Page images
PDF
EPUB

PORTRAIT

EMBELLISHMENTS.

[MOST persons of literary tastes and acquirements look with pleasure upon the well-executed portraits of men renowned and celebrated in the intellectual world, in the present or past ages. To gratify this very rational pleasure, we have reproduced a group of portraits of men whose fame has long shone brightly, like stars, in the literary firmament of the past. The results of their intellectual labors still enrich many public and private libraries in many lands. The plate illustrating the literary party at sir Joshua Reynolds', has been much admired and called for. We reproduce it to gratify our numerous and rapidly increasing patrons who have never seen it in this form.]

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.

age was now at an end. Of readers there were still but few; the prices therefore that booksellers could afford to pay to authors were necessarily small; and an author, whatever were his talents or his industry, had great difficulty in keeping a shilling in his purse. The poverty and neglected condition of his friend and brother author, Savage, were the causes of Johnson's writing his "London," an imitation of the third satire of Juvenal, for which Mr. Dodsley gave him ten guineas, and by which he obtained a certain degree of reputation. We are told that when Pope read it he said: "The author, whoever he is, will not be long concealed." No great advantage, however, immediately accrued to him. Again he sought to be a schoolmaster, again his scheme miscarried, and he returned to his drudgery in the service of Cave the bookseller, who was his only patron. His pen was continually at work, and his pamphlets, prefaces, epitaphs, essays, and biographical memoirs, were continually published by Cave, either by themselves or in his pe

THIS renowned man of letters and learning was the son of Michael Johnson, a bookseller at Litchfield, England, and was born September 18th, 1709. His education was commenced in his native town, afterwards he attended school at Stourbridge; and in 1728, he was placed at Pembroke College, Oxford. Young Johnson had early shown a vigorous understanding and an eagerness for knowledge. He acquired a large fund of information at the University. But he was subject to periodical attacks of morbid melancholy. Necessity compelled him to abandon the hope of taking a degree. His debts increased, and his remittances were insufficient, and he quitted college and returned home. In December, 1731, his father died in pecuniary distress, and young Johnson was glad to become an usher in a school for support. While thus employed he became acquainted with a family by the name of Porter, and after the death of Mr. Porter, he married his widow, to whom he was deeply at-riodical, the Gentleman's Magazine. tached, though she was more than twenty years older than himself. She brought him £800, which added to his means of living, with which he established a school, but his advertisements produced few scholars, the scheme failed, and he left Staffordshire with his pupil Garrick to seek his fortune in the metropolis.

For many years his bread continued to be earned by literary slavery; by slow degrees only did his great talents become known, and the trust reposed in him by publishers increase.

In 1740, and for more than two years afterwards, Johnson wrote the parliamentary speeches in the Gentleman's Maga His prospects at this time must have zine. In 1744 he published his "Life been very gloomy; he had nothing but of Savage ;" in the following year some literature to trust to for subsistence, and observations on Shakspeare, whose plays those were times when the condition of he proposed to edit ; and in 1747 he comliterary men was most miserable and de- menced his "English Dictionary," which graded. In the reigns of William, of he engaged to complete in three years for Anne, and George I., successful writers £1575, a small sum if we consider that were rewarded by private munificence the author agreed to bear the heavy exand public situations; but such patron-penses necessary for preparing a work of

such magnitude and importance. In 1749 | society of a weekly club, of which Burke, appeared "The Vanity of Human Wish- Goldsmith, and Sir Joshua Reynolds were es," an imitation of the tenth satire of also members. He was introduced in the Juvenal; and in the following year was following year to his biographer Boswell, printed the first paper of the "Rambler." and we have from this date (1763) as full These are some of his most remarkable and minute account of him as has ever publications, for a complete list of which, been written of any individual. From and the dates at which they were pub- this time we are made as familiar as it is lished, we must refer to Boswell's "Life." in the power of writing to make us with For "The Vanity of Human Wishes," 15 the character, the habits, and the appearguineas only were received from Mr. ance of Johnson, and the persons and Dodsley. We mention this because the things with which he was connected. frame and condition of Johnson's mind "Every thing about him," says Macauand temper, his views of things and per- lay, "his coat, his wig, his figure, his face, sons, were probably influenced in no small his scrofula, his St. Vitus's dance, his rolldegree by the deficiency of his means. ing walk, his blinking eye, the outward He was now engaged in a steady course of signs which too clearly marked the apoccupation sufficient to employ his time probation of his dinner, his insatiable apfor several years; and so assiduous were petite for fish sauce and veal-pie with his labors that, whilst preparing his "Dic- plums, his inextinguishable thirst for tea, tionary," he had an upper room at his re- his trick of touching the posts as he sidence in Gough Square fitted up like a walked, his mysterious practice of treacounting-house, in which several copyists suring up scraps of orange-peel, his mornsat, whom he supplied with continual em- ing slumbers, his midnight disputations, ployment. his contortions, his mutterings, his gruntings, his puffings; his vigorous, acute, and ready eloquence; his sarcastic wit, his vehemence, his insolence, his fits of tempestuous rage, his queer inmatesold Mr. Levett and blind Mrs. Williams, the cat Hodge and the negro Frank-all are as familiar to us as the objects by which we have been surrounded from childhood."

The efforts of his mind were the utmost it could bear; and when it was subdued by grief at the death of his wife, (1752,) he relinquished the "Rambler." Bad as his circumstances were, still they were somewhat more easy than they had been; the number of his acquaintances had increased; the "Dictionary," which occupied eight instead of the promised three years, was nearly complete; and he found leisure (in 1754) to make an excursion to Oxford for the purpose of consulting its libraries. This was his first emancipation from necessary labor. He soon returned to London, to increase the number of reviews and essays which flowed continually from his pen. Thus occupied, an offer of a living was made to him if he would take orders; but though he was a firm believer in revelation, and a somewhat rigid moralist, he could not overcome his scruples respecting the fitness of his temper and habits for the duties that would be required of him, and the offer was rejected. He continued therefore to write for his bread; and it was not until he was fiftythree years old, and had for thirty years been toiling with his pen, that any certain source of income was opened to him. In May, 1762, George III., through his minister Lord Bute, granted Johnson a pension of £300 a year, and the days of his penury were at an end. Happy, in a state of independence, he enjoyed the

In 1765 the University of Dublin sent over a diploma creating him a doctor of laws, but he did not assume the title of doctor until eight or ten years afterwards, when the University of Oxford conferred the same honor upon him.

In 1766 his constitution seemed to be rapidly giving way, and he was depressed with a melancholy. In this condition his friend Mr. Thrale received him into his house at Streatham; an apartment was fitted up for him, companions were invited from London, and he became a constant resident in the family. His celebrity attracted the notice of the King, to whom he was introduced by the librarian of Buckingham House. We are not told that politics had in any way led to this introduction, but it is not impossible that the opinions that Johnson entertained upon the principal questions of the day might have reached the King's ears. For several years he occasionally published political pamphlets. In the autumn of 1773 he made a tour, in company with

Mr. Boswell, to the Western Islands of
Scotland, of which he published an ac-
count. Two years afterwards he made a
short excursion to Paris. The last of his
literary labors was "The Lives of the
Poets,"
," which were completed in 1781.
We now take leave of him as an author,
and have only to record the few domestic
occurrences which took place before the
close of his long life. These are for the
most part melancholy. His friends Mr.
Thrale and Mrs. Williams preceded him
to the grave. In June, 1783, he had a
paralytic stroke, and in the following No-
vember was greatly swollen with the
dropsy. During a journey to Derbyshire
he felt a temporary relief; but in 1784
he suffered both from dropsy and from
asthma. His diseases were evidently irre-
mediable; and the thought of death in-
creased his constitutional melancholy.
On Monday, the 13th of December, 1784,
he expired in his house in Bolt Court;
on the 20th of the month his remains, with
due solemnity and a numerous attendance
of his friends were buried in Westminster
Abbey, near the foot of Shakspeare's mon-
ument, and close to the grave of Garrick.

and soon became the most prominent painter of the capital. In 1768, when the Royal Academy was established, Reynolds was unanimously elected president at the first meeting of the members, December 14th of that year, and he was knighted by George III. in consequence. In 1784 he succeeded Allan Ramsay as principal painter in ordinary to the King; and after an unrivaled career as a portrait painter, died at his house in Leicester Square, February 23, 1792. He was buried with great pomp in St. Paul's Cathedral, where a fine statue by Flaxman is placed immediately below the dome, in honor of his memory. His large fortune, about £80,000, was inherited by his niece, Miss Palmer, who became afterwards Marchioness of Thomond. His collection of works of art sold for nearly £17,000. Sir Joshua Reynolds, notwithstanding his careless and feeble drawing, was indisputably a great painter; some of his portraits are among the first masterpieces of the art, whether as simple portraits, or as fancy pieces, as for instance, "Lord Heathfield," in the National Gallery, of the former class, and "Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse," at Dulwich, of the latter. His pictures are necessarily very numerous, their chief excellence is their natural grace, fullness of expression, subThis eminent painter and artist at whose stantial character, and frequently a charmmansion assembled the group of celebrities ing richness of color and light and shade. represented in the engraved plate, which His eulogium can not be better expressed embellishes our present Number, was con- than in the words of Burke: "He was sidered the founder of the English school the first Englishman who added the praise of painting as regards its special charac- of the elegant arts to the other glories of teristics. He was born at Plympton in his country;" "The loss of no man of his Devonshire, where his father was rector, time can be felt with more sincere, geneJuly 16, 1723. He was intended for the ral, and unmixed sorrow." Sir Joshua medical profession, but was induced by has bequeathed to posterity besides his the perusal of Richardson's Essays on paintings, fifteen elegant and valuable Painting, etc., to take up painting as a Discourses," of which a magnificent ediprofession. A handsome edition of these tion by John Burnet, was published by essays was in 1773 dedicated to Sir Joshua James Carpenter in 1842. There is a full by Richardson's son, comprising The life of Reynolds by Northcote, two vols. Theory of Painting, Essays on the Art 8vo, London, 1819. of Criticism, and The Science of a Connoisseur. Reynolds' first master was Hudson, the portrait-painter, with whom he was placed in 1741. He first set up as a portrait-painter at Davenport, but in 1746 settled in London in St. Martin's Lane. In 1749 he accompanied Commodore Keppel in the Centurion to the Mediterranean, and remained altogether about three years in Italy. He commenced business again in London in 1752,

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

66

JAMES BOSWELL.

This renowned biographer of Dr. Johnson, was born at Edinburgh, October 29, 1740. His father was Alexander Boswell. His mother was Euphemia Erskine, greatgrand-daughter of John, the twenty-third Earl of Mar, who was lord high-treasurer of Scotland from 1615 to 1630. After

having studied law at the universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, Boswell visited London for the first time in 1760, and made many acquaintances both in the fashionable world and among the literary men of the day. In 1762 he made, as far as is known, his first essay in authorship. In 1763 he published a small volume of "Letters," which had passed between himself and the honorable Andrew Erskine. This is a very characteristic volume, sufficiently prognosticating, by its style of frank exposure and good-natured self-complacency, the most remarkable qualities of the author's subsequent productions. With his father's consent be determined to make the tour of the Continent before being called to the bar; and accordingly he set out early in 1763. While passing through London he was introduced to Dr. Johnson, on the 16th of May in that year, in the back-shop of Mr. Thomas Davies, the bookseller, in Russell-street, Covent Garden. He proceeded in the first instance to Utrecht, where he spent the winter in attending the law classes at the university. After visiting various places in the Netherlands, he continued his route, in company with his friend the Earl Marischal, through Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. With his passion for making the acquaintance of remarkable persons, he had, while in the neighborhood of Geneva, visited both Rousseau and Voltaire; and he now crossed over to Corsica, and introduced himself by means of a letter from Rousseau to General Paoli, then in the height of his celebrity as the leader of his countrymen in their resistance to the Genoese. Returning home by the way of Paris, in 1766, he passed as advocate in July of that year. In 1768 he published at Glasgow "An Account of Corsica, with Memoirs of General Paoli."

In November, 1769, he married his cousin, Miss Margaret Montgomery of Lainshaw. About the same time his intimacy with his literary friends in London, and especially with Dr. Johnson, was drawn closer by another visit to the metropolis. In 1773 he accompanied Johnson on his journey to the Western Islands of Scotland. In 1782, on his father's death, he succeeded to the family estate, and soon after removing to London entered himself at the English bar. In 1784 he published a pamphlet in support of the new ministry of Mr. Pitt. His

great friend Johnson died towards the end of this year; and in 1785 he published the first and not the least remarkable sample of his Johnsoniana, in a "Journal of the Tour to the Hebrides." It appeared at Edinburgh in an octavo volume. Becoming now ambitious to make a figure in the political world, he made various unsuccessful attempts to obtain a seat in Parliament. At the general election in 1790 he stood for the county of Ayr, but was defeated after an expensive contest. Before the close of the same year appeared in two volumes quarto the work which has made his name universally known, his "Life of Johnson." The sensation excited by this extraordinary production was very great; and if it be an evidence of superior talent to do any thing whatever better than it has ever been done before, the work undoubtedly deserved all the immediate success it met with, and also the celebrity it has ever since enjoyed; for whatever may be thought of the cha racter of either the intellectual or the moral qualities which its composition demanded, it can not be disputed that the same qualities had never before been half so skillfully or felicitously exerted. Nor has any work of the same kind since appeared that can for a moment be compared with Boswell's. The best editions of this celebrated work are that in 10 vols. duodecimo, edited by Mr. Croker, and a carefully revised reprint of the same edition in a single volume royal octavo. Both these editions contain Boswell's "Journal of the Tour to the Hebrides," and also many other pieces relating to Johnson never before incorporated with the present books. Boswell is said to have contributed a series of papers, entitled the "Hypochondriac," to the first sixty-two numbers of the "London Magazine," (from 1777 to 1782,) which are said to be of very little merit; and a series of his "Epistolary Correspondence and Conversations with many Eminent Persons," appeared in two volumes quarto 1791, and again in three volumes octavo in 1793. He was preparing a second edition of his "Life of Johnson" at the time of his death, May 19th, 1795. He left two sons and three daughters.

DAVID GARRICK.

David Garrick was the most respected actor that ever trod the English stage.

He was born at Hereford, and was baptized in the church of All-Saints February 28, 1716. At ten years of age he was entered at the grammar school at Lichfield. At eleven he formed the project of get ting a play acted by young gentleman and ladies. The trial was made with "The Recruiting Officer." One of his sisters played the part of the chambermaid; he himself undertook Serjeant Kite. The after celebrated Doctor, Samuel Johnson, his boy-friend, was applied to for the prologue, which, however, he neglected to write. Not long after, Garrick went to Lisbon at the request of an uncle, a wine-merchant there, and was acquainted with the unfortunate Duke d'Aveixo. On his return to England he, in 1736, became one of Johnson's scholars at Lichfield; but the latter growing tired of teaching the classics to two or three pupils, resolved on trying his fortune in London, and thither Garrick accompanied him. Here the latter lost no time in getting introduced to theatrical managers, and in 1741 obtained an engagement at Ipswich, and met with much success, under the assumed name of Lyddal. In the winter of the same year Garrick ventured on the London stage. On the 19th of October, 1741, he made his debut in Richard the Third at the playhouse in Goodman's Fields, and with his novel and natural style, startled the critics and the reigning actors. Quin, in particular, was much annoyed, saying: "If the young fellow was right, he and the rest of the players had been all wrong." Being told that Goodman's Fields theater was crowded every night to see the new actor, he said: "That Garrick was a new religion; Whitefield was followed for a time; but they would all come to church again." Whereupon Garrick wrote this epigram:

[blocks in formation]

After a visit to Dublin, Garrick returned to London, and acted at Drury, having entered into an engagement with Fleetwood, the manager, for five hundred pounds a year. One merit claimed for him is the restoration of " Macbeth," and other Shakspearian dramas, with a closer adherence to the text than was then usual. The chief complaint against him was his conduct towards living authors; and it must be confessed, that in him was confirmed that usurpation of the poet's rights by the actor from which the stage is hardly yet emerging. Davies, his biographer, observes on this point that: "The time bestowed in rehearsing the piece, and the expense of new scenes, dresses, music, and other decorations, made it often very ineligible to a director of a theater to accept a new play, especially when it is considered that the revival of a good old play will answer his end of profit, and reputation too, perhaps as well." The actor-manager, as the representative and inheritor of the wealth of all dead poets, proves too powerful a competitor for the living dramatist. In this way tragic actors find Shakspeare a tower of strength, and are by this means enabled to suppress the proofs of living genius. Garrick had strong reasons for the Stratford jubilee in 1769, by which he gained increased celebrity and power. This pageant he afterwards transferred to the stage, where it ran for one hundred nights. Mr. Garrick was also the founder of the Drury Lane Fund for decayed performers. A thoroughly successful man in life, he was equally prudent and benevolent. He lived generously, kept the best society, made lavish gifts to his friends and neighbors, and basked, till his death, in the sun of popular favor. He died 20th January, 1779, and was magnificently interred in Westminster Abbey, being attended to his grave by persons illustrious for their genius and rank. In the opinion of his admirers he was the greatest actor that ever graced the stage He was certainly the most exemplary as a man and moralist; and preserved, if he did not originate, the dignity of his profession. He was also the author of several dramatic pieces, some of which displayed considerable humor, and of many brief poems, prologues, and epilogues, abounding in wit, and in allusions to the measures of his time.

« PreviousContinue »