’To SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.  ’DEAR SIR,

’It was not before yesterday that I received your splendid benefaction.  To a hand so liberal in distributing, I hope nobody will envy the power of acquiring.

’I am, dear Sir,

Your obliged and most humble servant, SAM, JOHNSON.  June 23, 1781.’

’To THOMAS ASTLE, Esq.[423]

’SIR,

’I am ashamed that you have been forced to call so often for your books, but it has been by no fault on either side.  They have never been out of my hands, nor have I ever been at home without seeing you; for to see a man so skilful in the antiquities of my country, is an opportunity of improvement not willingly to be missed.

’Your notes on Alfred[424] appear to me very judicious and accurate, but they are too few.  Many things familiar to you, are unknown to me, and to most others; and you must not think too favourably of your readers:  by supposing them knowing, you will leave them ignorant.  Measure of land, and value of money, it is of great importance to state with care.  Had the Saxons any gold coin?

’I have much curiosity after the manners and transactions of the middle ages, but have wanted either diligence or opportunity, or both.  You, Sir, have great opportunities, and I wish you both diligence and success.

‘I am, Sir, &c.  SAM.  JOHNSON.  July 17, 1781.’

The following curious anecdote I insert in Dr. Burney’s own words:—­

’Dr. Burney related to Dr. Johnson the partiality which his writings had excited in a friend of Dr. Burney’s, the late Mr. Bewley, well known in Norfolk by the name of the Philosopher of Massingham[425]:  who, from the Ramblers and Plan of his Dictionary, and long before the authour’s fame was established by the Dictionary itself, or any other work, had conceived such a reverence for him, that he urgently begged Dr. Burney to give him the cover of the first letter he had received from him, as a relick of so estimable a writer.  This was in 1755.  In 1760[426], when Dr. Burney visited Dr. Johnson at the Temple in London, where he had then Chambers, he happened to arrive there before he was up; and being shewn into the room where he was to breakfast, finding himself alone, he examined the contents of the apartment, to try whether he could undiscovered steal any thing to send to his friend Bewley, as another relick of the admirable Dr. Johnson.  But finding nothing better to his purpose, he cut some bristles off his hearth-broom, and enclosed them in a letter to his country enthusiast, who received them with due reverence.  The Doctor was so sensible of the honour done him by a man of genius and science, to whom he was an utter stranger, that he said to Dr. Burney, “Sir, there is no man possessed of the smallest portion of modesty, but must be flattered with the admiration of such a man.  I’ll give him a set of my Lives, if he will do me the honour to accept