How to Make an Index

by Henry B. Wheatley

A charming appendix to the index consists of "Dicta Philosophi: A Concordance of Johnson's Sayings."

Dr. Hill writes in his preface:

"In my Index, which has cost me many months' heavy work, 'while I bore burdens with dull patience and beat the track of the alphabet with sluggish resolution,' I have, I hope, shown that I am not unmindful of all that I owe to men of letters. To the dead we cannot pay the debt of gratitude that is their due. Some relief is obtained from its burthen, if we in our turn make the men of our own generation debtors to us. The plan on which my Index is made, will I trust be found convenient. By the alphabetical arrangement in the separate entries of each article the reader, I venture to think, will be greatly facilitated in his researches. Certain subjects I have thought it best to form into groups. Under America, France, Ireland, London, Oxford, Paris and Scotland, are gathered together almost all the references to those subjects. The provincial towns of France, however, by some mistake I did not include in the general article. One important but intentional omission I must justify. In the case of the quotations in which my notes abound I have not thought it needful in the Index to refer to the book unless the eminence of the author required a separate and a second entry. My labour would have been increased beyond all endurance and my Index have been swollen almost into a monstrosity had I always referred to the book as well as to the matter which was contained in the passage that I extracted. Though in such a variety of subjects there must be many omissions, yet I shall be greatly disappointed if actual errors are discovered. Every entry I have made myself, and every entry I have verified in the proof sheets, not by comparing it with my manuscript, but by turning to the reference in the printed volumes. Some indulgence nevertheless may well be claimed and granted. If Homer at times nods, an index maker may be pardoned, should he in the fourth or fifth month of his task at the end of a day of eight hours' work grow drowsy. May I fondly hope that to the maker of so large an index will be extended the gratitude which Lord Bolingbroke says was once shown to lexicographers? 'I approve,' writes his lordship, 'the devotion of a studious man at Christ Church, who was overheard in his oratory entering into a detail with God, and acknowledging the divine goodness in furnishing the world with makers of dictionaries.'"

It is impossible to speak too highly of Dr. Hill's indexes to Boswell's Life of Johnson and Boswell's Letters and Johnson Miscellanies. Not only are they good indexes in themselves, but an indescribable literary air breathes over every page, and gives distinction to the whole. The index volume of the Life is by no means the least interesting of the set, and one instinctively thinks of the once celebrated Spaniard quoted by the great bibliographer Antonio—that the index of a book should be made by the author, even if the book itself were written by some one else.

The very excellence of this index has been used as a cause of complaint against its compiler. It has been said that everything that is known of Johnson can be found in the index, and therefore that the man who uses it is able to pose as a student, appearing to know as much as he who knows his Boswell by heart; but this is somewhat of a joke, for no useful information can be gained unless the book to which the index refers is searched, and he who honestly searches ceases to be a smatterer. It is absurd to deprive earnest readers of a useful help lest reviewers and smatterers misuse it.

Boswell himself made the original index to the Life of Johnson, which has several characteristic signs of its origin. Mr. Percy Fitzgerald, in his edition (1874), reprints the original "Table of Contents to the Life of Johnson," with this note:

"This is Mr. Boswell's own Index, the paging being altered to suit the present edition; and the reader will see that it bears signs of having been prepared by Mr. Boswell himself. In the second edition he made various additions, as well as alterations, which are characteristic in their way. Thus, 'Lord Bute' is changed into 'the Earl of Bute,' and 'Francis Barber' into 'Mr. Francis Barber.' After Mrs. Macaulay's name he added, 'Johnson's acute and unanswerable refutation of her levelling reveries'; and after that of Hawkins he put 'contradicted and corrected.' There are also various little compliments introduced where previously he had merely given the name. Such as 'Temple, Mr., the author's old and most intimate friend'; 'Vilette, Reverend Mr., his just claims on the publick'; 'Smith, Captain, his attention to Johnson at Warley Camp'; 'Somerville, Mr., the authour's warm and grateful remembrance of him'; 'Hall, General, his politeness to Johnson at Warley Camp'; 'Heberden, Dr., his kind attendance on Johnson.' On the other hand, Lord Eliot's 'politeness to Johnson' which stands in the first edition, is cut down in the second to the bald 'Eliot, Lord'; while 'Loughborough, Lord, his talents and great good fortune,' may have seemed a little offensive, and was expunged. The Literary Club was reverentially put in capitals. There are also such odd entries as 'Brutus, a ruffian,' &c."

One wishes that there were more indexes like Dr. Hill's in the world; and since I made an index to Shelley's works, I have often thought that a series of indexes of great authors would be of inestimable value.

First, all the author's works should be indexed, then his biographies, and lastly the anecdotes and notices in reviews and other books. How valuable would such books be in the study of our greatest poets! The plan is quite possible of attainment, and the indexes would be entertaining in themselves if made fairly full.

It is not possible to refer to all the good indexes that have been produced, for they are too numerous. A very remarkable index is that of the publications of the Parker Society by Henry Gough, which contains a great mass of valuable information presented in a handy form. It is the only volume issued by the society which is sought after, as the books themselves are a drug in the market. Mr. Gough was employed to make an index to the publications of the Camden Society, which would have been of still more value on account of the much greater interest of the books indexed; but the expense of printing the index was too great for the funds of the society, and it had to be abandoned, to the great loss of the literary world. Most of the archæological societies, commencing with the Society of Antiquaries, have issued excellent indexes, and the scientific societies also have produced indexes of varying merit.