’While o’er the deep in many a dreadful form, The giant Danger howls along the storm, Furling the iron sails with numbed hands, Firm on the deck the great Adventurer stands; Round glitt’ring mountains hear the billows rave, And the vast ruin thunder on the wave.’

In the Gent.  Mag. 1793, p. 197, were given extracts abusive of Johnson from some foolish letters that passed between Miss Seward and Hayley, a poet her equal in feebleness.  Boswell, in his Corrections and Additions to the First Edition (ante, i.10), corrected an error into which he had been led by Miss Seward (ante, i.92, note 2).  She, in the Gent.  Mag. for 1793, p.875, defended herself and attacked him.  His reply is found on p.1009.  He says:—­’As my book was to be a real history, and not a novel, it was necessary to suppress all erroneous particulars, however entertaining.’ (Ante, ii 467, note 4.) He continues:—­’So far from having any hostile disposition towards this Lady, I have, in my Life of Dr. Johnson...quoted a compliment paid by him to one of her poetical pieces; and I have withheld his opinion of herself, thinking that she might not like it.  I am afraid it has reached her by some other means; and thus we may account for various attacks by her on her venerable townsman since his decease...What are we to think of the scraps of letters between her and Mr. Hayley, impotently attempting to undermine the noble pedestal on which the publick opinion has placed Dr. Johnson?’

[1025] See ante, i.265, and iv. 174.

[1026] ’Johnson said he had once seen Mr. Stanhope at Dodsley’s shop, and was so much struck with his awkward manners and appearance that he could not help asking Mr. Dodsley who he was.’  Johnson’s Works, (1787) xi.209.

[1027] Chesterfield was Secretary of State from Nov. 1746 to Feb. 1748.  His letters to his son extend from 1739 to 1768.

[1028] Foote had taken off Lord Chesterfield in The Cozeners.  Mrs. Aircastle trains her son Toby in the graces.  She says to her husband:—­’Nothing but grace!  I wish you would read some late Posthumous Letters; you would then know the true value of grace.’  Act ii. sc. 2.

[1029] See ante, p.78, note 1.

[1030] See a pamphlet entitled Remarks on the Characters of the Court of Queen Anne, included in Swift’s Works, ed. 1803, vi. 163.

[1031] Carleton, according to the Memoirs, made his first service in the navy in 1672—­seventeen years before the siege of Derry.  There is no mention of this siege in the book.

[1032] ’He had obtained, by his long service, some knowledge of the practic part of an engineer.’  Preface to the Memoirs.

[1033] Nearly 200 pages in Bohn’s edition.  See ante, i. 71, for Johnson’s rapid reading.