65. The " Life " Of " Samuel Johnson, LL.D. " [Twelve lines] In Two Volumes. " By James Boswell, Esq. " [Quotation] Volume The First. " London: " Printed by Henry Baldwin, " For Charles Dilly, In the Poultry. " MDCCXCI.

Boswell had published, the year before, two specimens of his work: The Celebrated Letter from Samuel Johnson, LL.D., to Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield, now first published, with notes by James Boswell, Esq., and A Conversation between His Most Sacred Majesty George III, and Samuel Johnson, LL.D., illustrated with observations by James Boswell, Esq. They were probably issued to secure the copyright, and sold for half a guinea apiece.

The whole matter of publication of the Life was a source of no small worry to our author. He was plunged, at that time, in pecuniary difficulties due to the purchase of an estate for £2500, and it seemed as if he might be obliged to accept the offer of Robinson, the publisher, of £1000 for the copyright of his beloved book. "But it would go to his heart," he said, "to accept such a sum, which he considered far too low", and he avoided the difficulty by borrowing the money. All of these things made him very low-spirited:

"I am at present," he says, "in such bad spirits that I have fear concerning it—that I may get no profit, nay, may lose—that the public may be disappointed, and think that I have done it poorly—that I may make many enemies, and even have quarrels. But perhaps the very reverse of all may happen."

He worked very hard over all the details connected with the making of the book. "I am within a short walk of Mr. Malone, who revises my 'Life of Johnson' with me. We have not yet gone over quite a half of it, but it is at last fairly in the press. I intended to have printed it upon what is called an English letter, which would have made it look better. I have therefore taken a smaller type, called Pica, and even upon that I am afraid its bulk will be very large." He gave much thought to the title-page, and we are told that it was a long time before he could be perfectly satisfied. This statement, we are compelled to assume, refers to the literary composition of the title, rather than to the construction of the page: upon the latter he might have worked much longer and still have been dissatisfied.

The work was at last delivered to the world May sixteenth (the "Advertisement" is dated April twentieth), and was sold for two guineas a copy. So successful was it that by August twenty-second, 1200 out of the edition of 1700 copies were disposed of, and the whole edition was exhausted before the end of the year. A supplement was issued in 1793, at one guinea; and a second edition with eight additional sheets appeared in July of the same year.

With all Boswell's fussiness many mistakes crept into the printing, and the book abounds in wrong paging, omission of pages, and other things "of which," says Fitzgerald, "the great exemplar is the first Shakespeare Folio." So bad were these errors, indeed, that it was found necessary to issue a small quarto volume of forty-two pages to correct them. This pamphlet is sometimes bound up with the second edition. It is entitled: The " Principal Corrections and Addition " To The First Edition Of " Mr. Boswell's Life " Of " Dr. Johnson. " London: " Printed by Henry Baldwin, " For Charles Dilly In The Poultry. " MDCCXCIII." [Price Two Shillings and Sixpence.] "A Chronological Catalogue of the Prose Works of Samuel Johnson, L.L.D.," is printed at the end.

Charles Dilly, the bookseller, was well known in his day. Beloe speaks of him as "the queer little man ... characterized by a dryness of manner peculiarly his own." He and his elder brother, John, were famous not only for their successful publishing ventures, but for their dinners as well. Boswell speaks of "my worthy booksellers and friends, Messrs. Dilly, in the Poultry, at whose hospitable and well covered table I have seen a greater number of literary men than at any other, except that of Sir Joshua Reynolds."

The engraved portrait of Doctor Johnson by James Heath, after the painting by Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1756, which forms the frontispiece to the first volume, bears the inscription: "Samuel Johnson. From the original Picture in the Po?se?sion of James Boswell, Esq. Publi?h'd April 10, 1791, by C. Dilly." A plate of facsimiles of Dr. Johnson's handwriting, and another showing a "Round Robin, addre?sed to Samuel Johnson, L.L.D., with FacSimiles of the Signatures," add to the interest of the second volume. Both plates were engraved by H. Shepherd.

Quarto.

Collation: Two volumes. Volume I: xii pp., 8 ll., 516 pp. Volume II: 1 l., 588 pp. Portrait. Two plates.