which Johnson
neither recommended nor revised. He recommended only Blackmore on the
Creation, and Watts. How then are they Johnson's? This is indecent."'
The poets whom Johnson recommended were Blackmore, Watts, Pomfret, and
Yalden. _Ante_, under Dec. 29, 1778.

[128] Gibbon says of the last five quartos of the six that formed his
_History_:--'My first rough manuscript, without any intermediate copy,
has been sent to the press.' _Misc. Works_, i. 255. In the _Memoir of
Goldsmith_, prefixed to his _Misc. Works_, i. 113, it is said:--'In
whole quires of his _Histories_, _Animated Nature_, &c., he had seldom
occasion to correct or alter a single word.' See _ante_, i. 203.

[129] From Waller's _Of Loving at First Sight_. Waller's _Poems,
Miscellanies_, xxxiv.

[130] He trusted greatly to his memory. If it did not retain anything
exactly, he did not think himself bound to look it up. Thus in his
criticism on Congreve (_Works_, viii. 31) he says:--'Of his plays I
cannot speak distinctly; for since I inspected them many years have
passed.' In a note on his _Life of Rowe_, Nichols says:--'This _Life_
is a very remarkable instance of the uncommon strength of Dr. Johnson's
memory. When I received from him the MS. he complacently observed that
the criticism was tolerably well done, considering that he had not read
one of Rowe's plays for thirty years.' _Ib_. vii. 417.

[131] Thus:--'In the _Life of Waller_, Mr. Nichols will find a reference
to the _Parliamentary History_ from which a long quotation is to be
inserted. If Mr. Nichols cannot easily find the book, Mr. Johnson will
send it from Streatham.'

'Clarendon is here returned.'

'By some accident, I laid _your_ note upon Duke up so safely, that I
cannot find it. Your informations have been of great use to me. I must
beg it again; with another list of our authors, for I have laid that
with the other. I have sent Stepney's Epitaph. Let me have the revises
as soon as can be. Dec. 1778.'

'I have sent Philips, with his Epitaphs, to be inserted. The fragment of
a preface is hardly worth the impression, but that we may seem to do
something. It may be added to the _Life of Philips_. The Latin page is
to be added to the _Life of Smith_. I shall be at home to revise the two
sheets of Milton. March 1, 1779.'

'Please to get me the last edition of Hughes's _Letters_; and try to get
_Dennis upon Blackmore_, and upon Calo, and any thing of the same writer
against Pope. Our materi