��Anecdotes.
��Though Mr. Johnson had but little reverence either for talents or fortune, when he found them unsupported by virtue ; yet it was sufficient to tell him a man was very pious, or very charit able, and he would at least begin with him on good terms, however the conversation might end *. He would, sometimes too, good-naturedly enter into a long chat for the instruction or entertainment of people he despised. I perfectly recollect his condescending to delight my daughter's dancing-master with a long argument about his art ; which the man protested, at the close of the discourse, the Doctor knew more of than himself; who remained astonished, enlightened, and amused by the talk of a person little likely to make a good disquisition upon dancing 2 . I have sometimes indeed been rather pleased than vexed when Mr. Johnson has given a rough answer to a man who perhaps deserved one only half as rough, because I knew he would repent of his hasty reproof 3 , and make us all amends by some conversation at once instructive and entertaining, as in the following cases: A young fellow asked him abruptly one day, Pray, Sir, what and where is Palmira ? I heard somebody talk last night of the ruins of Palmira. ' 'Tis a hill in Ireland (replies Johnson), with palms growing on the top, and a bog at the
��his works, was greatly disappointed when he met him. 'I was filled at this time with horror at slavery and the slave-trade, and his history of the two Indies had served to en lighten these sentiments ; but when I came to talk on these subjects with him he appeared to me so cold and so indifferent about them that I con ceived a very unfavourable opinion of him.' Memoirs of Romilly, ed. 1840, 1.70.
In Grimm's Correspondance, ed. 1814, v. 390, under date of Sept. 1782, is the following entry: 'J'ai vu,' ecrivit dernierement le Roi de Prusse a M. d'Alembert, 'j'ai vu l'Abb Raynal. A la maniere dont il m'a parl de la puissance, des ressources et des richesses de tous
��les peuples du globe, j'ai cru m'entre- tenir avec la Providence. . . . Je me suis bien gardd de revoquer en doute 1'exactitude du moindre de ses cal- culs ; j'ai compris qu'il n'entendrait pas raillerie, meme sur un e"cu.'
1 See ante, p. 35, where he invited ' a kind of Methodist ' to his house on Easter Sunday, but did not keep him, as he had purposed, to dinner.
2 He had had, he said, one or two lessons in dancing. Life, iv. 80, n. 2.
3 Reynolds remarked that 'when upon any occasion Johnson had been rough to any person in company, he took the first opportunity of recon ciliation by drinking to him, or addressing his discourse to him.' Ib. ii. 109. See also ib. ii. 256, and post) p. 269.
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