Nor would it be just,under this head,to omit the fondness which he shewed for animals which he had taken under his protection.Inever shall forget the indulgence with which he treated Hodge,his cat:for whom he himself used to go out and buy oysters,lest the servants having that trouble should take a dislike to the poor creature.I am,unluckily,one of those who have an antipathy to a cat,so that I am uneasy when in the room with one;and I own,Ifrequently suffered a good deal from the presence of this same Hodge.I recollect him one day scrambling up Dr.Johnson's breast,apparently with much satisfaction,while my friend smiling and half-whistling,rubbed down his back,and pulled him by the tail;and when I observed he was a fine cat,saying,'Why yes,Sir,but Ihave had cats whom I liked better than this;'and then as if perceiving Hodge to be out of countenance,adding,'but he is a very fine cat,a very fine cat indeed.'
This reminds me of the ludicrous account which he gave Mr.Langton,of the despicable state of a young Gentleman of good family.'Sir,when I heard of him last,he was running about town shooting cats.'
And then in a sort of kindly reverie,he bethought himself of his own favourite cat,and said,'But Hodge shan't be shot;no,no,Hodge shall not be shot.'
On Thursday,April 10,I introduced to him,at his house in Bolt-court,the Honourable and Reverend William Stuart,son of the Earl of Bute;a gentleman truly worthy of being known to Johnson;being,with all the advantages of high birth,learning,travel,and elegant manners,an exemplary parish priest in every respect.
After some compliments on both sides,the tour which Johnson and Ihad made to the Hebrides was mentioned.JOHNSON.'I got an acquisition of more ideas by it than by any thing that I remember.
I saw quite a different system of life.'BOSWELL.'You would not like to make the same journey again?'JOHNSON.'Why no,Sir;not the same:it is a tale told.Gravina,an Italian critick,observes,that every man desires to see that of which he has read;but no man desires to read an account of what he has seen:so much does deion fall short of reality.Deion only excites curiosity:seeing satisfies it.Other people may go and see the Hebrides.'BOSWELL.'I should wish to go and see some country totally different from what I have been used to;such as Turkey,where religion and every thing else are different.'JOHNSON.
'Yes,Sir;there are two objects of curiosity,--the Christian world,and the Mahometan world.All the rest may be considered as barbarous.'BOSWELL.'Pray,Sir,is the Turkish Spy a genuine book?'JOHNSON.'No,Sir.Mrs.Manley,in her Life,says that her father wrote the first two volumes:and in another book,Dunton's Life and Errours,we find that the rest was written by one Sault,at two guineas a sheet,under the direction of Dr.
Midgeley.'
About this time he wrote to Mrs.Lucy Porter,mentioning his bad health,and that he intended a visit to Lichfield.'It is,(says he,)with no great expectation of amendment that I make every year a journey into the country;but it is pleasant to visit those whose kindness has been often experienced.'
On April 18,(being Good-Friday,)I found him at breakfast,in his usual manner upon that day,drinking tea without milk,and eating a cross-bun to prevent faintness;we went to St.Clement's church,as formerly.When we came home from church,he placed himself on one of the stone-seats at his garden-door,and I took the other,and thus in the open air and in a placid frame of mind,he talked away very easily.JOHNSON.'Were I a country gentleman,I should not be very hospitable,I should not have crowds in my house.'
BOSWELL.'Sir Alexander Dick tells me,that he remembers having a thousand people in a year to dine at his house:that is,reckoning each person as one,each time that he dined there.'JOHNSON.
'That,Sir,is about three a day.'BOSWELL.'How your statement lessens the idea.'JOHNSON.'That,Sir,is the good of counting.
It brings every thing to a certainty,which before floated in the mind indefinitely.'
BOSWELL.'I wish to have a good walled garden.'JOHNSON.'Idon't think it would be worth the expence to you.We compute in England,a park wall at a thousand pounds a mile;now a garden-wall must cost at least as much.You intend your trees should grow higher than a deer will leap.Now let us see;for a hundred pounds you could only have forty-four square yards,which is very little;for two hundred pounds,you may have eighty-four square yards,which is very well.But when will you get the value of two hundred pounds of walls,in fruit,in your climate?No,Sir,such contention with Nature is not worth while.I would plant an orchard,and have plenty of such fruit as ripen well in your country.My friend,Dr.Madden,of Ireland,said,that "in an orchard there should be enough to eat,enough to lay up,enough to be stolen,and enough to rot upon the ground."Cherries are an early fruit,you may have them;and you may have the early apples and pears.'BOSWELL.'We cannot have nonpareils.'JOHNSON.
'Sir,you can no more have nonpareils than you can have grapes.'
BOSWELL.'We have them,Sir;but they are very bad.'JOHNSON.
