’To MR. PERKINS.  ’DEAR SIR,

’I cannot but flatter myself that your kindness for me will make you glad to know where I am, and in what state.

’I have been struggling very hard with my diseases.  My breath has been very much obstructed, and the water has attempted to encroach upon me again.  I past the first part of the summer at Oxford, afterwards I went to Lichfield, thence to Ashbourne, in Derbyshire, and a week ago I returned to Lichfield.

’My breath is now much easier, and the water is in a great measure run away, so that I hope to see you again before winter.

’Please to make my compliments to Mrs. Perkins, and to Mr. and Mrs. Barclay.

’I am, dear Sir, ’Your most humble servant, ‘SAM.  JOHNSON.’  ’Lichfield, Oct. 4, 1784.’

’To THE RIGHT HON.  WILLIAM GERARD HAMILTON.  ’DEAR SIR,

’Considering what reason[1124] you gave me in the spring to conclude that you took part in whatever good or evil might befal me, I ought not to have omitted so long the account which I am now about to give you.  My diseases are an asthma and a dropsy, and, what is less curable, seventy-five.  Of the dropsy, in the beginning of the summer, or in the spring, I recovered to a degree which struck with wonder both me and my physicians:  the asthma now is likewise, for a time, very much relieved.  I went to Oxford, where the asthma was very tyrannical, and the dropsy began again to threaten me; but seasonable physick stopped the inundation:  I then returned to London, and in July took a resolution to visit Staffordshire and Derbyshire, where I am yet struggling with my diseases.  The dropsy made another attack, and was not easily ejected, but at last gave way.  The asthma suddenly remitted in bed, on the 13th of August, and, though now very oppressive, is, I think, still something gentler than it was before the remission.  My limbs are miserably debilitated, and my nights are sleepless and tedious.  When you read this, dear Sir, you are not sorry that I wrote no sooner.  I will not prolong my complaints.  I hope still to see you in a happier hour[1125], to talk over what we have often talked, and perhaps to find new topicks of merriment, or new incitements to curiosity.  I am, dear Sir, &c.  SAM.  JOHNSON.  Lichfield, Oct. 20, 1784.’

’TO JOHN PARADISE, ESQ.[1126]

DEAR SIR,

Though in all my summer’s excursion I have given you no account of myself, I hope you think better of me than to imagine it possible for me to forget you, whose kindness to me has been too great and too constant not to have made its impression on a harder breast than mine.  Silence is not very culpable when nothing pleasing is suppressed.  It would have alleviated none of your complaints to have read my vicissitudes of evil.  I have struggled hard with very formidable and obstinate maladies; and though I cannot talk of health, think all praise due to my Creator and Preserver for the continuance of my life.  The dropsy has made two attacks, and has given way to medicine; the asthma is very oppressive, but that has likewise once remitted.  I am very weak, and very sleepless; but it is time to conclude the tale of misery.  I hope, dear Sir, that you grow better, for you have likewise your share of human evil, and that your lady and the young charmers are well.