Innumerable other instances might be given; but these are sufficient to prove, that in erroneous inscription Hogarth is not alone.
[173] This good gentleman was undoubtedly designed to place his hand upon his heart; but Hogarth had either heard of some examples similar to one which was lately seen at Dr. John Hunter's, or has, as in many other instances, reversed the drawing.
[174] The Countess Spencer, who has dignified the arts by making several very elegant drawings, has given a sanction to this baptism in a print lately engraved by Bartolozzi.
[175] The pit was formerly the seat of the critics, and dread of authors; our critics of the present day have taken to the green boxes.
[176] The father of Huggins was warden of the Fleet Prison, and in that office guilty of extortion, cruelty, breach of trust, and many other crimes; he accumulated a considerable fortune, and died at ninety years of age. His son William was educated for holy orders, and sent to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he took the degree of M.A., but on the death of his elder brother gave up all thoughts of entering into the church. In 1757 some flattering verses were addressed to him on his version of Ariosto: they are preserved in the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. xxvii. p. 180; but, except by the author and the person to whom they are written, were probably never read through. A specimen of his translation from Dante, which was published in the British Magazine for 1760, exhibits an unequivocal proof that Mr. Huggins was worthy of his encomiast. He died the 2d of July 1761, and left to posterity a MS. tragedy, a MS. translation of Dante, a MS. farce, and though last, not least in estimation—two thousand pounds per annum.
[177] He was a respectable performer on the violin, some years chapelmaster at Antwerp, and several seasons leader of the band at Marybone Gardens. He published a collection of musical compositions, to which was annexed a portrait of himself, characterized by three lines from Milton:
"Thou honour'dst verse, and verse must lend her wing
To honour thee, the priest of Phœbus' quire,
That tun'st her happiest lines in hymn or song."
He died in 1750, aged seventy years, and gives one additional name to a catalogue I have somewhere seen of very old professors of music, who, saith my author, "generally live unto a greater age than persons in any other way of life, from their souls being so attuned unto harmony, that they enjoy a perpetual peace of mind." It has been observed, and I believe justly, that thinking is a great enemy to longevity, and that, consequently, they who think least will be likely to live longest. The quantity of thought necessary to make an adept in this divine science must be determined by those who have studied it.