and I have not a penny to purchase any.  Go beg me a loaf directly.’  The fellow returns once more with one in his hand and a halfpenny, telling ’em the gentleman threw him three, and laughed at his impudence.  She gave her Mercury the money, broke the bread into a wash-hand basin which stood near, poured the Tokay over it, and devoured the whole with eagerness.  This was indeed a heroine in PROFUSION.  Some active well-wishers procured her a benefit after this; she gained about 350_l_., ’tis said, and laid out two hundred of the money instantly in a shell-cap.  They wore such things then.”

When Savage got a guinea, he commonly spent it in a tavern at a sitting; and referring to the memorable morning when the “Vicar of Wakefield” was produced, Johnson says:  “I sent him (Goldsmith) a guinea, and promised to come to him directly.  I accordingly went as soon as I was dressed, and found that his landlady had arrested him for his rent.  I perceived that he had already changed my guinea, and had got a bottle of Madeira and a glass before him.”  Mrs. Piozzi continues: 

“But Doctor Johnson had always some story at hand to check extravagant and wanton wastefulness.  His improviso verses made on a young heir’s coming of age are highly capable of restraining such folly, if it is to be restrained:  they never yet were printed, I believe.

  “’Long expected one-and-twenty,
      Lingering year, at length is flown;
  Pride and pleasure, pomp and plenty,
      Great Sir John, are now your own.

  Loosen’d from the minor’s tether,
      Free to mortgage or to sell,
  Wild as wind, and light as feather,
      Bid the sons of thrift farewell.

  Call the Betseys, Kates, and Jennies,
      All the names that banish care;
  LAVISH of your grandsire’s guineas,
      Show the spirit of an heir.

  All that prey on vice or folly
      Joy to see their quarry fly;
  There the gamester light and jolly,
      There the lender grave and sly.

  Wealth, my lad, was made to wander,
      Let it wander as it will;
  Call the jockey, call the pander,
      Bid them come and take their fill.

  When the bonny blade carouses,
      Pockets full, and spirits high—­
  What are acres? what are houses? 
      Only dirt or wet or dry.

  Should the guardian friend or mother
      Tell the woes of wilful waste;
  Scorn their counsel, scorn their pother—­
      You can hang or drown at last.’”

These verses were addressed to Thrale’s nephew, Sir John Lade, in August, 1780.  They bear a strong resemblance to some of Burns’ in his “Beggar’s Sonata,” written in 1785:—­

  “What is title, what is treasure,
      What is reputation’s care;
  If we lead a life of pleasure,
      Can it matter how or where?”

Boswell’s “Life of Johnson” was published in May, 1791.  It is thus mentioned in “Thraliana":—­