[617] Virgil, Eclogues, i. 47.

[618] ‘Mr. Johnson,’ writes Mrs. Piozzi (Anec. p. 21), ’was exceedingly disposed to the general indulgence of children, and was even scrupulously and ceremoniously attentive not to offend them.  He had strongly persuaded himself of the difficulty people always find to erase early impressions either of kindness or resentment.’

[619] Ante, ii.171, iv.75; also post, May 15, 1784.

[620] Johnson, on May 1, 1780, wrote of the exhibition dinner:—­’The apartments were truly very noble.  The pictures, for the sake of a sky-light, are at the top of the house; there we dined, and I sat over against the Archbishop of York.  See how I live when I am not under petticoat government.’ Piozzi Letters, ii. 111.  It was Archbishop Markham whom he met; he is mentioned by Boswell in his Hebrides, post, v. 37.  In spite of the ‘elaboration of homage’ Johnson could judge freely of an archbishop.  He described the Archbishop of Tuam as ’a man coarse of voice and inelegant of language.’ Piozzi Letters, ii. 300.

[621] By Lord Perceval, afterwards Earl of Egmont.  He carried, writes Horace Walpole (Letters, ii. 144), ’the Westminster election at the end of my father’s ministry, which he amply described in the history of his own family, a genealogical work called the History of the House of Yvery, a work which cost him three thousand pounds; and which was so ridiculous, that he has since tried to suppress all the copies.  It concluded with the description of the Westminster election, in these or some such words:—­“And here let us leave this young nobleman struggling for the dying liberties of his country."’

[622] Five days earlier Johnson made the following entry in his Diary:—­’1783, April 5.  I took leave of Mrs. Thrale.  I was much moved.  I had some expostulations with her.  She said that she was likewise affected.  I commended the Thrales with great good-will to God; may my petitions have been heard.’  Hawkins’s Life, p. 553.  This was not ’a formal taking of leave,’ as Hawkins says.  She was going to Bath (Mme. D’Arblay’s Diary, ii. 264).  On May-day he wrote to her on the death of one of her little girls:—­’I loved her, for she was Thrale’s and yours, and, by her dear father’s appointment, in some sort mine:  I love you all, and therefore cannot without regret see the phalanx broken, and reflect that you and my other dear girls are deprived of one that was born your friend.  To such friends every one that has them has recourse at last, when it is discovered and discovered it seldom fails to be, that the fortuitous friendships of inclination or vanity are at the mercy of a thousand accidents.’ Piozzi Letters, ii. 255.  He was sadly thinking how her friendship for him was rapidly passing away.

[623] Johnson modestly ended his account of the tour by saying:—­’I cannot but be conscious that my thoughts on national manners are the thoughts of one who has seen but little.’ Works, ix. 161.  See Boswell’s Hebrides, Nov. 22.