BOSWELL. Johnson here assumes his title of Doctor, which Boswell says (ante, ii. 332, note 1), so far as he knew, he never did. Perhaps the letter has been wrongly copied, or perhaps Johnson thought that, in writing to a man of title, he ought to assume such title as he himself had.
[829] The eminent painter, representative of the ancient family of Homfrey (now Humphry) in the west of England; who, as appears from their arms which they have invariably used, have been, (as I have seen authenticated by the best authority,) one of those among the Knights and Esquires of honour who are represented by Holinshed as having issued from the Tower of London on coursers apparelled for the justes, accompanied by ladies of honour, leading every one a Knight, with a chain of gold, passing through the streets of London into Smithfield, on Sunday, at three o'clock in the afternoon, being the first Sunday after Michaelmas, in the fourteenth year of King Richard the Second. This family once enjoyed large possessions, but, like others, have lost them in the progress of ages. Their blood, however, remains to them well ascertained; and they may hope in the revolution of events, to recover that rank in society for which, in modern times, fortune seems to be an indispensable requisite. BOSWELL.
[830] Son of Mr. Samuel Paterson. BOSWELL. In the first two editions after 'Paterson' is added 'eminent for his knowledge of books.' See ante, iii. 90.
[831] Humphry, on his first coming to London, poor and unfriended, was helped by Reynolds. Northcote's Reynolds, ii. 174.
[832] On April 21 he wrote:—'After a confinement of 129 days, more than the third part of a year, and no inconsiderable part of human life, I this day returned thanks to God in St. Clement's Church for my recovery.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 365.
[833] On April 26 he wrote:—'On Saturday I showed myself again to the living world at the Exhibition; much and splendid was the company, but like the Doge of Genoa at Paris [Versailles, Voltaire, Siècle de Louis XIV, chap, xiv.], I admired nothing but myself. I went up the stairs to the pictures without stopping to rest or to breathe,
|
"In all the madness of superfluous health." |
[Pope's Essay on Man, iii. 3.] The Prince of Wales had promised to be there; but when we had waited an hour and a half, sent us word that he could not come.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 367. 'The first Gentleman in Europe' was twenty-one years old when he treated men like Johnson and Reynolds with this insolence. Mr. Forster (Life of Goldsmith, ii. 244) says that it was at this very dinner that 'Johnson left his seat by desire of the Prince of Wales, and went to the head of the table to be introduced.' He does not give his authority for the statement.
[834] Mr. Croker wrote in 1847 that he had 'seen it very lately framed and glazed, in possession of the lady to whom it was addressed.' Croker's Boswell, p. 753.
[835] Shortly before he begged one of Mrs. Thrale's daughters 'never to think that she had arithmetic enough.' Ante, p. 171, note 3. See ante, iii. 207, note 3.