a man to live there without being
contemptible. He allowed ten pounds for clothes and linen. He said a
man might live in a garret at eighteen-pence a week; few people would
inquire where he lodged; and if they did, it was easy to say, "Sir, I am
to be found at such a place." By spending three-pence in a coffeehouse,
he might be for some hours every day in very good company; he might dine
for six-pence, breakfast on bread and milk for a penny, and do without
supper. On clean-shirt-day he went abroad, and paid visits.' I have
heard him more than once talk of this frugal friend, whom he recollected
with esteem and kindness, and did not like to have one smile at the
recital. 'This man (said he, gravely) was a very sensible man, who
perfectly understood common affairs: a man of a great deal of knowledge
of the world, fresh from life, not strained through books. He amused
himself, I remember, by computing how much more expence was absolutely
necessary to live upon the same scale with that which his friend
described, when the value of money was diminished by the progress of
commerce. It may be estimated that double the money might now with
difficulty be sufficient.'

Amidst this cold obscurity, there was one brilliant circumstance to
cheer him; he was well acquainted with Mr. Henry Hervey, one of the
branches of the noble family of that name, who had been quartered at
Lichfield as an officer of the army, and had at this time a house in
London, where Johnson was frequently entertained, and had an opportunity
of meeting genteel company. Not very long before his death, he
mentioned this, among other particulars of his life, which he was kindly
communicating to me; and he described this early friend, 'Harry Hervey,'
thus: 'He was a vicious man, but very kind to me. If you call a dog
HERVEY, I shall love him.'

He told me he had now written only three acts of his Irene, and that he
retired for some time to lodgings at Greenwich, where he proceeded in it
somewhat further, and used to compose, walking in the Park; but did not
stay long enough at that place to finish it.

In the course of the summer he returned to Lichfield, where he had left
Mrs. Johnson, and there he at last finished his tragedy, which was not
executed with his rapidity of composition upon other occasions, but
was slowly and painfully elaborated. A few days before his death,
while burning a great mass of papers, he picked out from among them the
original unformed