Mrs. Piozzi (late Mrs. Thrale), to her Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson, added the following postscript:—
'Naples, Feb. 10, 1786.
'Since the foregoing went to the press, having seen a passage from Mr. Boswell's Tour to the Hebrides, in which it is said, that I could not get through Mrs. Montague's "Essay on Shakspeare," I do not delay a moment to declare, that, on the contrary, I have always commended it myself, and heard it commended by every one else; and few things would give me more concern than to be thought incapable of tasting, or unwilling to testify my opinion of its excellence.'
It is remarkable that this postscript is so expressed, as not to point out the person who said that Mrs. Thrale could not get through Mrs. Montague's book; and therefore I think it necessary to remind Mrs. Piozzi, that the assertion concerning her was Dr. Johnson's, and not mine. The second observation that I shall make on this postscript is, that it does not deny the fact asserted, though I must acknowledge from the praise it bestows on Mrs. Montague's book, it may have been designed to convey that meaning.
What Mrs. Thrale's opinion is or was, or what she may or may not have said to Dr. Johnson concerning Mrs. Montague's book, it is not necessary for me to enquire. It is only incumbent on me to ascertain what Dr. Johnson said to me. I shall therefore confine myself to a very short state of the fact. The unfavourable opinion of Mrs. Montague's book, which Dr. Johnson, is here reported to have given, is, known to have been that which he uniformly expressed, as many of his friends well remember. So much, for the authenticity of the paragraph, as far as it relates to his own sentiments. The words containing the assertion, to which Mrs. Piozzi objects, are printed from my manuscript Journal, and were taken down at the time. The Journal was read by Dr. Johnson, who pointed out some inaccuracies, which I corrected, but did not mention any inaccuracy in the paragraph in question: and what is still more material, and very flattering to me, a considerable part of my Journal, containing this paragraph, was read several years ago by, Mrs. Thrale herself [see ante, ii. 383], who had it for some time in her possession, and returned it to me, without intimating that Dr. Johnson had mistaken her sentiments.
When the first edition of my Journal was passing through the press, it occurred to me that a peculiar delicacy was necessary to be observed in reporting the opinion of one literary lady concerning the performance of another; and I had such scruples on that head, that in the proof sheet I struck out the name of Mrs. Thrale from the above paragraph, and two or three hundred copies of my book were actually printed and published without it; of these Sir Joshua Reynolds's copy happened to be one. But while the sheet was working off, a friend, for whose opinion I have great respect, suggested that I had no right to deprive Mrs. Thrale of the high honour which Dr. Johnson had done her, by stating her opinion along with that of Mr. Beauclerk, as coinciding with, and, as it were, sanctioning his own. The observation appeared to me so weighty and conclusive, that I hastened to the printing-house, and, as a piece of justice, restored Mrs. Thrale to that place from which a too scrupulous delicacy had excluded her. On this simple state of facts I shall make no observation whatever. BOSWELL. This note was first published in the form of a letter to the Editor of The Gazetteer on April 17, 1786.
[678] See ante, p. 215, for his knowledge of coining and brewing, and post, p. 263, for his knowledge of threshing and thatching. Now and then, no doubt, 'he talked ostentatiously,' as he had at Fort George about Gunpowder (ante, p. 124). In the Gent. Mag. for 1749, p. 55, there is a paper on the Construction of Fireworks, which I have little doubt is his. The following passage is certainly Johnsonian:—'The excellency of a rocket consists in the largeness of the train of fire it emits, the solemnity of its motion (which should be rather slow at first, but augmenting as it rises), the straightness of its flight, and the height to which it ascends.'
[679] Perhaps Johnson refers to Stephen Hales's Statical Essays (London, 1733), in which is an account of experiments made on the blood and blood-vessels of animals.
[680] Evidence was given at the Tichborne Trial to shew that it takes some years to learn the trade.
[681] Not the very tavern, which was burned down in the great fire. P. CUNNINGHAM.