But the most intimate in the house, amongst the Wits, from being the personal favourite of Mr. Thrale, was Mr. Murphy; who, for gaiety of spirits, powers of dramatic effect, stories of strong humour and resistless risibility, was nearly unequalled: and they were coupled with politeness of address, gentleness of speech, and well bred, almost courtly, demeanour.

He was a man of great erudition,[32] without one particle of pedantry; and a stranger not only to spleen and malevolence, but the happiest promoter of convivial hilarity.

With what pleasure, and what pride, does the editor copy, from an ancient diary, the following words that passed between Dr. Johnson and Mr. Murphy, relative to Dr. Burney, upon the first meeting of the editor with Mr. Murphy at Streatham!

Mrs. Thrale was lamenting the sudden disappearance of Dr. Burney, who was just gone to town sans adieu; declaring that he was the most complete male-coquet she knew, for he only gave just enough of his company to make more desired.

“Dr. Burney,” said Mr. Murphy, “is, indeed, a most extraordinary man. I think I do not know such another. He is at home upon all subjects; and upon all is so highly agreeable! I look upon him as a wonderful man.”

“I love Burney!” cried Dr. Johnson, emphatically: “my heart, as I told him—goes out to meet Burney!”

“He is not ungrateful, Sir,” cried the Doctor’s bairne, “for heartily indeed does he love you!”

“Does he, Madam?” said the Doctor, looking at her earnestly: “I am surprised at that!”

“And why, Sir?—Why should you have doubted it?”

“Because, Madam,” answered he, gravely, “Dr. Burney is a man for every body to love. It is but natural to love him!”

He paused, as if with an idea of a self-conceived contrast not gaifying; but he soon cheerfully added, “I question if there be in the world such another man, altogether, for mind, intelligence, and manners, as Dr. Burney.”

Dr. Johnson, at this time, was engaged in writing his Lives of the Poets; a work, to him, so light and easy, that it never robbed his friends of one moment of the time that he would, otherwise, have spared to their society. Lives, however, strictly speaking, they are not; he merely employed in them such materials, with respect to biography, as he had already at hand, without giving himself any trouble in researches for what might be new, or unknown; though he gladly accepted any that were offered to him, if well authenticated, The critical investigations alone he considered as his business. He himself never named them but as prefaces. No man held in nobler scorn, a promise that out-went performance.

The ease and good-humour with which he fulfilled this engagement, made the present a moment peculiarly propitious for the opening acquaintance with him of the new, and by no means very hardened author; for whose terrors of public notice he had a mercy the most indulgent. He quickly saw that—whether wise or not—they were true; and soothed them without raillery or reprehension; though in this he stood nearly alone! Her fears of him, therefore, were soon softened off by his kindness; or dispelled by her admiration.

The friendship with which so early he had honoured the father, was gently and at once, with almost unparalleled partiality, extended to the daughter: and, in truth, the whole current of his intercourse with both was as unruffled by storm as it was enlightened by wisdom.

While this charming work was in its progress, when only the Thrale family and its nearly adopted guests, the two Burneys, were assembled, Dr. Johnson would frequently produce one of its proof sheets to embellish the breakfast table, which was always in the library; and was, certainly, the most sprightly and agreeable meeting of the day; for then, as no strangers were present to stimulate exertion, or provoke rivalry, argument was not urged on by the mere spirit of victory; it was instigated only by such truisms as could best bring forth that conflict of pros and cons which elucidates opposing opinions. Wit was not flashed with the keen sting of satire; yet it elicited not less gaiety from sparkling with an unwounding brilliancy, which brightened without inflaming, every eye, and charmed without tingling, every ear.

These proof sheets Mrs. Thrale was permitted to read aloud; and the discussions to which they led were in the highest degree entertaining. Dr. Burney wistfully desired to possess one of them; but left to his daughter the risk of the petition. A hint, however, proved sufficient, and was understood not alone with compliance, but vivacity. Boswell, Dr. Johnson said, had engaged Frank Barber, his negro servant, to collect and preserve all the proof sheets; but though it had not been without the knowledge, it was without the order or the interference of their author: to the present solicitor, therefore, willingly and without scruple, he now offered an entire life; adding, with a benignant smile, “Choose your poet!”

Without scruple, also, was the acceptance; and, without hesitation, the choice was Pope. And that not merely because, next to Shakespeare himself, Pope draws human characters the most veridically, perhaps, of any poetic delineator; but for yet another reason. Dr. Johnson composed with so ready an accuracy, that he sent his copy to the press unread; reserving all his corrections for the proof sheets:[33] and, consequently, as not even Dr. Johnson could read twice without ameliorating some passages, his proof sheets were at times liberally marked with changes; and, as the Museum copy of Pope’s Translation of the Iliad, from which Dr. Johnson has given many examples, contains abundant emendations by Pope, the Memorialist secured at once, on the same page, the marginal alterations and second thoughts of that great author, and of his great biographer.

When the book was published, Dr. Johnson brought to Streatham a complete set, handsomely bound, of the Works of the Poets, as well as his own Prefaces, to present to Mr. and Mrs. Thrale. And then, telling this Memorialist that to the King, and to the chiefs of Streatham alone he could offer

so large a tribute, he most kindly placed before her a bound copy of his own part of the work; in the title page of which he gratified her earnest request by writing her name, and “From the Author.”

After which, at her particular solicitation, he gave her a small engraving of his portrait from the picture of Sir Joshua Reynolds. And while, some time afterwards, she was examining it at a distant table, Dr. Johnson, in passing across the room, stopt to discover by what she was occupied; which he no sooner discerned, than he began see-sawing for a moment or two in silence; and then, with a ludicrous half laugh, peeping over her shoulder, he called out: “Ah ha!—Sam Johnson!—I see thee!—and an ugly dog thou art!”

He even extended his kindness to a remembrance of Mr. Bewley, the receiver and preserver of the wisp of a Bolt Court hearth-broom, as a relic of the Author of the Rambler; which anecdote Dr. Burney had ventured to confess: and Dr. Johnson now, with his compliments, sent a set of the Prefaces to St. Martin’s-street, directed,