which they who may think that I ought to have suppressed, must have less ardent feelings than I have always avowed.'

LETTER 118.

TO JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ.

66 'Brighthelmstone, Sept. 9, 1769. "DEAR SIR,- Why do you charge me with unkindness? I have omitted nothing that could do you good, or give you pleasure, unless it be that I have forborne to tell you my opinion of your Account of Corsica.' I believe my opinion, if you think well of my judgment, might have given you pleasure; but when it is considered how much vanity is excited by praise, I am not sure that it would have done you good. Your History is like other histories, but your Journal is, in a very high degree, curious and delightful. There is between the History and the Journal that difference which there will always be found between notions borrowed from without, and notions generated within. Your history was copied from books; your journal rose out of your own experience and observation. You express images which operated strongly upon yourself, and you have impressed them with great force upon your readers. I know not whether I could name any narrative by which curiosity is better excited, or better gratified.

"I am glad that you are going to be married; and as I wish you well in things of less importance, wish you well with proportionate ardour in this crisis of your life. What I can contribute to your happiness, I should be very unwilling to withhold; for I have always loved and valued you, and shall love and value you still more, as you become more regular and useful: effects which a happy marriage will hardly fail to produce.

"I do not find that I am likely to come back very soon from this place. I shall, perhaps, stay a fortnight longer; and a fortnight is a long time to a lover absent from his mistress. Would a fortnight ever have an end? I am, dear, Sir, your most affectionate humble servant, "SAM. JOHNSON."

1 In the Preface to my Account of Corsica, published in 1768, I thus express myself:"He who publishes a book, affecting not to be an author, and professing an indifference for literary fame, may possibly impose upon many people such an idea of his consequence as he wishes may be received. For my part, I should be proud to be known as an author, and I have an ardent ambition for literary fame; for, of all possessions, I should imagine literary fame to be the most valuable. A man who has been able to furnish a book, which has been approved by the world, has established himself as a respectable character in distant society, without any danger of having that character lessened by the observation of his weaknesses. To preserve an uniform dignity among those who see us every day, is hardly possible; and to aim at it, must put us under the fetters of perpetual restraint. The author of an approved book may allow his natural disposition an easy play, and yet indulge the pride of superior genius, when he considers that by those who know him only as an author, he never ceases to be respected. Such an author, when in his hours of gloom and discontent, may have the consolation to think, that his writings are, at that very time, giving pleasure to numbers; and such an author may cherish the hope of being remembered after death, which has been a great object to the noblest minds in all ages."

APPENDIX.

No. I.

For the convenience of the reader, No. I. was introduced as a note page 34.

No. II.

AN ACCOUNT OF THE EARLY LIFE OF DR. JOHNSON, WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.

[From a little volume published in 1805, and now become scarce, entitled "An Account of the Life of Dr. Samuel Johnson, from his Birth to his Eleventh Year, written by himself: to which are added, Original Letters to Dr. Johnson, by Miss Hill Boothby: from the MSS. preserved by the Doctor, and now in possession of Richard Wright, Surgeon, of Lichfield." "This volume (says the Editor) was among that mass of papers which were ordered to be committed to the flames a few days before Dr. Johnson's death, thirty-two pages of which were torn out by himself, and destroyed. Francis Barber, his black servant, unwilling that all the MSS. of his illustrious master should be utterly lost, preserved these relics from the flames. By purchase they came into possession of the Editor."]

ANNALS.-I. 1709-10.

Sept. 7,1 1709, I was born at Lichfield. My mother had a very difficult and dangerous labour, and was assisted by George Hector, a man mid-wife of great reputation. I was born almost dead,' and could not cry for some time. Wheu he had me in his arms, he said, "Here is a brave boy."

In a few weeks an inflammation was discovered on my buttock, which was, at first, I think, taken for a burn; but soon appeared to be a natural disorder. It swelled, broke, and healed.

My father being that year Sheriff of Lichfield, and to ride the circuit of the

1 18 of the present style-Orig.

? To have been born almost dead has been related of many eminent men; amongst others of Addison, Lord Lyttelton, and Voltaire.-OROKER.

County next day, which was a ceremony then performed with great pomp; he was asked by my mother, Whom he would invite to the Riding?" and answered, "All the town now." He feasted the citizens with uncommon mag. nificence, and was the last but one that maintained the splendour of the Riding.

I was, by my father's persuasion, put to one Marclew, commonly called Bellison,' the servant, or wife of a servant of my father, to be nursed in George Lane, where I used to call when I was a bigger boy, and eat fruit in the garden, which was full of trees. Here it was discovered that my eyes were bad; and an issue was cut in my left arm, of which I took no great notice, as I think my mother has told me, having my little hand in a custard.

2

It is observable, that, having been told of this operation, I always imagined that I remembered it, but I laid the scene in the wrong house. Such confunons of memory I suspect to be common.

My mother visited me every day, and used to go different ways, that her assiduity might not expose her to ridicule; and often left her fan or glove behind her, that she might have a pretence to come back unexpected; but she never discovered any token of neglect. Dr. Swinfen told me, that the scrofulous sores which afflicted me proceeded from the bad humours of the nurse. whose son had the same distemper, and was likewise short-sighted, but both in a less degree. My mother thought my diseases derived from her family.*

In ten weeks I was taken home, a poor, diseased infant, almost blind.

...

I remember my aunt Nath. Ford told me, when I was about . . . years old, that she would not have picked such a poor creature up in the street.

In . . . 67, when I was at Lichfield, I went to look for my nurse's house; and, inquiring somewhat obscurely, was told "this is the house in which you were nursed." I saw my nurse's son, to whose milk I succeeded, reading a large Bible, which my nurse had bought, as I was then told, some time before her death.

Dr. Swinfen used to say,. that he never knew any child reared with so much difficulty.

II. 1710-11.

In the second year I knew not what happened to me. I believe it was then

1 The name of Marklew, alias Bellison, is yet common in Lichfield, anu is usually so dis tinguished-R. WRIGHT.

2 How long this issue was continued I do not remember. I believe it was suffered to dry when I was about six years old.—Orig.

3 Samuel Swinfen, who took a degree of Doctor of Medicine from Pembroke College In 1712-HALL.

4 His mother and Dr. Swinfen were both perhaps wrong in their conjecture as to the origin of the disease; he more probably inherited it from his father, with the morbid melancholy which is so commonly an attendant on scrofulous habits.-CROKER.

that my mother carried me to Trysul,' to consult Dr. Atwood, an oculist of Worcester. My father and Mrs. Harriots, I think, never had much kindness for each other. She was my mother's relation; and he had none so high to whom he could send any of his family. He saw her seldom himself, and willingly disgusted her, by sending his horses from home on Sunday; which she considered, and with reason, as a breach of duty. My father had much vanity, which his adversity hindered from being fully exerted. I remember, that, mentioning her legacy in the humility of distress, he called her our good Cousin Harriots. My mother had no value for his relations; those, indeed, whom we krew of, were much lower than hers. This contempt began, I know not on which side, very early: but, as my father was little at home, it had not much effect.

My father and mother had not much happiness from each other. They sel dom conversed; for my father could not bear to talk of his affairs; and my mother; being unacquainted with books, cared not to talk of anything else. Had my mother been more literate, they had been better companions. She might have sometimes introduced her unwelcome topic with more success, if she could have diversified her conversation. Of business she had no distinct conception; and, therefore, her discourse was composed only of complaint, fear, and suspicion. Neither of them ever tried to calculate the profits of trade, or the expenses of living. My mother concluded that we were poor, because we lost by some of our trades; but the truth was, that. my father, having in the early part of his life contracted debts. never had trade sufficient to enable him to pay them, and maintain his family; he got something, but not enough.

It was not till about 1768, that I thought to calculate the returns of my father's trade, and by that estimate his probable profits. This, I believe, my parents never did.

III. 1711-12.

This year, in Lent-12. I was taken to London, to be touched for the evil by Queen Anne. My mother was at Nicholson's, the famous bookseller, in Little Britain. I always retained some memory of this journey, though I was then but thirty months old. I remembered a little dark room behind the kitchen, where the jack-weight fell through a hole in the floor, into which I once slipped my leg."

I remember a boy crying at the palace when I went to be touched. Being

1 Near Wolverhampton.-R. WRIGHT.

2 My mother, then with child, concealed her pregnancy, that she might not be hindered from the journey-Orig.

I seem to remember, that I played with a string and a bell, which my cousin Isaac Johnon gave me; and that there was a cat with a white collar, and a dog, called Chops, that leaped over a stick: but I know not whether I remember the thing, or the talk of it. -Orig.