ight be added. I cannot omit Lord and Lady
Lucan, at whose house he often enjoyed all that an elegant table and the
best company can contribute to happiness; he found hospitality united
with extraordinary accomplishments, and embellished with charms of which
no man could be insensible.

On Tuesday, June 22, I dined with him at THE LITERARY CLUB, the last
time of his being in that respectable society. The other members present
were the Bishop of St. Asaph, Lord Eliot, Lord Palmerston, Dr. Fordyce,
and Mr. Malone. He looked ill; but had such a manly fortitude, that he
did not trouble the company with melancholy complaints. They all shewed
evident marks of kind concern about him, with which he was much pleased,
and he exerted himself to be as entertaining as his indisposition
allowed him.

The anxiety of his friends to preserve so estimable a life, as long as
human means might be supposed to have influence, made them plan for him
a retreat from the severity of a British winter, to the mild climate
of Italy. This scheme was at last brought to a serious resolution at
General Paoli's, where I had often talked of it. One essential matter,
however, I understood was necessary to be previously settled, which
was obtaining such an addition to his income, as would be sufficient to
enable him to defray the expence in a manner becoming the first literary
character of a great nation, and independent of all his other merits,
the Authour of THE DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. The person
to whom I above all others thought I should apply to negociate this
business, was the Lord Chancellor, because I knew that he highly valued
Johnson, and that Johnson highly valued his Lordship; so that it was no
degradation of my illustrious friend to solicit for him the favour of
such a man. I have mentioned what Johnson said of him to me when he was
at the bar; and after his Lordship was advanced to the seals, he said
of him, 'I would prepare myself for no man in England but Lord Thurlow.
When I am to meet with him I should wish to know a day before.' How he
would have prepared himself I cannot conjecture. Would he have selected
certain topicks, and considered them in every view so as to be in
readiness to argue them at all points? and what may we suppose those
topicks to have been? I once started the curious inquiry to the great
man who was the subject of this compliment: he smiled, but did not
pursue it.

I first consulted with Sir Joshua Reyn