0, p. 587.)
Northcote says that the award was not a fair one. He adds that Lowe,
being sent to Rome by the patronage of the Academy, was dissatisfied
with the sum allowed him. 'When Sir Joshua said that he knew from
experience that it was sufficient, Lowe pertly answered "that it was
possible for a man to live on guts and garbage."' He died at an obscure
lodging in Westminster, in 1793. There is, wrote Miss Burney, 'a certain
poor wretch of a villainous painter, one Mr. Lowe, whom Dr. Johnson
recommends to all the people he thinks can afford to sit for their
picture. Among these he applied to Mr. Crutchley [one of Mr. Thrale's
executors]. "But now," said Mr. Crutchley to me, "I have not a notion of
sitting for my picture--for who wants it? I may as well give the man
the money without; but no, they all said that would not do so well, and
Dr. Johnson asked me to give _him_ my picture." "And I assure you, Sir,"
says he, "I shall put it in very good company, for I have portraits of
some very respectable people in my dining-room." After all I could say I
was obliged to go to the painter's. And I found him in such a condition!
a room all dirt and filth, brats squalling and wrangling... "Oh!" says
I, "Mr. Lowe, I beg your pardon for running away, but I have just
recollected another engagement; so I poked three guineas in his hand,
and told him I would come again another time, and then ran out of the
house with all my might."' Mme. D'Arblay's _Diary_, ii.41. A
correspondent of the _Examiner_ writing on May 28, 1873, said that he
had met one of Lowe's daughters, 'who recollected,' she told him, 'when
a child, sitting on Dr. Johnson's knee and his making her repeat the
Lord's Prayer.' She was Johnson's god-daughter. By a committee
consisting of Milman, Thackeray, Dickens, Carlyle and others, an annuity
fund for her and her sister was raised. Lord Palmerston gave a large
subscription.

[632] See _post_, May 15, 1783.

[633] See Boswell's _Hebrides_, _post_, v. 48.

[634] See _ante_, p. 171.

[635] Quoted by Boswell, _ante_, iii. 324.

[636] It is suggested to me by an anonymous Annotator on my Work, that
the reason why Dr. Johnson collected the peels of squeezed oranges may
be found in the 58th [358th] Letter in Mrs. Piozzi's _Collection_, where
it appears that he recommended 'dried orange-peel, finely powdered,' as
a medicine. BOSWELL. See _ante_, ii. 330.

[637] There are two mistakes in this calculation, both perhaps due