BOSWELL'S SUBSERVIENCY.

395

him with many direct questions, such as, "What did you do, sir? What did you say, sir?" until the great philologist became perfectly enraged. "I will not be put to the question!" roared he. "Don't you consider, sir, that these are not the manners of a gentleman? I will not be baited with what and why;-What is this? What is that? Why is a cow's tail long? Why is a fox's tail bushy?" "Why, sir," replied pilgarlick, "you are so good that I venture to trouble you." "Sir," replied Johnson, "my being so good is no reason why you should be so ill." "You have but two topics, sir," exclaimed he on another occasion, "yourself and me, and I am sick of both."

Boswell's inveterate disposition to toad, was a sore cause of mortification to his father, the old laird of Auchinleck, (or Affleck.) He had been annoyed by his extravagant devotion to Paoli, but then he was something of a military hero; but this tagging at the heels of Dr. Johnson, whom he considered a kind of pedagogue, set his Scotch blood in a ferment. "There's nae hope for Jamie, mon," said he to a friend;—“ Jamie is gaen clean gyte. What do you think, mon? He's done wi' Paoli; he's off wi' the landlouping scoundrel of a Corsican; and whose tail do you think he has pinn'd himself to now, man? A dominie, mon; an auld dominie; he keeped a schule, and cau'd it an acaadamy.”

We shall show in the next chapter that Jamie's devotion to the dominie did not go unrewarded.

CHAPTER XL.

CHANGES IN THE LITERARY CLUB.-JOHNSON'S OBJECTION TO GARRICK.-ELECTION OF BOSWELL.

HE Literary Club (as we have termed the club in Gerard Street, though it took that name some time later) had now been in existence several years. Johnson was exceedingly chary at first of its exclusiveness, and opposed to its being augmented in number. Not long after its institution, Sir Joshua Reynolds was speaking of it to Garrick. "I like it much," said little David, briskly; "I think I shall be of you." "When Sir Joshua mentioned this to Dr. Johnson," says Boswell, "he was much displeased with the actor's conceit. 'He'll be of us?' growled he. 'How does he know we will permit him? The first duke in England has no right to hold such language.'

When Sir John Hawkins spoke favorably of Garrick's pretensions, "Sir," replied Johnson, “he will disturb us by his buffoonery." In the same spirit he declared to Mr. Thrale, that, if Garrick should apply for admission, he would black-ball him. "Who, sir?" exclaimed Thrale, with surprise; "Mr. Garrick-your friend, your compan

JOHNSON'S OBJECTION TO GARRICK.

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ion-black-ball him!" "Why, sir," replied Johnson, "I love my little David dearly-better than all or any of his flatterers do; but surely one ought to sit in a society like ours,

"Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or player."

999

The exclusion from the club was a sore mortification to Garrick, though he bore it without complaining. He could not help continually to ask questions about it— what was going on there—whether he was ever the subject of conversation. By degrees the rigor of the club relaxed some of the members grew negligent. Beauclerc lost his right of membership by neglecting to attend. On his marriage, however, with Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of the Duke of Marlborough, and recently divorced from Viscount Bolingbroke, he had claimed and regained his seat in the club. The number of members had likewise been augmented. The proposition to increase it originated with Goldsmith. "It would give," he thought, "an agreeable variety to their meetings; for there can be nothing new amongst us," said he; "we have travelled over each other's minds." Johnson was piqued at the suggestion. "Sir," said he, "you have not travelled over my mind, I promise you." Sir Joshua, less confident in the exhaustless fecundity of his mind, felt and acknowledged the force of Goldsmith's suggestion. Several new members, therefore, had been added; the first, to his great joy, was David Garrick. Gold