[951] Johnson’s Prologue at the opening of Drury Lane Theatre.  Works, i. 23.

[952] According to Mr. Seward, who published this account in his Anecdotes, ii. 83, it was Mr. Langton’s great-grandfather who drew it up.

[953] ’My Lord said that his rule for his, health was to be temperate and keep himself warm.  He never made breakfasts, but used in the morning to drink a glass of some sort of ale.  That he went to bed at nine, and rose between six and seven, allowing himself a good refreshment for his sleep.  That the law will admit of no rival, nothing to go even with it; but that sometimes one may for diversion read in the Latin historians of England, Hoveden and Matthew Paris, &c.  But after it is conquered, it will admit of other studies.  He said, a little law, a good tongue, and a good memory, would fit a man for the Chancery.’  Seward’s Anecdotes, ii. 92.

[954] Wednesday was the 16th

[955] See ante, i. 41.

[956] Letters to Mrs. Thrale, vol. ii. p. 372.  BOSWELL.

[957] See ante/, i. 155.

[958] The recommendation in this list of so many histories little agrees ‘with the fierce and boisterous contempt of ignorance’ with which, according to Lord Macaulay, Johnson spoke of history.  Macaulay’s Essays, ed. 1843, i. 403.

[959] See ante, iii. 12.

[960] Northcote’s account of Reynolds’s table suits the description of this ‘gentleman’s mode of living.’  ’A table prepared for seven or eight was often compelled to contain fifteen or sixteen.’  There was a ’deficiency of knives and forks, plates and glasses.  The attendance was in the same style.’  There were ’two or three undisciplined domestics.  The host left every one at perfect liberty to scramble for himself.’  ‘Rags’ is certainly a strong word to apply to any of the company; but then strong words were what Johnson used.  Northcote mentions ’the mixture of company.’  Northcote’s Reynolds, ii. 94-6.  See ante, iii. 375, note 2.

[961] The Mayor of Windsor.  Rogers’s Boswelliana, p. 211.

[962] The passage occurs in Brooke’s Earl of Essex(1761) at the close of the first act, where Queen Elizabeth says: 

               ’I shall henceforth seek
     For other lights to truth; for righteous monarchs,
     Justly to judge, with their own eyes should see;
     To rule o’er freemen should themselves be free.’
       Notes and Queries, 5th S. viii. 456.

The play was acted at Drury Lane Theatre, old Mr. Sheridan taking the chief part.  He it was who, in admiration, repeated the passage to Johnson which provoked the parody.  Murphy’s Garrick, p. 234.

[963] ’Letters to Mrs. Thrale, vol. ii. p. 284.  BOSWELL.  In a second letter (ib. p. 347) he says:—­’Cator has a rough, manly independent understanding, and does not spoil it by complaisance.’  Miss Burney accuses him of emptiness, verbosity and pomposity, all of which she describes in an amusing manner.  Mme. D’Arblay’s Diary, ii. 47.