respect inferiour to those of former years.

In consequence of Johnson's request that I should ask our physicians
about his case, and desire Sir Alexander Dick to send his opinion, I
transmitted him a letter from that very amiable Baronet, then in his
eighty-first year, with his faculties as entire as ever; and mentioned
his expressions to me in the note accompanying it: 'With my most
affectionate wishes for Dr. Johnson's recovery, in which his friends,
his country, and all mankind have so deep a stake:' and at the same time
a full opinion upon his case by Dr. Gillespie, who, like Dr. Cullen,
had the advantage of having passed through the gradations of surgery and
pharmacy, and by study and practice had attained to such skill, that
my father settled on him two hundred pounds a year for five years, and
fifty pounds a year during his life, as an honorarium to secure his
particular attendance.

I also applied to three of the eminent physicians who had chairs in our
celebrated school of medicine at Edinburgh, Doctors Cullen, Hope, and
Monro.

All of them paid the most polite attention to my letter, and its
venerable object. Dr. Cullen's words concerning him were, 'It would give
me the greatest pleasure to be of any service to a man whom the publick
properly esteem, and whom I esteem and respect as much as I do Dr.
Johnson.' Dr. Hope's, 'Few people have a better claim on me than your
friend, as hardly a day passes that I do not ask his opinion about this
or that word.' Dr. Monro's, 'I most sincerely join you in sympathizing
with that very worthy and ingenious character, from whom his country has
derived much instruction and entertainment.'

'TO THE REVEREND DR. TAYLOR, ASHBOURNE, DERBYSHIRE.

'DEAR SIR,--What can be the reason that I hear nothing from you? I hope
nothing disables you from writing. What I have seen, and what I have
felt, gives me reason to fear every thing. Do not omit giving me the
comfort of knowing, that after all my losses I have yet a friend left.

'I want every comfort. My life is very solitary and very cheerless.
Though it has pleased GOD wonderfully to deliver me from the dropsy,
I am yet very weak, and have not passed the door since the 13th of
December. I hope for some help from warm weather, which will surely come
in time.

'I could not have the consent of the physicians to go to church
yesterday; I therefore received the holy sacrament at home, in the room
where I communicated with dear