Aetat. 74.] The Essex Head Club. 253 'The true state of the parallel must be this. Suppose a man, with eyes like his neighbours, was told by a boasting corporal, that the troops, indeed, wore red clothes for their ordinary dress, but that every soldier had likewise a suit of black velvet, which he put on when the King reviews them. This he thinks strange, and desires to see the fine clothes, but finds nobody in forty thousand men that can produce. either coat or waistcoat. One, indeed, has left them in his chest at Port Mahon; another has always heard that he ought to have velvet clothes somewhere; and a third has heard somebody say, that soldiers ought to wear velvet. Can the enquirer be blamed if he goes away believing that a soldier's red coat is all that he has ? 'But the most obdurate incredulity may be shamed or silenced by acts. To overpower contradictions, let the soldier shew his velvetcoat, and the Fingalist the original of Ossian '. 'The difference between us and the blind man is this :-the blind man is unconvinced, because he cannot see; and we, because though we can see, we find that nothing can be shown.' Notwithstanding the complication of disorders under which Johnson now laboured, he did not resign himself to despondency and discontent, but with wisdom and spirit endeavoured to console and amuse his mind with as many innocent enjoyments as he could procure. Sir John Hawkins has mentioned the cordiality with which he insisted that such of the members of the old club in Ivy-lane as survived, should meet again and dine together, which they did, twice at a tavern and once at his house3: and in order to insure himself society in the evening for three days in the week, he instituted a club at the Essex Head, in Essex-street, then kept by Samuel Greaves, an old servant of Mr. Thrale's. 'DEAR SIR, 'TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. 'It is inconvenient to me to come out, I should else have waited on you with an account of a little evening Club which we are establishing in Essex-street, in the Strand, and of which you are desired to be 'Why is not the original deposited in some publick library?' he asked. Boswell's Hebrides, Nov. 10. 2 See ante, i. 190. 3 See Appendix C. * 'Dec. 27, 1873. The wearisome solitude of the long evenings did indeed suggest to me the convenience of a club in my neighbourhood, but I have been hindered from attending it by want of breath.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 340. 'Dec. 31. I have much need of entertainment; spiritless, infirm, sleepless, and solitary, looking back with sorrow and forward with terrour.' lb. p. 343. one 254 Members of the Essex Head Club. [A.D. 1783. one. It will be held at the Essex Head, now kept by an old servant of Thrale's. The company is numerous, and, as you will see by the list, miscellaneous. The terms are lax, and the expences light. Mr. Barry was adopted by Dr. Brocklesby, who joined with me in forming the plan. We meet thrice a week, and he who misses forfeits two-pence1. 'If you are willing to become a member, draw a line under your name. Return the list. We meet for the first time on Monday at eight. 'Dec. 4, 1783.' 'I am, &c. 'SAM. JOHNSON.' It did not suit Sir Joshua to be one of this Club. But when I mention only Mr. Daines Barrington, Dr. Brocklesby, Mr. Murphy, Mr. John Nichols, Mr. Cooke, Mr. Joddrel, Mr. Paradise, Dr. Horsley, Mr. Windham, I shall sufficiently obviate the misrepresentation of it by Sir John Hawkins, as if it had been a low ale-house association, by which Johnson was degraded 3. Johnson himself, like his namesake Old Ben, composed the Rules of his Club 5. 666 * ""I think," said Mr. Cambridge, "it sounds more like some club that one reads of in The Spectator than like a real club in these times; for the forfeits of a whole year will not amount to those of a single night in other clubs."' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, ii. 290. Mr. Cambridge was thinking of the Two-penny Club. Spectator, No. ix. 2 I was in Scotland when this Club was founded, and during all the winter. Johnson, however, declared I should be a member, and invented a word upon the occasion: 'Boswell (said he) is a very clubable man.' When I came to town I was proposed by Mr. Barrington, and chosen. I believe there are few societies where there is better conversation or more decorum. Several of us resolved to continue it after our great founder was removed by death. Other members were added; and now, above eight years since that loss, we go on happily. BOSWELL. Mr. Croker says 'Johnson had already invented unclubable for Sir J. Hawkins,' and refers to a note by Dr. Burney (ante, i. 480, note 1), in which Johnson is represented as saying of Hawkins, while he was still a member of the Literary Club: Sir John, Sir, is a very unclubable man.' But, as Mr. Croker points out (Croker's Boswell, p. 164), 'Hawkins was not knighted till long after he had left the club.' The anecdote, being proved to be inaccurate in one point, may be inaccurate in another, and may therefore belong to a much later date. 3 See Appendix D. Ben Jonson wrote Leges Convivales that were engraven in marble over the chimney in the Apollo of the Old Devil Tavern, Temple Bar; that being his Club Room.' Jonson's Works, ed. 1756, vii. 291. 5 RULES. 'To-day deep thoughts with me resolve to drench Aetat. 74.] Johnson's rules for the Club. 255 In the end of this year he was seized with a spasmodick asthma of such violence, that he was confined to the house in great pain, being sometimes obliged to sit all night in his chair, a recumbent posture being so hurtful to his respiration, that he could not endure lying in bed; and there came upon him at the same time that oppressive and fatal disease, a dropsy. It was a very severe winter, which probably aggravated his complaints; and the solitude in which Mr. Levett and Mrs. Williams had left him, rendered his life very gloomy. Mrs. Desmoulins', who still lived, was herself so very ill, that she could contribute very little to his relief. He, however, had none of that unsocial In mirth, which after no repenting draws.'-MILTON. [To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench In mirth that, &c.' Sonnets, xxi.] "The Club shall consist of four-and twenty. 'The meetings shall be on the Monday, Thursday, and Saturday of every week; but in the week before Easter there shall be no meeting. 'Every member is at liberty to introduce a friend once a week, but not oftener. 'Two members shall oblige themselves to attend in their turn every night from eight to ten, or to procure two to attend in their room. 'Every member present at the Club shall spend at least sixpence ; and every member who stays away shall forfeit three-pence. 'The master of the house shall keep an account of the absent members; and deliver to the President of the night a list of the forfeits incurred. 'When any member returns after absence, he shall immediately lay down his forfeits; which if he omits to do, the President shall require. 'There shall be no general reckoning, but every man shall adjust his own expences. 'The night of indispensable attendance will come to every member once a month. Whoever shall for three months together omit to attend himself, or by substitution, nor shall make any apology in the fourth month, shall be considered as having abdicated the Club. 'When a vacancy is to be filled, the name of the candidate, and of the member recommending him, shall stand in the Club-room three nights. On the fourth he may be chosen by ballot; six members at least being present, and two-thirds of the ballot being in his favour; or the majority, should the numbers not be divisible by three. 'The master of the house shall give notice, six days before, to each of those members whose turn of necessary attendance is come. 'The notice may be in these words: -"Sir, On the-ofwill be your turn of presiding at the Essex-Head. Your company is therefore earnestly requested." 'One penny shall be left by each member for the waiter.' Johnson's definition of a Club in this sense, in his Dictionary, is, 'An assembly of good fellows, meeting under certain conditions.' BOSWELL. She had left him in the summer (ante, p. 233), but perhaps she had returned. 2 He received many acts of kindness from outside friends. On Dec. shyness 256 Johnson confined by illness. [A.D. 1783. shyness which we commonly see in people afflicted with sickness. He did not hide his head from the world, in solitary abstraction; he did not deny himself to the visits of his friends and acquaintances; but at all times, when he was not overcome by sleep, was ready for conversation as in his best days1. 'TO MRS. LUCY PORTER, IN Lichfield. 'DEAR MADAM, 'You may perhaps think me negligent that I have not written to you again 2 upon the loss of your brother; but condolences and consolations are such common and such useless things, that the omission of them is no great crime and my own diseases occupy my mind, and engage my care. My nights are miserably restless, and my days, therefore, are heavy. I try, however, to hold up my head as high as I can 3. 'I am sorry that your health is impaired; perhaps the spring and the summer may, in some degree, restore it: but if not, we must submit to the inconveniences of time, as to the other dispensations of Eternal Goodness. Pray for me, and write to me, or let Mr. Pearson write for you. 'London, Nov. 29, 1783.' 31 he wrote:-'I have now in the house pheasant, venison, turkey, and ham, all unbought. Attention and respect give pleasure, however late or however useless. But they are not useless when they are late; it is reasonable to rejoice, as the day declines, to find that it has been spent with the approbation of mankind.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 343. I'Dec. 16, 1783. I spent the afternoon with Dr. Johnson, who indeed is very ill, and whom I could hardly tell how to leave. He was very, very kind. Oh! what a cruel, heavy loss will he be! Dec. 30. I went to Dr. Johnson, and spent the evening with him. He was very indifferent indeed. There were some very disagreeable people with him; and he once affected me very much by turning suddenly to me, and 'I am, &c. grasping my hand and saying :— 2 He had written to her on Nov. 10. See Croker's Boswell, p. 742. 3 Hawkins (Life, 562) says that this November Johnson said to him: -'What a man am I, who have got the better of three diseases, the palsy, the gout, and the asthma, and can now enjoy the conversation of my friends, without the interruptions of weakness or pain.' Aetat. 75.] BURTON'S BOOKS. 257 1784: ÆTAT. 75.]—And now I am arrived at the last year of the life of SAMUEL JOHNSON, a year in which, although passed in severe indisposition, he nevertheless gave many evidences of the continuance of those wondrous powers of mind, which raised him so high in the intellectual world. His conversation and his letters of this year were in no respect inferiour to those of former years. The following is a remarkable proof of his being alive to the most minute curiosities of literature. 'SIR, 'TO MR. DILLY, Bookseller, IN THE POULTRY. 'There is in the world a set of books which used to be sold by the booksellers on the bridge', and which I must entreat you to procure me. They are called Burton's Books 2; the title of one is Admirable Curiosities, Rarities, and Wonders in England. I believe there are about five or six of them; they seem very proper to allure backward readers; be so kind as to get them for me, and send me them with the best printed edition of Baxter's Call to the Unconverted. 'I am, &c. 'Jan. 6, 1784.' 'TO MR. PERKINS. 'SAM. JOHNSON.' 'DEAR SIR, 'I was very sorry not to see you when you were so kind as to call on me; but to disappoint friends, and if they are not very good-natured, to disoblige them, is one of the evils of sickness. If you will please to let me know which of the afternoons in this week I shall be favoured is given a list of nearly fifty of these books. Some of them were reprinted by Stace in 1810-13 in 6 vols. quarto. Dr. Franklin, writing of the books that he bought in his boyhood, says: 1 'The street [on London Bridge], which, before the houses fell to decay, consisted of handsome lofty edifices, pretty regularly built, was 20 feet broad, and the houses on each side generally 26 feet deep.' After 1746 My first acquisition was Bunyan's works in separate little volumes. I afterwards sold them to enable me to buy R. Burton's Historical Collections; they were small chapmen's books, and cheap. Forty volumes in all.' Franklin's Memoirs, i. 17. with |