re every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man.!
[Act iii. sc. 4.]

Milton thus pourtrays our first parent, Adam:--

'His fair large front and eye sublime declar'd
Absolute rule; and hyacinthin locks
Round from his parted forelock manly hung
Clus'tring, but not beneath his shoulders broad.'
[_P.L._ iv. 300.] BOSWELL.

[242] 'Grattan's Uncle, Dean Marlay [afterwards Bishop of Waterford],
had a good deal of the humour of Swift. Once, when the footman was out
of the way, he ordered the coachman to fetch some water from the well.
To this the man objected, that _his_ business was to drive, not to run
on errands. "Well, then," said Marlay, "bring out the coach and four,
set the pitcher inside, and drive to the well;"--a service which was
several times repeated, to the great amusement of the village.' Rogers's
_Table-Talk_, p.176.

[243] See _ante_, ii. 241, for Johnson's contempt of puns.

[244] 'He left not faction, but of that was left.' _Absalom and
Achitophel_, l. 568.

[245] Boswell wrote of Gibbon in 1779:--'He is an ugly, affected,
disgusting fellow, and poisons our Literary Club to me.' _Letters of
Boswell_, p.242. See _ante_, ii.443, note 1.

[246] _The schools_ in this sense means a University.

[247] See _ante_, ii.224.

[248] Up to the year 1770, controverted elections had been tried before
a Committee of the whole House. By the _Grenville Act_ which was passed
in that year they were tried by a select committee. _Parl. Hist._ xvi.
902. Johnson, in _The False Alarm_ (1770), describing the old method of
trial, says;--'These decisions have often been apparently partial, and
sometimes tyrannically oppressive.' _Works, vi. 169._ _In The Patriot_
(1774), he says:--'A disputed election is now tried with the same
scrupulousness and solemnity as any other title.' _Ib._ p.223. See
Boswell's _Hebrides_, Nov.10.

[249] Miss Burney describes a dinner at Mr. Thrale's, about this time,
at which she met Johnson, Boswell, and Dudley Long. Mme. D'Arblay's
_Diary_, ii. 14.

[250] See _ante_, ii.171, _post_, two paragraphs before April 10, 1783,
and May 15, 1784.

[251] Johnson wrote on May i, 1780:--'There was the Bishop of St. Asaph
who comes to every place.' _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 111. Hannah More, in
1782, describes an assembly at this Bishop's. 'Conceive to yourself 150
or 200 people met together dressed in the extremity of the fashion,
painted