solemnity of vocal grief. Yet many pains are incident to a man of delicacy, which the unfeeling world cannot be persuaded to pity, and which, when they are separated from their peculiar and personal circumstances, will never be considered as important enough to claim attention, or deserve redress.

Of this kind will appear to gross and vulgar apprehensions, the miseries which I endured in a morning visit to Prospero,1 a man lately raised to wealth by a lucky project, and too much intoxicated by sudden elevation, or too little polished by thought and conversation, to enjoy his present fortune with elegance and decency.

We set out in the world together2; and for a long time mutually assisted each other in our exigencies, as either happened to have money or influence beyond his immediate necessities. You know that nothing generally endears men SO

1 "Some of the characters in The Rambler are believed to have been actually drawn from the life, particularly that of Prospero from Garrick, who never entirely forgave its pointed satire."-Boswell's Johnson, i. 216.

2 "Both Johnson and Garrick used to talk pleasantly of their first journey to London. Garrick, evidently meaning to embellish a little, said one day in my hearing, 'We rode and tied.' And the Bishop of Killaloe informed me, that at another time, when Johnson and Garrick were dining together in a pretty large company, Johnson humorously ascertaining the chronology of something, expressed himself thus :-' That was the year when I came to London with twopence halfpenny in my pocket.' Garrick overhearing him, exclaimed, 'Eh? What do you say? With twopence halfpenny in your pocket?' JOHNSON. 'Why, yes; when I came with twopence halfpenny in my pocket, and thou, Davy, with threehalfpence in thine.'"-Ib., i. 101.

much as participation of dangers and misfortunes; I therefore always considered Prospero as united with me in the strongest league of kindness, and imagined that our friendship was only to be broken by the hand of death. I felt at his sudden shoot of success1 an honest and disinterested joy; but as I want no part of his superfluities, am not willing to descend from that equality in which we hitherto have lived.

Our intimacy was regarded by me as a dispensation from ceremonial visits; and it was so long before I saw him at his new house, that he gently complained of my neglect, and obliged me to come on a day appointed. I kept my promise, but found that the impatience of my friend arose not from any desire to communicate his happiness, but to enjoy his superiority.

When I told my name at the door, the footman went to see if his master was at home, and, by the tardiness of his return, gave me reason to suspect that time was taken to deliberate. He then informed me, that Prospero desired my company, and showed the staircase carefully secured by mats from the pollution of my feet. The best apartments were ostentatiously set open, that I might have a distant view of the magnificence which I was not permitted to approach; and my old friend receiving me with all the insolence of condescension at the top of the stairs, conducted

1 Gray, writing in the end of 1741 or early in 1742, says: -"Did I tell you about Mr. Garrick, that the town are horn-mad after: there are a dozen dukes of a night at Goodman's Fields sometimes."-Gray's Works, ed. 1858, ii. 185.

me to a back room, where he told me he always breakfasted when he had not great company.

On the floor where we sat, lay a carpet covered with a cloth, of which Prospero ordered his servant to lift up a corner, that I might contemplate the brightness of the colours, and the elegance of the texture, and asked me whether I had ever seen any thing so fine before? I did not gratify his folly with any outcries of admiration, but coldly bade the footman let down the cloth.

We then sat down, and I began to hope that pride was glutted with persecution, when Prospero desired that I would give the servant leave to adjust the cover of my chair, which was slipt a little aside, to show the damask; he informed me that he had bespoke ordinary chairs for common use, but had been disappointed by his tradesman. I put the chair aside with my foot, and drew another so hastily, that I was entreated not to rumple the carpet.

Breakfast was at last set, and as I was not willing to indulge the peevishness that began to seize me, I commended the teal; Prospero then told me, that another time I should taste his finest sort, but that he had only a very small quantity remaining, and reserved it for those

1 "Dr. ScorT. 'Garrick has been represented as very saving.' JOHNSON. 'With his domestic saving we have nothing to do. I remember drinking tea with him long ago, when Peg Woffington made it, and he grumbled at her for making it too strong.' When Johnson told this little anecdote to Sir Joshua Reynolds, he mentioned a circumstance which he omitted to-day :-'Why (said Garrick) it is as red as blood.'"-Boswell's Johnson, iii. 264.

whom he thought himself obliged to treat with particular respect1.

While we were conversing upon such subjects as imagination happened to suggest, he frequently digressed into directions to the servant that waited, or made a slight inquiry after the jeweller or silversmith; and once, as I was pursuing an argument with some degree of earnestness, he started from his posture of attention, and ordered, that if Lord Lofty called on him that morning, he should be shown into the best parlour.2

1 Out of this passage no doubt grew the following story, recorded in C. C. Greville's Journal, ed. 1874, ii. 316. “Lord Holland told some stories of Johnson and Garrick which he had heard from Kemble. ... When Garrick was in the zenith of his popularity and grown rich, and lived with the great, and while Johnson was yet obscure, the Doctor [Johnson was not a Doctor in those days] used to drink tea with him, and he would say, 'Davy, I do not envy you your money nor your fine acquaintance, but I envy you your power of drinking such tea as this.' 'Yes,' said Garrick, 'it is very good tea; but it is not my best, nor that which I give to my Lord this, and Sir somebody t'other.""

2 "Johnson could not patiently endure to hear that such respect as he thought due only to higher intellectual qualities should be bestowed on men of slighter, though perhaps more amusing, talents. I told him that one morning when I went to breakfast with Garrick, who was very vain of his intimacy with Lord Camden, he accosted me thus: 'Pray now, did you did you meet a little lawyer turning the corner, eh?' 'No, sir,' said I; 'pray what do you mean by the question?' 'Why,' replied Garrick, with an affected indifference, yet as if standing on tip-toe, 'Lord Camden has this moment left me. We have had a long walk together.' JOHNSON. 'Well, sir, Garrick talked very properly. Lord Camden was a little lawyer to be associating so familiarly with a player."-Boswell's Johnson, iii. 311.

My patience was yet not wholly subdued. I was willing to promote his satisfaction, and therefore observed that the figures on the china, were eminently pretty. Prospero had now an opportunity of calling for his Dresden china, which, says he, I always associate with my chased teakettle. The cups were brought; I once resolved not to have looked upon them, but my curiosity prevailed. When I had examined them a little, Prospero desired me to set them down, for they who were accustomed only to common dishes, seldom handled china with much care. You will, I hope, commend my philosophy, when I tell you that I did not dash his baubles to the ground.

He was now so much elevated with his own greatness, that he thought some humility necessary to avert the glance of envy, and therefore told me, with an air of soft composure, that I was not to estimate life by external appearance, that all these shining acquisitions had added little to his happiness, that he still remembered with pleasure the days in which he and I were upon the level, and had often, in the moment of reflection, been doubtful, whether he should lose much by changing his condition for mine.

I began now to be afraid lest his pride should, by silence and submission, be emboldened to insults that could not easily be borne, and therefore coolly considered, how I should repress it without such bitterness of reproof as I was yet unwilling to use. But he interrupted my meditation, by asking leave to be dressed, and told me, that he had promised to attend some ladies in the