February and March, 1771, the House of Commons ordered eight
printers to attend at the bar on a charge of breach of privilege, in
publishing reports of debates. One of the eight, Miller of the _Evening
Post_, when the messenger of the House tried to arrest him, gave the man
himself into custody on a charge of assault. The messenger was brought
before Lord Mayor Crosby and Aldermen Wilkes and Oliver, and a warrant
was made out for his commitment. Bail was thereupon offered and accepted
for his appearance at the next sessions. The Lord Mayor and Oliver were
sent to the Tower by the House. Wilkes was ordered to appear on April 8;
but the Ministry, not daring to face his appearance, adjourned the House
till the 9th. A committee was appointed by ballot to inquire into the
late obstructions to the execution of the orders of the House. It
recommended the consideration of the expediency of the House ordering
that Miller should be taken into custody. The report, when read, was
received with a roar of laughter. Nothing was done. Such was, to quote
the words of Burke in the _Annual Register_ (xiv. 70), 'the miserable
result of all the pretended vigour of the Ministry.' See _Parl. Hist._
xvii. 58, 186.

[445] Lord Cornwallis's army surrendered at York Town, five days before
Sir Henry Clinton's fleet and army arrived off the Chesapeak. _Ann.
Reg._ xxiv. 136.

[446] Johnson wrote on March 30:--'The men have got in whom I have
endeavoured to keep out; but I hope they will do better than their
predecessors; it will not be easy to do worse.' Croker's _Boswell_,
p. 706.

[447] This note was in answer to one which accompanied one of the
earliest pamphlets on the subject of Chatterton's forgery, entitled
_Cursory Observations on the Poems attributed to Thomas Rowley_, &c. Mr.
Thomas Warton's very able _Inquiry_ appeared about three months
afterwards; and Mr. Tyrwhitt's admirable _Vindication of his Appendix_
in the summer of the same hear, left the believers in this daring
imposture nothing but 'the resolution to say again what had been said
before.' MALONE.

[448] _Pr. and Med._ p. 207. BOSWELL.

[449] He addressed to him an Ode in Latin, entitled _Ad Thomam Laurence,
medicum doctissimum, quum filium peregre agentem desiderio nimis tristi
prosequeretur. Works_, i. 165.

[450] Mr. Holder, in the Strand, Dr. Johnson's apothecary. BOSWELL.

[451] 'Johnson should rather have written "imperatum est." But the
meaning of the words is p