Johnson could tolerate the quarrels of his household and the anarchy of his kitchen better than most men, for the simple reason that he generally dined out at about 2 o'clock and stayed in a club or a tavern or a friend's house until bedtime. A tavern chair was for him "the throne of human felicity" and we shall shortly see him as he loved best to be—"folding his legs and having his talk out" with his friends.

First, let us see something of his daily habits and manner of life. Here is Boswell's description of him in later years:

"His person was large, robust, I may say approaching to the gigantick, and grown unwieldy from corpulency. His countenance was naturally of the cast of an ancient statue, but somewhat disfigured by the scars of that evil, which, it was formerly imagined, the royal touch could cure. He was now ... become a little dull of hearing. His sight had always been somewhat weak; yet, so much does mind govern, and even supply the deficiency of organs, that his perceptions were uncommonly quick and accurate. His head, and sometime also his body shook with a kind of motion like the effect of a palsy: he appeared to be frequently disturbed by cramps, or convulsive contractions, of the nature of that distemper called St Vitus's dance. He wore a full suit of plain brown clothes, with twisted hair-buttons of the same colour, a large bushy greyish wig, a plain shirt, black worsted stockings, and silver buckles."

His day began late with a breakfast consisting of a penny-loaf and a large pot of tea. It was not usually a very tidy meal, for Johnson often appeared "in deshabille, as just risen from bed"; Levet poured out the tea, while Johnson clumsily divided the bread.

When there was a guest, however, his "tea and rolls and butter, and whole breakfast apparatus were all in such decorum, and his behaviour was so courteous" that the visitor "was quite surprised, and wondered at his having heard so much said of Johnson's slovenliness and roughness."

Once, when Boswell called unexpectedly before he was up, he called briskly "Frank, go and get coffee, and let us breakfast in splendour."

But these splendid occasions were exceptional.

"About twelve o'clock" wrote Dr Maxwell, a 'social friend' of Johnson, "I commonly visited him, and frequently found him in bed, or declaiming over his tea, which he drank very plentifully. He generally had a levee of morning visitors, chiefly men of letters; Hawkesworth, Goldsmith, Murphy, Langton, Steevens, Beauclerk &c. &c., and sometimes learned ladies, particularly I remember a French lady of wit and fashion doing him the honour of a visit. He seemed to be considered as a kind of publick oracle, whom every body thought they had a right to visit and consult; and doubtless they were well rewarded. I never could discover how he found time for his compositions. He declaimed all the morning, then went to dinner at a tavern, where he commonly staid late, and then drank his tea at some friend's house, over which he loitered a great while, but seldom took supper. I fancy he must have read and wrote chiefly in the night, for I can scarcely recollect that he ever refused going with me to a tavern, and he often went to Ranelagh, which he deemed a place of innocent recreation. He frequently gave all the silver in his pocket to the poor, who watched him, between his house and the tavern where he dined. He walked the streets at all hours and said he was never robbed, for the rogues knew he had little money, nor had the appearance of having much."

Such was Johnson's week-day life. Sunday was another matter.

"It should be different (he observed) from another day. People may walk, but not throw stones at birds. There may be relaxation, but there should be no levity."

He made some good resolutions accordingly:

"To rise early, and in order to it, to go to sleep early on Saturday....
To read the Scripture methodically....
To go to church twice.
To read books of Divinity....
To wear off by meditation any worldly soil contracted in the week."

As he himself confessed, he did not always keep his resolutions, but that religion was a real part of Johnson's life and work is shewn not only by a score of incidents and conversations recorded by Boswell, but by the numerous Prayers and Meditations which were collected and published after his death. This was his prayer as he began the second volume of the Dictionary:

"O God, who hast hitherto supported me, enable me to proceed in this labour, and in the whole task of my present state; that when I shall render up, at the last day, an account of the talent committed to me, I may receive pardon, for the sake of Jesus Christ. Amen."

His favourite place of worship was St Clement Danes and in the churchyard to-day we may see his figure facing the street he loved best and still seeming ready to "defend the most minute circumstance connected with the Church of England."

Partly from ill-health, partly by natural disposition, Johnson was incurably lazy.

"I have been trying" he told Boswell "to cure my laziness all my life, and could not do it."

He slept badly and had no inclination to go to bed; indeed he seldom came home till two in the morning. Nor, as we shall see[15], did he mind being roused in the middle of the night, if there was some fun to be had.

"He has more fun" said his friend Miss Burney "and comical humour and love of nonsense about him than almost anybody I ever saw."

His laugh was "a kind of good humoured growl" or, as Tom Davies the bookseller described it, "he laughed like a rhinoceros."

Boswell could not always share this boisterous amusement and was puzzled at his hero being "exceedingly diverted at what seemed to others a very small sport."

One evening they were sitting in the Temple with a lawyer named Chambers who had just been drawing up a will for Johnson's friend, Langton. Johnson's sense of humour was for some reason keenly tickled by this; he twitted Chambers with having made the will himself and ran on in a playful manner, "which certainly was not such as might be expected from the authour of The Rambler."

"Ha, ha, ha!" he bellowed "I hope he has left me a legacy. I'd have his will turned into verse, like a ballad."

In the street, "Johnson could not stop his merriment, but continued it all the way till we got without the Temple-gate. He then burst into such a fit of laughter, that he appeared to be almost in a convulsion; and, in order to support himself, laid hold of one of the posts at the side of the foot pavement, and sent forth peals so loud, that in the silence of the night his voice seemed to resound from Temple-bar to Fleet-ditch."

Poor Boswell is almost ashamed to record what he calls "this most ludicrous exhibition of the aweful, melancholy, and venerable Johnson," but most of his readers prefer this picture of Johnson staggering in helpless laughter down Fleet Street to the most impressive essay in The Rambler.

Johnson's oddities in the street must often have made people turn round to look at him. He always took care, for instance, "to go out or in at a door or passage by a certain number of steps from a certain point, or at least so as that either his right or his left foot, (I am not certain which,) should constantly make the first actual movement when he came close to the door or passage. Thus I conjecture: for I have, upon innumerable occasions, observed him suddenly stop, and then seem to count his steps with a deep earnestness; and when he had neglected or gone wrong in this sort of magical movement, I have seen him go back again, put himself in a proper posture to begin the ceremony, and, having gone through it, break from his abstraction, walk briskly on, and join his companion."

He was full of these childish tricks. He would never, if he could help it, step on the cracks between paving-stones; when passing a row of posts, he was careful to touch the top of each with his hand; and all the time he would probably be talking to himself and jerking his head and limbs in the queer way which was habitual with him.

Indoors he was the same. Strangers could not make him out:

"Johnson used to be a pretty frequent visitor at the house of Mr Richardson, authour of Clarissa, and other novels of extensive reputation. Mr Hogarth came one day to see Richardson, soon after the execution of Dr Cameron, for having taken arms for the house of Stuart in 1745-6."

Hogarth was "a warm partisan of George the Second" and defended the king's decision.

"While he was talking, he perceived a person standing at a window in the room, shaking his head, and rolling himself about in a strange ridiculous manner. He concluded that he was an ideot, whom his relations had put under the care of Mr Richardson, as a very good man. To his great surprize, however, this figure stalked forwards to where he and Mr Richardson were sitting, and all at once took up the argument, and burst out into an invective against George the Second, as one, who, upon all occasions, was unrelenting and barbarous.... He displayed such a power of eloquence, that Hogarth looked at him with astonishment, and actually imagined that this ideot had been at the moment inspired. Neither Hogarth nor Johnson were made known to each other at this interview."

It is a pity Hogarth has not left us a picture of the scene.

Although he never wished to have a child of his own, Johnson had a warm corner in his heart for young people:

"Mr Strahan [the printer] had taken a poor boy from the country as an apprentice, upon Johnson's recommendation. Johnson having enquired after him, said, 'Mr Strahan, let me have five guineas on account, and I'll give this boy one. Nay, if a man recommends a boy, and does nothing for him, it is sad work. Call him down.' I followed him into the court-yard, behind Mr Strahan's house.... 'Well, my boy, how do you go on?'—'Pretty well, Sir; but they are afraid I an't strong enough for some parts of the business.' Johnson. 'Why, I shall be sorry for it; for when you consider with how little mental power and corporeal labour a printer can get a guinea a week, it is a very desirable occupation for you. Do you hear,—take all the pains you can; and if this does not do, we must think of some other way of life for you. There's a guinea.'"

To his friends' children he liked to appear as a benevolent great-uncle; when Mrs Thrale was away from home, he would send her reports from the nursery:

"I went this afternoon to visit the two babies at Kensington, and found them indeed a little spotted with their disorder, but as brisk and gay as health and youth can make them. I took a paper of sweetmeats and spread them on the table. They took great delight to shew their governess the various animals that were made of sugar; and when they had eaten as much as was fit, the rest were laid up for to-morrow."

Here is another letter written in his seventy-fifth year—seven months before his death:

"To Miss Jane Langton.

"He must have been a bold laugher," says Boswell "who would have ventured to tell Dr Johnson of any of his particularities."

But when a little girl asked him "Pray, Dr Johnson, why do you make such strange gestures?"

"From bad habit" he replied. "Do you, my dear, take care to guard against bad habits."

Had the questioner been some distinguished man, the reply would more likely have been: "Why, Sir, because I choose to, and there's an end on't."