[454] Eight days later he recorded:—'I have in ten days written to Aston, Lucy, Hector, Langton, Boswell; perhaps to all by whom my letters are desired.' Pr. and Med. 209. He had written also to Mrs. Thrale, but her affection, it should seem from this, he was beginning to doubt.
[455] See ante, p. 84.
[456] See ante, i. 247.
[457] See post, p. 158, note 4.
[458] Johnson has here expressed a sentiment similar to that contained in one of Shenstone's stanzas, to which, in his life of that poet, he has given high praise:—
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'I prized every hour that went by, Beyond all that had pleased me before; But now they are gone [past] and I sigh, I grieve that I prized them no more.' |
J. BOSWELL, JUN.
[459] She was his god-daughter. See post, May 10, 1784.
[460] 'Dr. Johnson gave a very droll account of the children of Mr. Langton, "who," he said, "might be very good children, if they were let alone; but the father is never easy when he is not making them do something which they cannot do; they must repeat a fable, or a speech, or the Hebrew alphabet, and they might as well count twenty for what they know of the matter; however, the father says half, for he prompts every other word."' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, i. 73. See ante, p. 20, note 2.
[461] A part of this letter having been torn off, I have, from the evident meaning, supplied a few words and half-words at the ends and beginnings of lines. BOSWELL.