[397] 'Garrick used to tell, that Johnson said of an actor who played Sir Harry Wildair at Lichfield, "There is a courtly vivacity about the fellow;" when, in fact, according to Garrick's account, "he was the most vulgar ruffian that ever went upon boards."' Ante, ii. 465.
[398] Mrs. Cibber was the sister of Dr. Arne the musical composer, and the wife of Theophilus Cibber, Colley Cibber's son. She died in 1766, and was buried in the cloisters of Westminster Abbey. Baker's Biog. Dram. i. 123.
[399] See ante, under Sept. 30, 1783.
[400] See ante, i. 197, and ii. 348.
[401] Johnson had set him to repeat the ninth commandment, and had with great glee put him right in the emphasis. Ante, i. 168.
[402] Act iii. sc. 2.
[403] Boswell's suggestion is explained by the following passage in Johnson's Works, viii. 463:—'Mallet was by his original one of the Macgregors, a clan that became about sixty years ago, under the conduct of Robin Roy, so formidable and so infamous for violence and robbery, that the name was annulled by a legal abolition.'
[404] See ante, iii. 410, where he said to an Irish gentleman:—'Do not make an union with us, Sir. We should unite with you, only to rob you. We should have robbed the Scotch, if they had had anything of which we could have robbed them.'
[405] It is remarkable that Dr. Johnson read this gentle remonstrance, and took no notice of it to me. BOSWELL. See post, Oct. 12, note.
[406] St. Matthew, v. 44.