[515] See ante, p. 69.
[516] See ante, i. 402.
[517] See ante, i. 167.
[518] See post, under Sept. 30, 1783.
[519] See post, ib., where Johnson told Mrs. Siddons that 'Garrick was no declaimer.'
[520] Hannah More (Memoirs, ii. 16) says that she once asked Garrick 'why Johnson was so often harsh and unkind in his speeches both of him and to him:—"Why," he replied, "it is very natural; is it not to be expected he should be angry that I, who have so much less merit than he, should have had so much greater success?"'
[521] Foote died a month after this conversation. Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale:—'Did you see Foote at Brighthelmstone? Did you think he would so soon be gone? Life, says Falstaff, is a shuttle [Merry Wives of Windsor, act v. sc. 1]. He was a fine fellow in his way; and the world is really impoverished by his sinking glories. Murphy ought to write his life, at least to give the world a Footeana. Now will any of his contemporaries bewail him? Will genius change his sex to weep? I would really have his life written with diligence.' This letter is wrongly dated Oct. 3, 1777. It was written early in November. Piozzi Letters, i. 396. Baretti, in a marginal note on Footeana, says:—'One half of it had been a string of obscenities.' See post, April 24, 1779, note.
[522] See ante, i. 447.
[523] To pit is not in Johnson's Dictionary.
[524] Very likely Mr. Langton. See ante, ii. 254.