Mr. Langton had entered the parlour purposely to speak to her, and with a message from Dr. Johnson:
But as soon as she could summon sufficient firmness to turn round, Mr. Langton solemnly said, “This poor man, I understand, Ma’am, from Frank, desired yesterday to see you.”
“My understanding, or hoping that, Sir, brought me hither to-day.”
“Poor man! ’tis a pity he did not know himself better; and that you should not have been spared this trouble.”
“Trouble?” she repeated; “I would come an hundred times to see Dr. Johnson the hundredth and first!”
“He begged me, Ma’am, to tell you that he hopes you will excuse him. He is very sorry, indeed, not to see you. But he desired me to come and speak to you for him myself, and to tell you, that he hopes you will excuse him; for he feels himself too weak for such an interview.”
Struck and touched to the very heart by so kind, though sorrowful a message, at a moment that seemed so awful, the Memorialist hastily expressed something like thanks to Mr. Langton, who was visibly affected, and, leaving her most affectionate respects, with every warmly kind wish she could half utter, she hurried back to her father’s coach.
The very next day, Monday, the 13th of December, Dr. Johnson expired—and without a groan. Expired, it is thought, in his sleep.
He was buried in Westminster Abbey; and a noble, almost colossal statue of him, in the high and chaste workmanship of Bacon, has been erected in St. Paul’s Cathedral.
The pall-bearers were Mr. Burke, Mr. Windham, Sir Joseph Banks, Mr. Colman, Sir Charles Bunbury, and Mr. Langton.