lor, too, related once to Mr.
Thrale and me, that when he lost his wife, the negro Francis ran away,
though in the middle of the night, to Westminster, to fetch Dr. Taylor to
his master, who was all but wild with excess of sorrow, and scarce knew
him when he arrived. After some minutes, however, the Doctor proposed
their going to prayers, as the only rational method of calming the
disorder this misfortune had occasioned in both their spirits. Time, and
resignation to the will of God, cured every breach in his heart before I
made acquaintance with him, though he always persisted in saying he never
rightly recovered the loss of his wife. It is in allusion to her that he
records the observation of a female critic, as he calls her, in Gay's
"Life;" and the lady of great beauty and elegance, mentioned in the
criticisms upon Pope's epitaphs, was Miss Molly Aston. The person spoken
of in his strictures upon Young's poetry is the writer of these
anecdotes, to whom he likewise addressed the following verses when he was
in the Isle of Skye with Mr. Boswell. The letters written in his
journey, I used to tell him, were better than the printed book; and he
was not displeased at my having taken the pains to copy them all over.
Here is the Latin ode:--

"Permeo terras, ubi nuda rupes
Saxeas miscet nebulis ruinas,
Torva ubi rident steriles coloni
Rura labores.

"Pervagor gentes, hominum ferorum
Vita ubi nullo decorata cultu,
Squallet informis, tigurique fumis
Faeda latescit.

"Inter erroris salebrosa longi,
Inter ignotae strepitus loquelae,
Quot modis mecum, quid agat requiro
Thralia dulcis?

"Seu viri curas pia nupta mulcet,
Seu fovet mater sobolem benigna,
Sive cum libris novitate pascit
Sedula mentem:

"Sit memor nostri, fideique merces,
Stet fides constans, meritoque blandum
Thraliae discant resonare nomen
Littora Skiae."

On another occasion I can boast verses from Dr. Johnson. As I went into
his room the morning of my birthday once, and said to him, "Nobody sends
me any verses now, because I am five-and-thirty years old, and Stella was
fed with them till forty-six, I remember." My being just recovered from
illness and confinement will account for the manner in which he burst
out, suddenly, for so he did without the least previous hesitation
whatsoever, and without having entertained the smallest intention