[From Aurengzebe.]
[141] The gold which the alchemists tried to make from base metals.
He is taller by almost the breadth of my nail than any of his court; which alone is enough to strike an awe into the beholders. His features are strong and masculine, with an Austrian lip and arched nose, his complexion olive, his countenance erect, his body and limbs well proportioned, all his motions graceful, and his deportment majestic. He was then past his prime, being twenty-eight years and three quarters old, of which he had reigned about seven in great felicity, and generally victorious. For the better convenience of beholding him, I lay on my side, so that my face was parallel to his, and he stood but three yards off; however, I have had him since many times in my hand, and therefore cannot be deceived in the description. His dress was very plain and simple, and the fashion of it between the Asiatic and the European; but he had on his head a light helmet of gold, adorned with jewels and a plume on the crest. He held his sword drawn in his hand to defend himself, if I should happen to break loose; it was almost three inches long: the hilt and scabbard were gold enriched with diamonds. His voice was shrill, but very clear and articulate, and I could distinctly hear it, when I stood up.
THE STRULDBRUGS.
One day in much good company, I was asked by a person of quality whether I had seen any of their Struldbrugs, or immortals? I said I had not, and desired he would explain to me what he meant by such an appellation, applied to a mortal creature. He told me that sometimes, though very rarely, a child happened to be born in a family with a red circular spot in the forehead, directly over the left eyebrow, which was an infallible mark that it should never die.... He said these births were so rare that he did not believe there could be above eleven hundred Struldbrugs of both sexes in the whole kingdom; of which he computed about fifty in the metropolis, and among the rest, a young girl born about three years ago; that these productions were not peculiar to any family, but a mere effect of chance; and the children of the Struldbrugs themselves were equally mortal with the rest of the people.... After this preface, he gave me a particular account of the Struldbrugs among them. He said they commonly acted like mortals till about thirty years old; after which, by degrees, they grew melancholy and dejected, increasing in both till they came to fourscore. This he learned from their own confession; for otherwise, there not being above two or three of that species born in an age, they were too few to form a general observation by. When they came to fourscore years, which is reckoned the extremity of living in this country, they had not only all the follies and infirmities of other old men, but many more, which arose from the dreadful prospect of never dying. They were not only opinionative, peevish, covetous, morose, vain, talkative, but incapable of friendship and dead to all natural affection, which never descended below their grandchildren. Envy and impotent desires are their prevailing passions. But those objects against which their envy seems principally directed are the vices of the younger sort and the deaths of the old. By reflecting on the former, they find themselves cut off from all possibility of pleasure; and whenever they see a funeral they lament and repine that others are gone to a harbor of rest, to which they themselves never can hope to arrive. They have no remembrance of any thing but what they learned and observed in their youth and middle age, and even that is very imperfect, And for the truth or particulars of any fact, it is safer to depend on common tradition than upon their best recollections. The least miserable among them appear to be those who turn to dotage and entirely lose their memories; these meet with more pity and assistance, because they want many bad qualities which abound in others.... At ninety, they lose their teeth and hair; they have at that age no distinction of taste, but eat and drink whatever they can get, without relish or appetite. The diseases they were subject to still continue, without increasing or diminishing. In talking, they forget the common appellation of things, and the names of persons, even of those who are their nearest friends and relatives. For the same reason they never can amuse themselves with reading, because their memory will not serve to carry them from the beginning of a sentence to the end; and by this defect they are deprived of the only entertainment whereof they might otherwise be capable.... They are despised and hated by all sorts of people; when one of them is born, it is reckoned ominous, and their birth is recorded very particularly.... They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld; and the women were homelier than the men Beside the usual deformities in extreme old age, they acquired an additional ghastliness, in proportion to their number of years, which is not to be described; and among half a dozen I soon distinguished which was the eldest, although there was not above a century or two between them.
[From the Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot.]
[From the Epistle of the Characters of Women.]
[142] A reference to Addison's tragedy of Cato.
[143] Young lawyers resident in the
temple. See Spenser's Prothalamion.
[144] Martha Blount, a dear friend of the poet's.
[145] The fashionable promenade in Hyde Park.
[146] The "pool" in the game of ombre.
There is nothing that of late years has afforded matter of greater amusement to the town than Signor Nicolini's combat with a lion in the Haymarket, which has been very often exhibited to the general satisfaction of most of the nobility and gentry in the kingdom of Great Britain.... But before I communicate my discoveries I must acquaint the reader that upon my walking behind the scenes last winter, as I was thinking on something else, I accidentally jostled against a monstrous animal that extremely startled me, and, upon my nearer survey of it, appeared to be a lion rampant. The lion, seeing me very much surprised, told me in a gentle voice that I might come by him if I pleased; "for," says he, "I do not intend to hurt any body." I thanked him very kindly and passed by him, and in a little time after saw him leap upon the stage and act his part with very great applause. It has been observed by several that the lion has changed his manner of acting twice or thrice since his first appearance, which will not seem strange when I acquaint the reader that the lion has been changed upon the audience three several times.
The first lion was a candle-snuffer, who, being a fellow of a testy, choleric temper, overdid his part, and would not suffer himself to be killed so easily as he ought to have done; besides, it was observed of him that he grew more surly every time he came out of the lion; and having dropt some words in ordinary conversation, as if he had not fought his best, and that he suffered himself to be thrown upon his back in the scuffle, and that he would wrestle with Mr. Nicolini for what he pleased, out of his lion's skin, it was thought proper to discard him; and it is verily believed to this day that had he been brought upon the stage another time he would certainly have done mischief. Besides, it was objected against the first lion that he reared himself so high upon his hinder paws, and walked in so erect a position, that he looked more like an old man than a lion.
The second lion was a tailor by trade, who belonged to the playhouse, and had the character of a mild and peaceful man in his profession. If the former was too furious, this was too sheepish, for his part; inasmuch that, after a short, modest walk upon the stage, he would fall at the first touch of 'Hydaspes'[147] without grappling with him and giving him an opportunity of showing his variety of Italian trips; it is said, indeed, that he once gave him a rip in his flesh-colored doublet; but this was only to make work for himself in his private character of a tailor. I must not omit that it was this second lion who treated me with so much humanity behind the scenes.
The acting lion at present is, as I am informed, a country gentleman who does it for his diversion, but desires his name may be concealed. He says very handsomely, in his own excuse, that he does not act for gain, that he indulges an innocent pleasure in it, and that it is better to pass away an evening in this manner than in gaming and drinking; but at the same time says, with a very agreeable raillery upon himself, that if his name should be known the ill-natured world might call him the ass in the lion's skin. This gentleman's temper is made out of such a happy mixture of the mild and the choleric that he outdoes both his predecessors, and has drawn together greater audiences than have been known in the memory of man.
I must not conclude my narrative without taking notice of a groundless report that has been raised to a gentleman's disadvantage, of whom I must declare myself an admirer; namely, that Signor Nicolini and the lion have been seen sitting peaceably by one another and smoking a pipe together behind the scenes, by which their common enemies would insinuate that it is but a sham combat which they represent upon the stage; but upon inquiry I find that if any such correspondence has passed between them it was not till the combat was over, when the lion was to be looked upon as dead, according to the received rules of the drama. Besides, this is what is practiced every day in Westminster Hall, where nothing is more usual than to see a couple of lawyers, who have been tearing each other to pieces in the court, embracing one another as soon as they are out of it.
[147] In the opera of Hydaspes, presented at the Haymarket in 1710, the hero, whose part was taken by Signor Nicolini, kills a lion in the amphitheater.
We talked of the education of children, and I asked him what he thought was best to teach them first. Johnson: Sir, it is no matter what you teach them first, any more than what leg you shall put into your breeches first. Sir, while you are considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learnt them both.
Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs. It is not done well, but you are surprised to see it done at all.
A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage married immediately after his wife died. Johnson said it was a triumph of hope over experience.
He would not allow Scotland to derive any credit from Lord Mansfield, for he was educated in England. "Much," said he, "may be made of a Scotchman if he be caught young." Johnson: An old tutor of a college said to one of his pupils, "Read over your compositions, and wherever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine strike it out." A gentleman who introduced his brother to Dr. Johnson was earnest to recommend him to the doctor's notice, which he did by saying: "When we have sat together some time you'll find my brother grow very entertaining."
"Sir," said Johnson, "I can wait."
"Greek, sir," said he, "is like lace; every man gets as much of it as he can."
Lord Lucan tells a very good story, that when the sale of Thrale's brewery was going forward, Johnson appeared bustling about with an inkhorn and pen in his button-hole, like an exciseman, and on being asked what he really considered to be the value of the property which was to be disposed of, answered, "We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond the dreams of avarice."
Johnson: My dear friend, clear your mind of cant. You may talk as other people do; you may say to a man, "Sir, I am your most humble servant." You are not his most humble servant. You may say, "These are bad times; it is a melancholy thing to be reserved to such times." You don't mind the times. You tell a man, "I am sorry you had such bad weather the last day of your journey and were so much wet." You don't care sixpence whether he is wet or dry. You may talk in this manner; it is a mode of talking in society, but don't think foolishly.
A lively saying of Dr. Johnson to Miss Hannah More, who had expressed a wonder that the poet who had written Paradise Lost should write such poor sonnets: "Milton, madam, was a genius that could cut a colossus from a rock, but could not carve heads upon cherry-stones."
A gentleman having said that a congé d'elire has not, perhaps, the force of a command, but may be considered only as a strong recommendation. "Sir," replied Johnson, "it is such a recommendation as if I should throw you out of a two pair of stairs window, and recommend you to fall soft."
Happening one day to mention Mr. Flaxman, the doctor replied, "Let me hear no more of him, sir; that is the fellow who made the index to my Ramblers, and set down the name of Milton thus: 'Milton, Mr, John.'"
Goldsmith said that he thought he could write a good fable, mentioned the simplicity which that kind of composition requires, and observed that, in most fables, the animals introduced seldom talk in character. "For instance," said he, "the fable of the little fishes, who saw birds fly over their heads, and, envying them, petitioned Jupiter to be changed into birds. The skill," continued he, "consists in making them talk like little fishes." While he indulged himself in this fanciful reverie, he observed Johnson shaking his sides and laughing. Upon which he smartly proceeded, "Why, Dr. Johnson, this is not so easy as you seem to think; for if you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like WHALES."
He expressed a particular enthusiasm with respect to visiting the wall of China. I caught it for the moment, and said I really believed I should go and see the wall of China, had I not children of whom it was my duty to take care. "Sir," said he, "by doing so, you would do what would be of importance in raising your children to eminence. There would be a luster reflected upon them from your spirit and curiosity. They would be at all times regarded as the children of a man who had gone to view the wall of China—I am serious, sir."