[1000] This has been printed in other publications, 'fall to the ground.' But Johnson himself gave me the true expression which he had used as above; meaning that the recommendation left as little choice in the one case as the other. BOSWELL. One of the 'other publications is Hawkins's edition of Johnson's Works. See in it vol. xi. p. 216.
[1001] They are published in vol. xi. of Hawkins's edition of Johnson's Works. 1787, and are often quoted in my notes. It should be remembered that Steevens is not trustworthy. See ante, iii. 281, and iv. 178.
[1002] See ante, ii. 96.
[1003] See ante, p. iii.
[1004] She Stoops to Conquer was first acted on March 15, 1773. The King of Sardinia had died on Feb. 20. Gent. Mag. 1773, pp. 149, 151.
[1005] Hannah More (Memoirs, i. 170) describes how, in 1780, she went to one of Mrs. Ord's assemblies at a time when 'the mourning for some foreign Wilhelmina Jaquelina was not over. Every human creature was in deep mourning, and I, poor I, all gorgeous in scarlet. Even Jacobite Johnson was in deep mourning.'
[1006] In the tenth edition of the Rambler, published in 1784, the entry is still found:—'Milton, Mr. John, remarks on his versification.' In like manner we find:—'Shakspeare, Mr. William, his eminent success in tragi-comedy;' 'Spenser, Mr. Edmund, some imitations of his diction censured;' 'Cowley, Mr. Abraham, a passage in his writing illustrated.'
[1007] See ante, p. 116.
[1008] See ante, iii. 425, note 3.
[1009] Hawkins (Life, p. 571) writes:—'The plan for Johnson's visiting the Continent became so well known, that, as a lady then resident at Rome afterwards informed me, his arrival was anxiously expected throughout Italy.'