When my friend William was angry, I was sure he was in earnest, and that it would not be over too soon: I therefore considered it as a proper, steady sort of concern. But his paroxysms of good-humour were occasionally awkward; and I have frequently begged of him to cheer up our society by getting into a little passion; nay, I have sometimes taken the liberty of putting him into a slight one myself, to make him more agreeable.
Be it remembered, however, that this was before Mr. William Johnson became a judge; I cannot say what effect an inoculation by Lord Norbury’s merry temperament may have had upon his constitution. But I have frequently told him, when I saw him drooping into placidity (he is not singular on that point), that either physic or wrangling was indispensable, to keep the bile from stagnation; and I hope my old chum has not suffered himself to sink into a morbid state of mental tranquillity.
I always promised to give William Johnson a page or two in my “Historic Memoirs of Ireland:” some of his friends suggested that he would be more appropriately introduced into my “Fragments.” As we are now both rather stricken in years, I will adopt their suggestion without abandoning my own purpose, and, with the best wishes for his celebrity, bequeath him in each work to posterity, to make what use they please of, as they certainly will of both of us, when we cannot help ourselves.
Though divers curious and memorable anecdotes occur to me of my said friend, Judge William Johnson, I do not conceive that any of them can be very interesting out of court, particularly after he becomes defunct, which nature has certainly set down as a “motion of course.” One or two, however, which connect themselves with my egotistical feelings shall not be omitted. At the same time, I assure him, that I by no means approve of our late brother Daly’s method of reasoning, who, on speaking rather indecorously of Mr. William Johnson, in his absence, at the bar-mess on circuit, was tartly and very properly asked by the present Mr. Justice Jebb, “Why he would say such things of Mr. Johnson behind his back?”—“Because,” replied Mr. Daly, “I would not hurt his feelings by saying them to his face!”
I often reflect on a singular circumstance which occurred between my friend Johnson and me, as proving the incalculability of what is called in the world “luck,” which, in my mind, cannot have a better definition than “The state-lottery of nature.” My friend is the son of a respectable apothecary, formerly of Fishamble-street, Dublin, and was called to the bar some few years before me; but the world being blind as to our respective merits, I got immediately into considerable business, and he, though a much steadier and wiser man, and a much cleverer lawyer, got none at all.—Prosperity, in short, was beginning fairly to deluge me; when suddenly I fell ill of a violent fever on circuit, which nearly ended my career. Under these circumstances, Johnson acted by me in a kind and friendly manner, and insisted on remaining with me, which however I would not allow; but I never forgot the proffered kindness, and determined, if ever it came within my power, to repay this act of civility (though then involving no great pecuniary sacrifice).
I was restored to health, and my career of good fortune started afresh, whilst Johnson had still no better luck. He remained assiduous, friendly, and good-natured to me; but at the same time he drooped, and told me at Wexford, in a state of despondency, that he was determined to quit the bar and go into orders. I endeavoured to dissuade him from this, because I had a presentiment that he would eventually succeed; and I fairly owned to him that I doubted much if he were mild enough for a parson, though quite hot enough for a barrister.
About two years after, I was appointed king’s counsel.—My stuff gown had been, so far, the most fortunate one of our profession, and Johnson’s the least so. I advised him jocosely to get a new gown; and shortly after, in the whim of the moment, fancying there might be some seeds of good luck sticking to the folds of my old stuff after I had quitted it for a silken robe, I despatched a humorous note to Johnson, together with the stuff gown, as a mark of my gratitude for his attentions, begging he would accept it from a friend and well-wisher, and try if wearing it would be of equal service to him as to me.
He received my jocose gift very pleasantly, and in good part; and, laughing at my conceit, in the same spirit of whim put on the gown. But, whatever may become of prepossessions, certain it is that from that day Johnson prospered; his business gradually grew greater and greater; and, in proportion as it increased, he became what they call in Ireland, high enough to every body but the attorneys. No doubt he was well able to do their business; but they never seemed to find it out till he had got the lucky gown on his back, though he had a “brother, Tom,” of that cast, a good bringer, too.
Thus my friend William Johnson trudged ably on through thick and thin, but minding his stepping stone, till he got to the Parliament House, into which Lord Castlereagh stuffed him (as he said himself), “to put an end to it.” However, he kept a clear look-out, and now sits in the place his elder brother Judge Robert had occupied, who was rather singularly unjudged for having Cobbettised Lord Redesdale, as will hereafter appear. I have always considered that Judge Robert Johnson was treated cruelly and illegally: the precedent has never been followed, and I hope never will.
Old Mr. Johnson, the father of these two gentlemen, when upward of sixty, procured a diploma as physician—to make the family genteeler. He was a decent, orderly, good kind of apothecary, and a very respectable, though somewhat ostentatious doctor; and, above all, an orthodox, hard-praying Protestant. I was much amused one day after dinner at Mr. Hobson’s, at Bushy, near Dublin, where the doctor, Curran, myself, and many others were in company. The doctor delighted in telling of the successes of his sons, Bob, Bill, Gam, and Tom the attorney, as he termed them: he was fond of attributing Bob’s advancement rather to the goodness of God than the Marquess of Downshire; and observed, most parentally, that he had brought up his boys, from their very childhood, with “the fear of God always before their eyes.”—“Ah! ’twas a fortunate circumstance indeed, doctor,” said Curran; “very fortunate indeed, that you frightened them so early!”