ANECDOTES BY MISS HAWKINS*
��WHEN first I remember Johnson I used to see him sometimes at a little distance from the house, coming to call on my father ; his look directed downwards, or rather in such apparent abstrac tion as to have no direction. His walk was heavy, but he got on at a great rate, his left arm always fixed across his breast, so as to bring the hand under his chin ; and he walked wide, as if to support his weight 2 . Getting out of a hackney-coach, which had set him down in Fleet Street, my brother Henry says he made his way up Bolt Court in the zig-zag direction of a flash of lightning ; submitting his course only to the deflections im posed by the impossibility of going further to right or left.
His clothes hung loose, and the pocket on the right hand swung violently, the lining of his coat being always visible. I can now call to mind his brown hand, his metal sleeve-buttons, and my surprise at seeing him with plain wristbands, when all gentlemen wore ruffles 3 ; his coat-sleeve being very wide showed his linen almost to the elbow. His wig in common was cut and bushy ; if by chance he had one that had been dressed in separate curls, it gave him a disagreeable look, not suited to his years or character. I certainly had no idea that this same Dr. Johnson,
1 From the Memoirs of Letitia which Mrs. Thrale said were old- Hawkins, 2 vols. 8vo. 1827. fashioned,' worn by Sir P. J. Clerk,
2 ' When he walked, it was like see Life, iv. 80. Clerk was a Whig, the struggling gait of one in fetters.' * Ah, Sir (said Johnson), ancient Life, iv. 425. See/0.y/, p. 165. ruffles and modern principles do not
3 For * the very rich laced ruffles, agree.'
whom
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