To BENNET LANGTON, ESQ.
'Dear Sir,
You may very reasonably charge me with insensibility of your kindness, and that of Lady Rothes, since I have suffered so much time to pass without paying any acknowledgement. I now, at last, return my thanks; and why I did it not sooner I ought to tell you. I went into Wiltshire as soon as I well could, and was there much employed in palliating my own malady. Disease produces much selfishness. A man in pain is looking after ease; and lets most other things go as chance shall dispose of them.
In the mean time I have lost a companion, to whom I have had recourse for domestick amusement for thirty years, and whose variety of knowledge never was exhausted; and now return to a habitation vacant and desolate. I carry about a very troublesome and dangerous complaint, which admits no cure but by the chirurgical knife. Let me have your prayers.
I am, &c.
SAM. JOHNSON.
London, Sept. 29, 1783.'
Happily the complaint abated without his being put to the torture of amputation. But we must surely admire the manly resolution which he discovered while it hung over him.
In a letter to the same gentleman he writes,
'The gout has within these four days come upon me with a violence which I never experienced before. It made me helpless as an infant.'
And in another, having mentioned Mrs. Williams, he says,—
'whose death following that of Levett, has now made my house a solitude. She left her little substance to a charity-school. She is, I hope, where there is neither darkness, nor want, nor sorrow.'
I wrote to him, begging to know the state of his health, and mentioned that Baxter's Anacreon, 'which is in the library at Auchinleck, was, I find, collated by my father in 1727, with the MS. belonging to the University of Leyden, and he has made a number of Notes upon it. Would you advise me to publish a new edition of it?'
His answer was dated September 30:—
'You should not make your letters such rarities, when you know, or might know, the uniform state of my health. It is very long since I heard from you; and that I have not answered is a very insufficient reason for the silence of a friend. Your Anacreon is a very uncommon book; neither London nor Cambridge can supply a copy of that edition. Whether it should be reprinted, you cannot do better than consult Lord Hailes.— Besides my constant and radical disease, I have been for these ten days much harassed with the gout; but that has now remitted. I hope GOD will yet grant me a little longer life, and make me less unfit to appear before him.'
He this autumn received a visit from the celebrated Mrs. Siddons {Sarah Siddons, the most celebrated British actress of the day. – Editor}. He gives this account of it in one of his letters to Mrs. Thrale:—
'Mrs. Siddons, in her visit to me, behaved with great modesty and propriety, and left nothing behind her to be censured or despised. Neither praise nor money, the two powerful corrupters of mankind, seem to have depraved her. I shall be glad to see her again. Her brother Kemble calls on me, and pleases me very well.
Mrs. Siddons and I talked of plays; and she told me her intention of exhibiting this winter the characters of Constance, Catharine, and Isabella, in Shakspeare.'
Mr. Kemble has favoured me with the following minute of what passed at this visit:—
'When Mrs. Siddons came into the room, there happened to be no chair ready for her, which he observing, said with a smile, "Madam, you who so often occasion a want of seats to other people, will the more easily excuse the want of one yourself."
Having placed himself by her, he with great good-humour entered upon a consideration of the English drama; and, among other inquiries, particularly asked her which of Shakspeare's characters she was most pleased with. Upon her answering that she thought the character of Queen Catharine, in Henry the Eighth, the most natural:—
"I think so too, Madam, (said he;) and whenever you perform it, I will once more hobble out to the theatre myself."
Mrs. Siddons promised she would do herself the honour of acting his favourite part for him; but many circumstances happened to prevent the representation of King Henry the Eighth during the Doctor's life.
'In the course of the evening he thus gave his opinion upon the merits of some of the principal performers whom he remembered to have seen upon the stage.
"Mrs. Porter, in the vehemence of rage, and Mrs. Clive in the sprightliness of humour, I have never seen equalled. What Clive did best, she did better than Garrick; but could not do half so many things well; she was a better romp than any I ever saw in nature. Pritchard, in common life, was a vulgar ideot; but, when she appeared upon the stage, seemed to be inspired by gentility and understanding. I once talked with Colley Cibber {Another famous actor and playwright of the time. – Editor}, and thought him ignorant of the principles of his art.
Garrick, Madam, was no declaimer; there was not one of his own scene-shifters who could not have spoken To be, or not to be, better than he did; yet he was the only actor I ever saw, whom I could call a master both in tragedy and comedy; though I liked him best in comedy. A true conception of character, and natural expression of it, were his distinguished excellencies."
Having expatiated, with his usual force and eloquence, on Mr. Garrick's extraordinary eminence as an actor, he concluded with this compliment to his social talents:
"And after all, Madam, I thought him less to be envied on the stage than at the head of a table."'
Johnson, indeed, had thought more upon the subject of acting than might be generally supposed. Talking of it one day to Mr. Kemble, he said,
'Are you, Sir, one of those enthusiasts who believe yourself transformed into the very character you represent?'
Upon Mr. Kemble's answering that he had never felt so strong a persuasion himself;
'To be sure not, Sir, (said Johnson;) the thing is impossible. And if Garrick really believed himself to be that monster, Richard the Third, he deserved to be hanged every time he performed it.'
A pleasing instance of the generous attention of one of his friends has been discovered by the publication of Mrs. Thrale's collection of Letters. In a letter to one of the Miss Thrales, he writes,—
'A friend, whose name I will tell when your mamma has tried to guess it, sent to my physician to enquire whether this long train of illness had brought me into difficulties for want of money, with an invitation to send to him for what occasion required. I shall write this night to thank him, having no need to borrow.'
And afterwards, in a letter to Mrs. Thrale,—
'Since you cannot guess, I will tell you, that the generous man was Gerard Hamilton. I returned him a very thankful and respectful letter.'
I applied to Mr. Hamilton, by a common friend, and he has been so obliging as to let me have Johnson's letter to him upon this occasion, to adorn my collection.
'To THE RIGHT HONOURABLE WILLIAM GERARD HAMILTON.
'DEAR SIR,
'Your kind enquiries after my affairs, and your generous offers, have been communicated to me by Dr. Brocklesby. I return thanks with great sincerity, having lived long enough to know what gratitude is due to such friendship; and entreat that my refusal may not be imputed to sullenness or pride. I am, indeed, in no want. Sickness is, by the generosity of my physicians, of little expence to me. But if any unexpected exigence should press me, you shall see, dear Sir, how cheerfully I can be obliged to so much liberality.
Your most obedient
And most humble servant,
SAM. JOHNSON.'
'November, 19, 1783.'
(classix comix™ is made possible in part through the generosity of the Bob’s Bowery Bar Fund for the Worthy Arts: “Yes, cold and flu season is upon us once again, and let me tell you, folks, even better than an ounce of prevention is an imperial pint of it, so before even those first warning signs of the grippe or a hacking lingering cough descend upon you, make your way to Bob’s Bowery Bar and order one of Bob’s Mom’s Germ Destroyers, a delightful heated concoction of cask-aged Royal Navy rum, echinacea, ginseng, crystallized ginger, fresh-squeezed lemon ‘n’ lime juice, and blackstrap molasses. Sorry, not covered by any insurance program, Medicare or Medicaid!”
– Horace P. Sternwall, host and narrator of Bob’s Bowery Bar Presents Philip Morris Commander’s “Blanche Weinberg, Lady Psychiatrist”, broadcast live 8pm Sundays {EST} exclusively on the Dumont Television Network. This week’s presentation: “The Dancing Poetess”, by Hortense P. Starkweather, starring Kitty Carlisle as “Dr. Blanche”, with special guest star Cyd Charisse as “Betty Bongo”.)
part 248
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