disappointments are chosen so judiciously, and painted so strongly, that the moment they are read, they bring conviction to every thinking mind.

The same year, his tragedy of Irene, which had long been kept back for want of encouragement, appeared upon the stage at Drury Lane, through the kindness of his friend Garrick. Previous to the representation, a violent altercation took place between the author and the manager-Johnson, like too many authors, little acquainted with stage effect, pertinaciously rejected the advice of Garrick, and would by no means submit his lines to the critical amputation of the manager; till at length, through the interference of a friend to both parties, he gave way to the proposed alterations, at least in part, and the tragedy was produced.

Before the curtain was drawn up, Johnson's friends were alarmed by the whistling of catcalls; but the prologue, written by the author in a manly strain, soothed the audience, and the play went off tolerably well till it came to the conclusion; when Mrs. Pritchard, the heroine of the piece, was to be strangled upon the stage, and was to speak two lines with the bow-string about her neck. The audience cried out-Murder! murder!" She several times attempted to speak, but in vain: at last she was obliged to go off the stage alive. This passage was afterwards struck out, and she was carried off to be put to death behind the scenes, no doubt at the suggestion of

Mr. Garrick; to which, if the author had attended in time, his compliance might have saved his play. However, it is said that he acquiesced without a murmur, in the unfavourable decision of the publick upon his tragedy; and it appears he was convinced that dramatick writing was not his fort, as he was never known to make another effort in that species of composition.

On the 20th day of March 1750, he published the first paper of the Rambler, and continued it without interruption every Tuesday and Friday till the 17th of March 1752, when it closed. In carrying on this periodical publication, he seems neither to have courted, nor to have met with much assistance; the papers contributed by others amounting only to five in number. These admirable essays, we are told by Mr. Boswell, were written in haste, just as they were wanted for the press, without ever being read over by him before they were printed. The Rambler was not successful as a periodical work, not more than five hundred copies, of any one number, having been ever sold. Soon after the first folio edition was concluded, it was published in four octavo volumes, and the author lived to see a just tribute of approbation paid to its merit, in the extensiveness of its sale; ten numerous editions of it having been printed in London before his death, besides those in Ireland and Scotland.

Sir John Hawkins relates, that in the spring of 1751, he indulged himself in a frolick of midnight revelling: this was to celebrate the birth

day of Mrs. Lennox's first literary child, the novel of Harriot Stuart.' He drew the members of the Ivy Lane club, and others to the number of twenty, to the Devil tavern, where Mrs. Lennox and her husband met them. Johnson, after an invocation of the muses, and some other ceremonies of his own invention, invested the authoress with a laurel crown: the festivity was protracted till morning, and Johnson, throughout the night, was a bacchanalian without the use of wine.

Though his circumstances at that time were far from being easy, he received as a constant visiter at his house, Miss Anna Williams, daughter of a Welch physician, and a woman of more than ordinary talents and literature, who had just lost her sight. She had contracted a close intimacy with his wife, and after her death had an apartment from him at all times when he had a house. In 1755, Garrick gave her a benefit which produced 2001. She afterwards published a quarto volume of miscellanies, and thereby increased her little stock to 3001. This, and Johnson's protection, supported her during the rest of her life.

In 1752 he lost his wife, after a cohabitation of seventeen years, and in this melancholy event felt the most poignant distress. In the interval between her death and burial, he composed a funeral sermon for her which was never preached, but being given to a friend, it has been published since his death. The following authentick and artless account of his situation after his wife's

death, was given to Mr. Boswell by Francis Barber, his faithful negro-servant, who was brought from Jamaica by Colonel Bathurst, father of his friend Doctor Bathurst, and came into the family about a week after the dismal event.

'He was in great afHiction, Miss Williams was then living in his house, which was in Gough Square. He was busy with his Dictionary; Mr. Shiels and some others of the gentlemen who had written for him, used to come about him-he had then little for himself, but frequently sent money to Mr. Shiels when in distress. The friends who visited him at that time, were chiefly Dr. Bathurst, and Mr. Diamond, an apothecary in Cork Street, Burlington Gardens, with whom he and Miss Williams generally dined every sunday. There were also Mr. Cave, Dr. Hawkesworth, Mrs. Masters, the poetess who lived with Mr. Cave, Mrs. Carter, and sometimes Mrs. Macauly; Mr. (afterwards Sir Joshua) Reynolds, Mr. Millar, Mr. Dodsley, Mr. Payne, Mr. Strahan, the Earl of Orrery, Lord Southwell, and Mr. Garrick.' Johnson seems to have sought a remedy for the deprivation of domestick society by the loss of his wife, in the company of this circle of his acquaintance, who conceived for him the most sincere veneration and esteem.

Soon after the Rambler ceased, Dr. Hawkesworth projected the Adventurer, in conjunction with Bonnel Thornton, Dr. Bathurst, and others: the first number was published 7th November, 1752, and the paper continued twice a week till

March 9th, 1754. Thornton's assistance was soon withdrawn, and he set up a new paper in conjunction with Coleman, called the Connoisseur. Johnson was zealous for the success of the Adventurer, which was at first rather more popular than the Rambler; and engaged the assistance of Dr. Warton, whose admirable essays were well known. Johnson began to write in the Adventurer April 10th, 1753, marking his papers with the signature T.-his price was two guineas for each paper. Of all the papers he wrote, he gave both the fame and the profit to Dr. Bathurst: indeed, the latter wrote them, while Johnson dictated; though he considered it as a point of honour not to own them. He even used to say he did not write them, on the pretext that he dictated them only; allowing himself by this casuistry to be accessary to the propagation of falsehood, though his conscience had been hurt by even the appearance of imposition in writing the Parliamentary Debates. This year he wrote for Mrs. Lennox the Dedication to the Earl of Orrery,' of her Shakespeare illustrated, in two volumes

12 mo.

The death of Mr. Cave, January the 10th, 1754, afforded Johnson an opportunity of showing his regard for his early patron, by writing his life, which was published in the Gentleman's Magazine for February: in the end of July, he found leisure to make an excursion to Oxford for the purpose of consulting the libraries there: He stayed,' says Mr. Warton, about five weeks, but he did not