JOHNSON. 



199 





JMmjKt, His mother, yielding to the superstitious notiqn which 

 so long prevailed as to the virtue of the royal touch, 

 carried him to London in his childhood, where he 

 was actually touched by Queen Anne. The faint re- 

 membrance of this circumstance always remained in 

 Johnson's mind. Being asked, If he could remember 

 Queen Anne ? He said, he had a confused, but sort of 

 solemn recollection, of a lady in diamonds, and a long 

 black hood. 



He was first taught to read English by a woman, 

 who kept a school for young children in Litchfield. 

 When he was going to Oxford, this humble instruc- 

 tress of hi- childhood came to take leave of him ; and, 

 in the simplicity of her kindness, brought him a j>- 

 of gingerbread, saying, that he was the best scholar she 

 bad ever had. He delighted in mentioning this little 

 Compliment ; adding, with a smile, " that this was as 

 hich a proof of his merit as he could receive." His 

 next instructor in English was one Brown, who had 

 published a spelling-book, which he dedicated to the 

 rse, but of w hich Dr. Johnson was afraid that no 

 was to be found. He learned Latin at a .school 

 at I.itchfield under a Mr. Hunter, a severe disciplina- 

 rian, but an attentive teacher. Johnson owned, that he 

 bad himself required the rod; and to that m-trument 

 of tuition, it was a part of his principles to pay the 

 most profound deference. Once, when he saw some 

 young ladies who hail been remarkably well bn 

 up by a si IT, he exclaimed, " Rod, I will ho- 



nour v !" The mind that can dwell 



with .!' the a.rx-iiitrd ideas of a rod and 



frame of must have it* sen- 



though he was 



too !>..! lighted '> j.-:i! ::i I 1 :- _ i.rrV tv <.t' IM\;-!I 



sxntueraenU. he nu -he same ascmdano 



ites thiit he kept up, in after life, in the cir- 

 rature. Hi* proficiency was also then, as in 

 ' life, much beyond hi apparent 

 was impatient of nt.ited uk-, but could 

 i great exertions. His memory was pro- 

 rnacious. When a boy, he was immoderate- 

 ly fond of reading romance- * extravagant 

 Actions he was once heard to alt: 

 turn of mind which prevented him from ev< 

 any settled profe*sion. The circumstance of his read- 

 ing many romance* in hi* youth is not woi 



i of reading wa* much more common in the 

 i the present age. Romance reading is now 

 revived * a specie* of black-letter learning ; it was 

 then the ordinary food of young m. 

 . M riou 



Vd for some time at the house of 

 hit i uson was, at the age of 







shirr, of whiih Mr. W ( ntwurth w,, 



according to his own account, he was rat' .-r irreverent 

 towards a severe matr, whom he did not on the whole 

 esteem, but in after life disposed to make allowance 







be bad Uu/ht him. H 

 * year, and tfi- 11 rtturn 

 years, reading in a 



w much 

 about 



where he staid for two 

 Itory manner, but with 



advantage, ai to go excr.dingly well 

 :<-l to the unr. . r-itv. I' j-erlupn, as Mr. 



Bowell justly remark", have rtudi. 



but it may be doubted ha mind as his was 



not more enriched by roaming at large in the fii 



HIT. The analogy l>rtwi in (lie Ixxly and mind 



u Ttry genera], and the parallel will hold M much a* 



to their food as to any other particular. The flesh of 

 animals who feed excursively, is allowed to have a Samuel. 

 higher flavour than that of those who aic i-oupcd up. v * ip v < 

 May there not be the same difference between men 

 who read as their taste prompts, and men who are con- 

 fined, in cells nnd colleges, to stated tasks. By what 

 means his father was enabled to undertake the expence 

 of sending him to the universty, has not been very ac- 

 curately told. He had once realized a good deal of 

 money in trade, but had afterwards lost it, by embark- 

 ing in a ruinous speculation, and was at this time in 

 narrow circumstances. It is believed that one of his 

 schoolfellows undertook to support Johnson at Oxford, 

 in the quality of his companion, though he failed in 

 rendering him the promised assistance. He went, how- 

 ever, to Oxford, and was entered a commoner of Pem- 

 broke college on the SIst of October, being then in hi* 

 19th year. His tutor was a Mr. Jordan, whom John- 

 son respected for his personal worth, but not for his 

 abilities. Having absented himself from this precep- 

 tor for several day*, Mr. Jordan asked him the reason 

 of his absence. Johnson told him he had been sliding 

 in Christ Church meadows. Mr. Boswell, to whom he 

 related this answer, remarked, that it shewed great for- 

 titudc of miiuU " No, Sir," said Johnson, " stark in- 

 sensibility." 



In his 20th year, while he was at Litchfield during 

 the college vacation, his constitutional melancholy as- 

 Mimed a peculiarly gloomy aspect, and on his return to 

 the ii the unequal state of his spirits, and 



probably too real causes for depression about his future 

 prospect*, won to have made him an irregular, and by 

 no means an exemplary student. He was often seen 

 lounging at the college gates with the younger stu- 

 dent. whom he amused by his wit, and spirited up to 

 contempt of their superior* by his satire. Dr. Adams, 

 his nominal tutor, after Norden, at Pembroke college, 

 said, that while he as there, he was a gay and frolic. 

 some fellow. When the remark was imparted to him 

 by Bm well, " Ah Sir," he said, " I was mad and vio- 

 lent ; ( was miserably poor, and thought to fight my 

 way by n-y literature and my wit." Poverty at length 

 compelled him to quit the university without a degree. 

 He nti:rr.<fl to Litchfield, in 17.11. with very gloomy 

 prospect*. Hi.- father died a few months after his re. 

 turn, and the little he left him was barely sufficient 

 for the temporary support of his widow. In the fol- 

 lowing year, he accepted the place of usher of the 

 school of Market Boswonh in Leicestershire, an em- 

 r.t which the intolence of the patron of the 

 school, .Vr \VoNt.m D.xir. with whom he was obliged 

 to live, made him speedily rcoign, and always remem- 

 ber with a ort of horror. After this he resided for she 

 months at Birmingham, as the guest of his old school- 

 fellow, Mr. Hector, an eminent surgeon, in whose house 

 he translated and abridged Father Lobo's Voyage to Abys- 

 tima. For this task he received five guineas. The 

 body of the work is written with no remarkable ele- 

 gance or power, but the preface ha* some passages that 

 are full of his characteristic manner. 



In 173* he returned to Litchricld, and there issued 

 proposals for an edition of the Latin poems of Politian, 

 w itfi the history of I^itin poetry, from the era of Pe- 

 trarch to the time of Politian, together with a life of 

 Politian. The subscription, however, was not enough 

 to encourage him to procinf. Disappointed in this 

 scheme, he offered his services to Mr. Cave, the proprie- 

 tor and editor of the Grntlrman't Magazine. On this 

 occasion be suggested some improvement* in the ma- 



