Then he talked a little of the business of the day and he told me that Mr. Anstruther was to speak.
“I was sure of it,” I cried, “by his manner when he entered the managers’ box. I shall know when you are to speak, Mr. Windham, before I hear you.”
He shrugged his shoulders a little uncomfortably. I asked him to name to me the various managers. He did; adding, “Do you not like to sit here, where you can look down upon the several combatants before the battle?”
When he named Mr. Michael Angelo Taylor, I particularly desired he might be pointed out to me, telling him I had long wished to see him, from the companion given to him in one of the “Probationary Odes,” where they have coupled him with my dear father, most impertinently and unwarrantably.
“That, indeed,” he cried, “is a licentiousness in the press quite intolerable—to attack and involve private characters in their public lampoons! To Dr. Burney they could have no right; but Mr. Michael Angelo Taylor is fair game enough, and likes that or any other way whatever of obtaining notice. You know what Johnson said to Boswell of preserving fame?”
“No.”
“There were but two ways,” he told him, “of preserving; one was by sugar, the other by salt. ‘Now,’ says he, ‘as the sweet way, Bozzy, you are but little likely to attain, I would have you plunge into vinegar, and get fairly pickled at once.’ And such has been the plan of Mr. Michael Angelo Taylor. With the sweet he had, indeed, little chance, so he soused into the other, head over ears.”
We then united forces in repeating passages from various of the “Probationary Odes,” and talking over various of the managers, till Mr. Anstruther was preparing to speak, and Mr. Windham went to his cell.
I am sure you will remember that Mr. Burke came also, and the panic with which I saw him, doubled by my fear lest he should see that panic.
When the speech was over, and evidence was filling up the day’s business, Mr. Windham returned. Some time after, but I have forgotten how, we were agreeing in thinking suspense, and all obscurity, in expectation or in opinion, almost the thing’s most trying to bear in this mortal life, especially where they lead to some evil construction.