A “POOR WRETCH OF A PAINTER.”
I had new specimens to-day of the oddities of Mr. Crutchley, whom I do not yet quite understand, though I have seen so much of him. In the course of our walks to-day we chanced, at one time, to be somewhat before the rest of the company, and soon got into a very serious conversation; though we began it by his relating a most ludicrous incident which had happened to him last winter.
There is a certain poor wretch of a villainous painter, one Mr. Lowe,[137] who is in some measure under Dr. Johnson's protection, and whom, therefore, he recommends to all the people he thinks can afford to sit for their pictures. Among these he made Mr. Seward very readily, and then applied to Mr. Crutchley.
“But now,” said Mr. Crutchley, as he told me the circumstance, “I have not a notion of sitting for my picture,—for who wants it? I may as well give the man the money without; but no, they all said that would not do so well, and Dr. Johnson asked me to give him my picture. 'And I assure you, sir,' says he, 'I shall put it in very good company, for I have portraits of some very respectable people in my dining-room.' 'Ay, sir,' says I, 'that's sufficient reason why you should not have mine, for I am sure it has no business in such society.' So then Mrs. Thrale asked me to give it to her. 'Ay sure, ma'am,' says I, 'you do me great honour; but pray, first, will you do me the favour to tell me what door you intend to put it behind?' However, after all I could say in opposition, I was obliged to go to the painter's. And I found him in such a condition! a room all dirt and filth, brats squalling and wrangling, up two pair of stairs, and a closet, of which the door was open, that Seward well said was quite Pandora's box—it was the repository of all the nastiness, and stench, and filth, and food, and drink, and—-oh, it was too bad to be borne! and 'Oh!' says I, 'Mr. Lowe, I beg your pardon for running away, but I have just recollected another engagement;' so I poked the three guineas in his hand, and told him I would come again another time, and then ran out of the house with all my might.”
DR. JOHNSON IN A RAGE.
June.—Wednesday—We had a terrible noisy day. Mr. and Mrs. Cator came to dinner, and brought with them Miss Collison, a niece. Mrs. Nesbitt was also here, and Mr. Pepys.[138]
The long war which has been proclaimed among the wits concerning Lord Lyttelton's “Life,” by Dr. Johnson, and which a whole tribe of “blues,” with Mrs. Montagu at their head, have vowed to execrate and revenge, now broke out with all the fury of the first actual hostilities, stimulated by long concerted schemes and much spiteful information. Mr. Pepys, Dr. Johnson well knew, was one of Mrs. Montagu's steadiest abettors; and, therefore, as he had some time determined to defend himself with the first of them he met, this day he fell the sacrifice to his wrath.
In a long tete-a-tete which I accidentally had with Mr. Pepys before the company was assembled, he told me his apprehensions of an attack, and entreated me earnestly to endeavour to prevent it; modestly avowing he was no antagonist for Dr. Johnson; and yet declaring his personal friendship for Lord Lyttelton made him so much hurt by the “Life,” that he feared he could not discuss the matter without a quarrel, which, especially in the house of Mrs. Thrale, he wished to avoid.