johnson, thinking it was a polite as well as gay thing to drink the Doctor's health with some proof that he had read his works, called out from the top of the table to the bottom.--At your health, Mr. Vagabond.' Piozzi's Synonymy, ii. 358. Mme. D'Arblay (Memoirs of Dr. Burney, ii. 258) says,--'General Paoli diverted us all very much by begging leave of Mrs. Thrale to give one toast, and then, with smiling pomposity, pronouncing "The great Vagabond."'
[1255] 'Very near to admiration is the wish to admire. Every man willingly gives value to the praise which he receives, and considers the sentence passed in his favour as the sentence of discernment.' Johnson's Works, vii.