pain she ever felt was from the appearance of defrauding her subscribers: 'but what can I do? the Doctor [Johnson] always puts me off with "Well, we'll think about it;" and Goldsmith says, "Leave it to me." However, two of her friends under her directions, made a new subscription at a crown, the whole price of the work, and in a very little time raised sixty pounds. Mrs. Carter was applied to by Mrs. Williams's desire, and she, with the utmost activity and kindness, procured a long list of names. At length the work was published, in which is a fine written but gloomy tale of Dr. Johnson 3. The money (150/.) Mrs. Williams had various uses for, and a part of it was funded 4.

Mrs. Williams's account of Johnson's wife was, that she had a good understanding and great sensibility, but inclined to be satirical. Her first husband died insolvent 5; her sons were much disgusted with her for her second marriage; perhaps because they, being struggling to get advanced in life, were mortified to think she had allied herself to a man who had not any visible means of being useful to them. However, she always retained her affection for them. While they resided in Gough Court, her son, the officer', knocked at the door, and asked the maid if her mistress was at home? She answered,

I

In the Gentleman's Magazine for September, 1750, p. 432, proposals were issued for printing her Essays in Verse and Prose by subscription. The price was to be five shillings, of which half was to be paid on subscribing. In 1759 Johnson was signing' receipts with her name for subscribers.' Letters, i. 87. The book was not published till 1766. Life, ii. 25.

2 In 1763 Goldsmith 'went with Johnson, strutting away,' from the Mitre, and calling out to Boswell, 'I go to Miss Williams.' Life, i. 421.

3 The Fountains. Ib. ii. 26.

In 1756 Garrick, at Johnson's desire, gave her a benefit-night at

his theatre, by which she got £200. Ib. i. 393, n. I; Letters, i. 53.

Miss Hawkins, with a foolish insolence unrivalled even by her father's, writes (Memoirs, i. 152):-' Miss Williams being a gentlewoman, conferred on her protector the character of gentleman.' See ante, ii. 141, for Miss Hawkins's description of her dress.

5 If he died insolvent 'her settlement was secured.' Life, i. 95,

'Yes, Sir, but she is sick in bed.'.'O!' says he, if it is so, tell her that her son Jervas [sic] called to know how she did;' and was going away. The maid begged she might run up to tell her mistress, and, without attending his answer, left him. Mrs. Johnson, enraptured to hear her son was below, desired the maid to tell him she longed to embrace him. When the maid descended, the gentleman was gone, and poor Mrs. Johnson was much agitated by the adventure: it was the only time he ever made an effort to see her. Dr. Johnson did all he could to console his wife; but told Mrs. Williams, Her son is uniformly undutiful; so I conclude, like many other sober men, he might once in his life be drunk, and in that fit nature got the better of his pride.'

Mrs. Williams was never otherwise dependent on Dr. Johnson, than in that sort of association, which is little known in the great world. They both had much to struggle through; and I verily believe, that whichever held the purse, the other partook what want required1. She was, in respect to morals, more rigid than modern politeness admits; for she abhorred vice, and was not sparing of anger against those who threw young folks into temptation. Her ideas were very just in respect to the improvement of the mind, and her own was well stored. I have several of her letters: they are all written with great good sense and simplicity, and with a tenderness and affection, that far excel all that is called politeness and elegance. I have been favoured with her company some weeks at different times, and always found her temper equal2, and her conversation lively. I never passed hours with more pleasure than when I heard her and Dr. Johnson talk of the persons they valued, or upon subjects in which they were much interested. One night I remember Mrs. Williams was giving an account of the Wilkinsons being at Paris, and having had consigned to their care

1 Except during the six years in which he was living in chambers (1759-65) he gave her an apartment (probably two rooms) in his own house from 1752 till her death in 1783. It is most unlikely that he

ever drew on her purse. For the last twenty-one years he was never in need, and at the time of his poverty they were not living in the same house.

2

Ante, ii. 141.

the

the letters of Lady Wortley Montagu, on which they had bestowed great praise. The Doctor said, 'Why, Madam, there might be great charms to them in being intrusted with honourable letters; but those who know better of the world, would have rather possessed two pages of true history. One day that he came to my house to meet many others, we told him that we had arranged our party to go to Westminster Abbey, would not he go with us? 'No,' he replied; 'not while I can keep out Upon our saying, that the friends of a lady had been in great fear lest she should make a certain match for herself, he said, 'We that are his friends have had great fears for him.' I talked to Mrs. Thrale much of dear Mrs. Williams. She said she was highly born; that she was very nearly related to a Welsh peer; but that, though Dr. Johnson had always pressed her to be acquainted with her, yet she could not; she was afraid of her3. I named her virtues; she seemed to hear me as if I had spoken of a newly discovered country *.

I think the character of Dr. Johnson can never be better summed up than in his own words in Rasselas, chapter xlii 5.

1 Horace Walpole wrote to Lady Craven on Jan. 2, 1787 (Letters, ix. 87):-'I am sorry to hear, Madam, that by your account Lady Mary Wortley was not so accurate and faithful as modern travellers.... As you rival her in poetic talents, I had rather you would employ them to celebrate her for her nostrum [inoculation than detect her for romancing.'

2 For his visit to the Abbey with Goldsmith see Life, ii. 238, and for the satisfaction he felt on being told that he would be buried there see ib. iv. 419.

3 Johnson wrote to Mrs. Thrale from Lichfield in 1775 Mrs. Williams wrote me word that you had honoured her with a visit, and behaved lovely? Letters, i. 360.

In spite of all the evidence of her 'valuable qualities,' and of 'the blank that her departure left in John

son's house' (Life, iv. 235, 239), Macaulay includes her in the 'crowd of wretched old creatures who could find no other asylum' than his house; whose 6 peevishness and ingratitude could not weary out his benevolence.' Essays, ed. 1843, i.

390.

It was not till 1778 that discord was caused by his taking in three more poor women. Life, iii. 222. Towards the end of Miss Williams' life her illness increased her peevishness. Ib. iii. 128.

5 It is doubtless to chapter xl that she refers, where the astronomer is thus described :-' His comprehension is vast, his memory capacious and retentive, his discourse is methodical, and his expression clear. His integrity and benevolence are equal to his learning. His deepest researches and most favourite studies

He

He was master of an infinite deal of wit, which proceeded from depth of thought, and of a humour which he used sometimes to take off from the asperity of reproof. Though he did frequently utter very sportive things, which might be said to be playing upon the folly of some of his companions, and though he never said one that could disgrace him, yet I think, now that he is no more, the care should be to prove his steady uniformity in wisdom, virtue, and religion. His political principles ran high, both in church and state: he wished power to the king and to the heads of the church, as the laws of England have established; but I know he disliked absolute power1, and I am very sure of his disapprobation of the doctrines of the church of Rome; because, about three weeks before we came abroad, he said to my Cornelia, 'You are going where the ostentatious pomp of church ceremonies attracts the imagination; but, if they want to persuade you to change your religion, you must remember, that, by increasing your faith, you may be persuaded to become a Turk 2.' If these were not the words, I have kept up to the express meaning.

are willingly interrupted for any opportunity of doing good by his counsel or his riches. To his closest retreat, in his most busy moments, all are admitted that want his assistance:-"For though I exclude idleness and pleasure, I will never," says he, "bar my doors against charity. To man is permitted the contemplation of the skies, but the practice of virtue is commanded." Johnson was also likened to Imlac, the man of learning. Life, ii. 119, n. 1; iii. 6. He describes himself also in chapter xlv.

I 'When I say that all governments are alike, I consider that in no government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it. If a sovereign oppresses his people to a great degree, they will rise and cut off his head. There is a remedy in human nature against tyranny, that will keep us safe under every form of government.' Life, ii. 170.

2 See Letters, i. 147, for the advice he gave to F. A. Barnard, the King's Librarian, when he was going to Italy, and ante, i. 210.

ANECDOTES BY HANNAH MORE1

['HANNAH MORE visited London in 1773 or 1774, in company with two of her sisters; her introduction to Mr. and Mrs. Garrick took place in about a week after her arrival. It was afterwards his delight to introduce his new friend to the best and most gifted society.' Memoirs, i. 47.

In her childhood she had been wont to make a carriage of a chair, and then to call her sisters to ride with her to London to see bishops and booksellers.' Ib. i. 14.

She was born in 1745 ten months before the Young Pretender invaded England, and died in 1833, the year after the great Reform Bill was passed.

'Her nurse, a pious old woman, had lived in the family of Dryden, whose son she had attended in his last illness, and the inquisitive mind of the little Hannah was continually prompting her to ask for stories about the poet Dryden.' Ib. i. 11. It must have been Dryden's third son, Erasmus Henry, whom the old woman nursed. He died in 1710, nine years after his father. Scott's Life of Dryden, ed. 1834, p. 396.

When Macaulay was six years old Hannah More wrote to him:-Though you are a little boy now, you will one day, if it please God, be a man; but long before you are a man I hope you will be a scholar. I therefore wish you to purchase such books as will be useful and agreeable to you then, and that you employ this very small sum in laying a little tiny cornerstone for your future library. A year or two afterwards she wrote: You must go to Hatchard's and choose another book. I think we have nearly exhausted the Epics. What say you

' From Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Mrs. Hannah

More, by William Roberts, Esq. 4 vols. 1834.

VOL. II.

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