"A camp" he wrote to Mrs Thrale "however familiarly we may speak of it, is one of the great scenes of human life. War and peace divide the business of the world. Camps are the habitations of those who conquer kingdoms, or defend them."
Finally, we must not omit a special journey to Uttoxeter. Johnson had a long memory, even for his own failings:
"Once," said he "I refused to attend my father to Uttoxeter-market. Pride was the source of that refusal, and the remembrance of it was painful.... I desired to atone for this fault; I went to Uttoxeter in very bad weather, and stood for a considerable time bareheaded in the rain, on the spot where my father's stall used to stand. In contrition I stood, and I hope the penance was expiatory."
FOOTNOTES:
[32] It is curious that Johnson, who was not exactly delicate in his manner of eating (see p. [64]), should be greatly upset by this. But he complained of the same thing of a waiter in Edinburgh.
[34] Johnson produced an abridged edition in 1756.