We landed at the Temple Stairs, where we parted. I found him in the evening in Mrs. Williams's room. We talked of religious orders. He said, "It is as unreasonable for a man to go into a Carthusian convent for fear of being immoral, as for a man to cut off his hands for fear he should steal. There is, indeed, great resolution in the immediate act of dismembering himself; but when that is once done, he has no longer any merit: for though it is out of his power to steal, yet he may all his life be a thief in his heart. So when a man has once become a Carthusian, he is obliged to continue so, whether he chooses it or not. Their silence, too, is absurd. We read in the Gospel of the apostles being sent to preach, but not to hold their tongues. All severity that does not tend to increase good, or prevent evil, is idle. I said to the Lady Abbess of a covent, Madam, you are here, not for the love of virtue, but the fear of vice.' She said, 'She should remember this as long as she lived.'" I thought it hard to give her this view of her situation, when she could not help it; and indeed, I wondered at the whole of what he now said; because, both in his "Rambler" and "Idler," he treats religious austerities with much solemnity of respect. Finding him still persevering in his abstinence from wine, I ventured to speak to him of it. JOHNSON. "6 Sir, I have no objection to a man's drinking wine, if he can do it in moderation. I found myself apt to go to excess in it, and therefore, after having been for some time without it, on account of illness, I thought it better not to return to it. Every man is to judge for himself, according to the effects which he experiences. One of the fathers tells us, he found fasting made him so peevish that he did not practise it." Though he often enlarged upon the evil of intoxication, he was by no means harsh and unforgiving to those who indulged in occasional excess in wine. One of his friends', I well remember, came to sup at a tavern with him and some other gentlemen, and too plainly discovered that he had drunk too much at dinner. When one who loved mischief, thinking to produce a severe censure, asked Johnson, a 1 Probably Mr. Boswell himself, who frequently committed these indiscretions. Hannah More, describing a dinner in 1781, at Bishop Shipley's, where there were present Lord and Lady Spencer and Lady Althorp, Johnson, Reynolds, &c., says, "I was heartily disgusted with Mr. Boswell, who came up stairs after dinner, much disordered with wine, and addressed me in a manner which drew from me a sharp rebuke, for which I fancy he will not readily forgive me." (Mem. i. 211). Intemperance was, indeed, too much the fashion in those days. The present century has shown a growing reformation in this point. CROKER, 1846. 2 This appears to be an ill-chosen illustration. It seems, on the contrary, that there are few powers of mind so unequally given as those connected with numbers. The few who have them in any extraordinary degree, like Jedediah Buxton, and like the boys Bidder and Colborne, of our times, seem to have little other intellectual power. See accounts of Buxton in Gent. Mag. vol. xxi. p. 61. and vol. xxiv. p. 251. -CROKER, 1831. I reprint this note, as I believe the opinion few days afterwards, "Well, Sir, what did your friend say to you, as an apology for being in such a situation ? " Johnson answered, "Sir, he said all that a man should say: he said he was sorry for it." I heard him once give a very judicious practical advice upon the subject: "A man who has been drinking wine at all freely should never go into a new company. With those who have partaken of wine with him, he may be pretty well in unison; but he will probably be offensive, or appear ridiculous, to other people. He allowed very great influence to education. "I do not deny, Sir, but there is some original difference in minds; but it is nothing in comparison of what is formed by education. We may instance the science of numbers, which all minds are equally capable of attaining 3; yet we find a prodigious difference in the powers of different men, in that respect, after they are grown up, because their minds have been more or less exercised in it; and I think the same cause will explain the difference of excellence in other things, gradations admitting always some difference in the first principles." This is a difficult subject; but it is best to hope that diligence may do a great deal. We are sure of what it can do, in increasing our mechanical force and dexterity. I again visited him on Monday. He took occasion to enlarge, as he often did, upon the wretchedness of a sea-life. "A ship is worse than a gaol. There is, in a gaol, better air, better company, better conveniency of every kind; and a ship has the additional disadvantage of being in danger. When men come to like a sea-life, they are not fit to live on land." "Then," said I, "it would be cruel in a father to breed his son to the sea." JOHNSON." It would be cruel in a father who thinks as I do. Men go to sea, before they know the unhappiness of that way of life; and when they have come to know it, they cannot escape from it, because it is then too late to choose another profession; as indeed is generally the case with men, when they have once engaged in any particular way of life.3 stated is generally true, but also to take the opportunity of doing justice to Mr. Bidder, concerning whom I was mistaken, and who is now an eminent civil engineer. - CHOKER, 1846. 3 See ante, p. 349., his dislike of a sea life. Mrs. Piozzi adds, that the roughness of the language used on board ship, when he had passed a week on a visit to Captain Knight, disgusted him terribly. He asked an officer what some place was called, and received for answer, that it was where the loptolly-man kept his loplolly; a reply he considered, not unjustly, as disrespectful, gross, and ignorant." — Letters. The loplolly-boy is the surgeon's assistant, and I can very well imagine a waggish young officer delighted to puzzle the great lexicographer by a word not to be found in his Dictionary-a joke which the Doctor, it appears, did not relish. Captain Knight, of the Belleisle, 74, lay for a couple of months of 1762 in Plymouth Sound, and may have been visited by Reynolds and Johnson (ante, p. 127.); but it is unlikely that they passed a week on ship-board. - CROKER. labour not disproportionate to its effect; but a fellow will hack half a year at a block of marble to make something in stone that hardly resembles a man. The value of statuary is owing to its difficulty. You would not value the finest head cut upon a carrot." Here he seemed to me to be strangely deficient in taste; for surely statuary is a noble art of imitation, and preserves a wonderful expression of the varieties of the human frame; and although it must be allowed that the circumstances of difficulty enhance the value of a marble head, we should consider, that if it requires a long time in the performance, it has a proportionate value in durability. 66 Gwyn was a fine lively rattling fellow. Dr. Johnson kept him in subjection, but with a kindly authority. The spirit of the artist, however, rose against what he thought a Gothic attack, and he made a brisk defence. What, Sir, you will allow no value to beauty in architecture or in statuary? Why should we allow it then in writing? Why do you take the trouble to give us so many fine allusions, and bright images, and elegant phrases ? might convey all your instruction without these ornaments." Johnson smiled with complacency; but said, "Why, Sir, all these ornaments are useful, because they obtain an easier reception for truth; but a building is not at all more convenient for being decorated with superfluous carved work.” You On Tuesday, 19th March', which was fixed for our proposed jaunt, we met in the morning at the Somerset Coffee-house in the Strand, where we were taken up by the Oxford coach. He was accompanied by Mr. Gwyn, the architect; and a gentleman of Merton college, whom he did not know, had the fourth seat. We soon got into conversation; for it was very remarkable of Johnson, that the presence of a stranger had no restraint upon his talk. I observed that Garrick, who was about to quit the stage, would soon have an easier life. JOHNSON. "I doubt that, Sir." BOSWELL. "Why, Sir, he will be Atlas with the burthen off his back." JOHNSON. "But I know not, Sir, if he will be Gwyn at last was lucky enough to make so steady without his load. However, he should one reply to Dr. Johnson, which he allowed never play any more, but be entirely the gen- to be excellent. Johnson censured him for tleman, and not partly the player: he should taking down a church which might have stood no longer subject himself to be hissed by a many years, and building a new one at a difmob, or to be insolently treated by performers, ferent place, for no other reason but that there whom he used to rule with a high hand, and might be a direct road to a new bridge; and who would gladly retaliate." BOSWELL. "I his expression was, "You are taking a church think he should play once a year for the benefit out of the way, that the people may go in a of decayed actors, as it has been said he means straight line to the bridge. "No, Sir," said to do." JOHNSON. "Alas, Sir! he will soon Gwyn, "I am putting the church in the way, be a decayed actor himself." that the people may not go out of the way.' JOHNSON (with a hearty loud laugh of approbation). Speak no more. Rest your colloquial fame upon this." Johnson expressed his disapprobation of ornamental architecture, such as magnificent columns supporting a portico, or expensive pilasters supporting merely their own capitals, "because it consumes labour disproportionate to its utility." For the same reason he satirised statuary. "Painting," said he, "consumes It appears from Hannah More's letters, that Boswell, and probably Johnson, spent the evening of the 18th at Garrick's. It seems to have been the first time of her seeing Boswell. "Corsican Boswell, a very agreeable good-natured man: he perfectly adores Johnson," &c. A few evenings before this, Hannah More writes that she had had a little evening party, of Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs. Garrick, and Miss Reynolds; Johnson, Garrick, and Dean Tucker, and that "Garrick was the life and soul of the company. I never saw Johnson in such perfect good humour. One can never enjoy the company of these two unless they are together. After the Dean and Mrs. Boscawen were gone, and the rest stood up to go, Johnson and Garrick began a close encounter, telling old stories, e'en from their boyish days' at Lichfield. We all stood round them for half an hour, laughing; and should not have thought of sitting down, or of parting, had not an impertinent watchman been saucily vociferous. Johnson outstaid them all, and sat with me half an hour."- Mem. i. 69. It is pleasing to find, from these letters, that there was more of 66 Upon our arrival at Oxford, Dr. Johnson and I went directly to University College, but were disappointed on finding that one of the fellows, his friend Mr. Scott, [p. 268.] who accompanied cordiality and social intercourse between Johnson and Garrick than Boswell's narrative would lead us to suppose.-CROKER, 1846. 2 Dr. Johnson does not seem to have objected to ornamental architecture or statuary per se, but to labour disproportionate to its utility or effect. In this view, his criticisms are just. The late style of building introduced into London, of colonnades and porticos, without any regard to aspect, climate, or utility, is so absurd to reason, so offensive to taste, and so adverse to domestic comfort, that it reconciles us to the short-lived materials of which these edifices are composed. It would have been well if we had, according to Johnson's sober advice, thought it necessary that the "magnificence of porticos," and the "expense of pilasters," should have borne some degree of proportion to their utility. With regard to "statuary, when it does "preserve the varieties of the human frame," it deserves all that Mr. Boswell says for it: but Johnson's objection was that it more frequently produced abortive failures, “hardly resembling man.” — CROKER. 66 him from Newcastle to Edinburgh, was gone to the country. We put up at the Angel inn, and passed the evening by ourselves in easy and familiar conversation. Talking of constitutional melancholy, he observed, "A man so afflicted, Sir, must divert distressing thoughts, and not combat with them. BOSWELL. 'May not he think them down, Sir?" JOHNSON. "No, Sir. To attempt to think them down is madness. He should have a lamp constantly burning in his bed-chamber during the night, and if wakefully disturbed, take a book, and read, and compose himself to rest. To have the management of the mind is a great art, and it may be attained in a considerable degree by experience and habitual exercise." BOSWELL. "Should not he provide amusement for himself? Would it not, for instance, be right for him to take a course of chemistry?" JOHNSON. Let him take a course of chemistry, or a course of ropedancing, or a course of any thing to which he is inclined at the time. Let him contrive to have as many retreats for his mind as he can, as many things to which it can fly from itself. Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy' is valuable work. It is, perhaps, overloaded with quotation. But there is a great spirit and great power in what Burton says, when he writes from his own mind." แ a Next morning [Wednesday, March 20.] we visited Dr. Wetherell, master of University College, with whom Dr. Johnson conferred on the most advantageous mode of disposing of the books printed at the Clarendon press, on which subject his letter has been inserted in a former page. I often had occasion to remark, Johnson loved business, loved to have his wisdom actually operate on real life. Dr. Wetherell and I talked of him without reserve in his own presence. WETHERELL. "I would have given him a hundred guineas if he would have written a preface to his 'Political Tracts,' by way of a discourse on the British constitution." BOSWELL. "Dr. Johnson, though in his writings, and upon all occasions, a great friend to the constitution, both in church and state, has never written expressly in support of either. There is really a claim upon him for both. I am sure he could give a volume of no great bulk upon each, which would comprise all the substance, and with his spirit would effectually maintain them. He should erect a fort on the confines of each." I could perceive that he was displeased with this dialogue. He burst out, "Why should I be always writing?" I hoped he was conscious that the debt was just, and meant to discharge it, though he disliked being dunned. We then went to Pembroke College, and waited on his old friend Dr. Adams, the master of it, whom I found to be a most polite, pleasing, communicative man. Before his advancement to the headship of his college, I had intended to go and visit him at Shrewsbury, where he was rector of St. Chad's, in order to get from him what particulars he could recollect of Johnson's academical life. He now obligingly gave me part of that authentic information, which, with what I afterwards owed to his kindness, will be found incorporated in its proper place in this work. Dr. Adams had distinguished himself by an able Answer to David Hume's "Essay on Miracles." He told me he had once dined in company with Hume in London: that Hume shook hands with him, and said, "You have treated me much better than I deserve;" and that they exchanged visits. I took the liberty to object to treating an infidel writer with smooth civility. Where there is a controversy concerning a passage in a classic author, or concerning a question in antiquities, or any other subject in which human happiness is not deeply interested, a man may treat his antagonist with politeness and even respect. But where the controversy is concerning the truth of religion, it is of such vast importance to him who maintains it, to obtain the victory, that the person of an opponent ought not to be spared. If a man firmly believes that religion is an invaluable treasure, he will consider a writer who endeavours to deprive mankind of it as a robber; he will look upon him as odious, though the infidel might think himself in the right. A robber who reasons as the gang do in the "Beggar's Opera," who call themselves practical philosophers, and may have as much sincerity as pernicious speculative philosophers, is not the less an object of just indignation. An abandoned profligate may think that it is not wrong to debauch my wife; but shall I, therefore, not detest him? And if I catch him in making an attempt, shall I treat him with politeness? No, I will kick him down stairs, or run him through the body; that is, if I really love my wife, or have a true rational notion of honour. An infidel then should not be treated handsomely by a Christian, merely because he endeavours to rob with ingenuity. I do declare, however, that I am exceedingly unwilling to be provoked to anger; and could I be persuaded that truth would not suffer from a cool moderation in its defenders, I should wish to preserve good humour, at least, in every controversy; nor, indeed, do I see why a man should lose his temper while he does all he can to refute an opponent. I think ridicule may be fairly used against an infidel; for instance, if he be an ugly fellow, and yet absurdly vain of his person, we may contrast his appearance with Cicero's beautiful image of Virtue, could she be seen. Johnson coincided with me, and said, "When a man voluntarily engages in an important controversy, he is to do all he can to lessen his antagonist, because authority from personal respect has 1 This tract appeared in 1752, and was republished in 1754. - WRIGHT. much weight with most people, and often more : 66 canon of Christ Church, and divinity professor, with whose learned and lively conversation we were much pleased. He gave us an invitation to dinner, which Dr. Johnson told me was a high honour. "Sir, it is a great thing to dine with the canons of Christ Church." We could not accept his invitation, as we were engaged to dine at University College. We had an excellent dinner there, with the masters and fellows, it being St. Cuthbert's day, which is kept by them as a festival, as he was a saint of Durham, with which this college is much connected.* We drank tea with Dr. Horne, late President of Magdalen College and Bishop of Norwich, of whose abilities in different respects the public has had eminent proofs, and the Dr. Adams told us, that in some of the colleges at Oxford, the fellows had excluded the students from social intercourse with them in JOHNSON. the common room. They are in the right, Sir: there can be no real conversation, no fair exertion of mind amongst them, if the young men are by for a man who has a character does not choose to stake it in their presence." BOSWELL. "But, Sir, may there not be very good conversation without a contest for superiority ?" JOHNSON. "No ani-esteem annexed to whose character was inmated conversation, Sir; for it cannot be but one or other will come off superior. I do not mean that the victor must have the better of the argument, for he may take the weak side; but his superiority of parts and knowledge will necessarily appear; and he to whom he thus shows himself superior is lessened in the eyes of the young men. You know it was said, 'Mallem cum Scaligero errare quam cum Clavio recte sapere. In the same manner take Bentley's and Jason de Nores' Comments upon Horace, you will admire Bentley more when wrong, than Jason when right." We walked with Dr. Adams into the master's garden, and into the common room. JOHNSON (after a reverie of meditation). "Ay! here I used to play at draughts with Phil. Jones and Fludyer. Jones loved beer, and did not get very forward in the church. Fludyer turned out a scoundrel3, a whig, and said he was ashamed of having been bred at Oxford. He had a living at Putney; and got under the eye of some retainers to the court at that time, and so became a violent whig; but he had been a scoundrel all along, to be sure." BOSWELL. "Was he a scoundrel, Sir, in any other way than that of being a political scoundrel? Did he cheat at draughts?" JOHNSON. Sir, we never played for money." He then carried me to visit Dr. Bentham, 1 A learned Cypriot, who, when the Turks took Cyprus in 1570, retired into Italy, where he published several Italian and Latin works; among the latter was a "Commentary on Horace's Art of Poetry. CROKER. 2 Fludyer entered within a month of Johnson's entrance. Jones must have been about a year their senior, having become M.A. March. 1734. — Hall. - CROKER. 3 See post, March 27. 1776, n. — C. 4 Dr. Fisher told me, in the conversation before mentioned, (antè, p. 458, n. 5.), that there were present at this dinner, Dr. Wetherell, Johnson, Boswell, Coulson, Scott, Gwyn, Dr. Chandler the traveller, and Fisher himself, then a young fellow of the College. He recollects one passage of the conversation at dinner. Boswell quoted Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat, and asked where it was. A pause. At last Dr. Chandler said, in Horace. Another pause. Then Fisher remarked that he knew of no metre in Horace to which the words could be reduced: and Johnson said dictatorially, "The young man is right."- See post, March 30. 1783. Át another conversation, during, as Dr. Fisher thought, this visit to Oxford, there happened to be present a Mr. Mortimer, a shallow, under-bred man, who had no sense of creased by knowing him personally. He had talked of publishing an edition of Walton's Lives, but had laid aside that design, upon Dr. Johnson's telling him, from mistake, that Lord Hailes intended to do it. I had wished to negotiate between Lord Hailes and him, that one or other should perform so good a work. JOHNSON. "In order to do it well, it will be necessary to collect all the editions of Walton's Lives. By way of adapting the book to the taste of the present age, they have, in a late edition, left out a vision which he relates Dr. Donne had, but it should be restored; and there should be a critical catalogue given of the works of the different persons whose lives were written by Walton, and therefore their works must be carefully read by the editor." We then went to Trinity College, where he introduced me to Mr. Thomas Warton, with whom we passed a part of the evening. We talked of biography. JOHNSON. "It is rarely well executed. They only who live with a man can write his life with any genuine exactness and discrimination; and few people who have lived with a man know what to remark about him. The chaplain of a late bishop 6, whom I was to assist in writing some memoirs of his lordship, could tell me scarcely any thing." "17 Johnson's superiority, and talked away a great deal of flippant nonsense: at last he flatly contradicted some assertion which Johnson had pronounced to be as clear as that two and two make four. "I deny it," replied the other vehemently, "I utterly deny it." Sir," said Johnson, "if you deny that, I can only say that plus in una hora negabit unus asinus, quam centum philosophi in centum annis probaverint." I suspect, however, that this scene occurred at one of Johnson's later visits. - CROKER, 1846. 5 The vision which Johnson speaks of was not in the original publication of Walton's "Life of Dr. Donne," in 1640. It is not found in the three earliest editions; but was first introduced into the fourth, in 1765. I have not been able to discover what modern republication is alluded to in which it was omitted. It has very properly been restored by Dr. Zouch.-J. BoswELL, jun. 6 The Bishop was Zachary Pearce, and the Chaplain, Mr. Derby. See post, sub May, 1777. — Croker. 7 It has been mentioned to me by an accurate English friend, that Dr. Johnson could never have used the phrase almost nothing, as not being English; and therefore I have put another in its place. At the same time, I am not quite con I said, Mr. Robert Dodsley's life should be written, as he had been so much connected with the wits of his time, and by his literary merit had raised himself from the station of a footman. Mr. Warton said, he had published a little volume under the title of "The Muse in Livery." JOHNSON. "I doubt whether Dodsley's brother' would thank a man who should write his life; yet Dodsley himself was not unwilling that his original low condition should be recollected. When Lord Lyttelton's Dialogues of the Dead' came out, one of which is between Apicius, an ancient epicure, and Dartineuf2, a modern epicure, Dodsley said to me, 'I knew Dartineuf well, for I was once his footman.'" เ Biography led us to speak of Dr. John Campbell, who had written a considerable part of the "Biographia Britannica." Johnson, though he valued him highly, was of opinion that there was not so much in his great work, "A Political Survey of Great Britain," as the world had been taught to expect3; and had said to me that he believed Campbell's disappointment on account of the bad success of that work had killed him. He this evening observed of it, "That work was his death.' Mr. Warton, not adverting to his meaning, answered, "I believe so, from the great attention he bestowed on it." JOHNSON. 6 Nay, Sir, he died of want of attention, if he died at all by that book." We talked of a work much in vogue at that time, written in a very mellifluous style, but which, under pretext of another subject, contained much artful infidelity. I said it was not fair to attack us unexpectedly; he should have warned us of our danger, before we entered his garden of flowery eloquence, by advertising, Spring-guns and men-traps set here." The author had been an Oxonian, and was remembered there for having "turned Papist." I observed, that as he had changed several times-from the church of England 66 to the church of Rome-from the church of Rome to infidelity,—I did not despair yet of seeing him a methodist preacher. Jousson (laughing). "It is said that his range has been more extensive, and that he has once been Mahometan. However, now that he has published his infidelity, he will probably per sist in it."4 BOSWELL. “I am not quite sure of that, Sir." I mentioned Sir Richard Steele having published his "Christian Hero," with the avowed purpose of obliging himself to lead a religious life; yet that his conduct was by no means strictly suitable. JOHNSON. "Steele, I believe, practised the lighter vices.” Mr. Warton, being engaged, could not sup with us at our inn; we had therefore another evening by ourselves. I asked Johnen whether a man's being forward to make himself known to eminent people, and seeing as much of life, and getting as much information as he could in every way, was not yet lessening himself by his forwardness. JOHNSON. “No. Sir; a man always makes himself greater as he increases his knowledge." I censured some ludicrous fantastic dialogues between two coach-horses, and other such stuff, which Baretti had lately published. He joined with me, and said, "Nothing odd will do long. Tristram Shandy' did not last." I expressed a desire to be acquainted with a lady who had been much talked of, and universally celebrated for extraordinary address and insinuation. JOHNSON. "Never believe extraordinary characters which you hear of people. Depend upon it, Sir, they are exaggerated. You do not see one man shoot a great deal higher than another." I mentioned Mr. Burke. JOHNSON." 'Yes, Burke is an extraordinary man. His stream of mind is perpetual." It is very pleasing to me to record, that Johnson's high estimation of the talents of this gentleman was uniform from their early acquaintance. Sir Joshua Reynolds informs me, that when vinced it is not good English. For the best writers use this phrase, "little or nothing," i. e. almost so little as to be nothing. BosWELL.. Mr. Boswell's friend was surely hypercritical. CROKER. 1 James Dodsley, many years a bookseller in Pall Mall. He died 19 Feb. 1797, aged 74, and was buried in the church of St. James', Piccadilly, where there is a tablet erected to his memory.-P. CUNNINGHAM. 2 This gentleman, whose proper name was Charles Dartiquenave (pronounced and commonly written Darteneuf), is now only recollected as a celebrated epicure; but he was a man of wit, pleasure, and political importance at the begin. ning of the last century - the associate of Swift, Pope, Addison, and Steele a contributor to the Tatler, and a member of the Kit-Cat Club, of which collection his portrait is oue of the best. He was Paymaster of the Board of Works, and Surveyor of the royal gardens; and died in 1737. It was suspected that he was a natural son of Charles the Second, by a foreign lady; and his physiognomy as well as his name evidences a foreign origin. - CROKER. 3 Yet surely it is a very useful work, and of wonderful research and labour for one man to have executed.- BosWELL. 4 As there can be no doubt that Gibbon and his History are the author and the work here alluded to, I once thought that the sceptical tone of the celebrated 15th and 16th chapters might have prompted this sarcasm, but there is in them no particular allusion to Mahometanism, and I now incline to believe, as was suggested by Mr. Macaulay in the Edinburgh Review, that it may have referred to some Oxford rumours of earlier infidelity. Gibbon, in his Memoirs, col fesses that the erratic course of study, which finally led to his conversion to Popery, began at Oxford by a turn towards "oriental learning and an inclination to study Arabic." "His tutor," he adds, "discouraged this childish fancy." He complains, too, of the invidious whispers which were afterwards circulated in Oxford on the subject of his apostacy; and as we may be certain that Johnson did not speak without a meaning, some whisper of this early inclination to the language of the Koran may have reached Johnson, and occasioned this sarcasm.-CROKER, 1835. 5 This was one of Boswell's predominant passions: he was, particularly in early life, fond of running after notorieties of all sorts.- CROKER. 6 Margaret Caroline Rudd, a woman who lived with one of the brothers Perreau, who were about this time executed (Jan. 17. 1776) for a forgery. Her fame "for extraordinary address and insinuation was probably very unfounded; it arose from this: she betrayed her accomplices; and they, in return, charged her with being the real author of the forgery, and alleged that they were dupes and instruments in ter hands; and, to support this allegation, they and their friends, who were numerous and respectable, exaggerated, to the highest degree, Mrs. Rudd's supposed powers of address and fascination. See post, p. 518. n. 2.- CROKER. |