of a work that fhould comprehend intelligence of both thefe kinds, we know of no exemplar in this country, earlier than the year 1716, when an effay towards fuch a one was made in the publication of a book, entitled The Hiftorical Regifter, containing, an impartial relation of all tranfactions foreign and domeftic, by a body of men, from whom few would have expected any thing of the kind. In fhort, the editors of the Hiftorical Register, were the members of a fociety, affociated about the year above-mentioned, for the purpose of infurance from fire, which, from the badge affumed by them, obtained the denomination of the Sun-fire-Office, and is still subsisting in a flourishing state. One of the managing perfons in this fociety, was, if my information misleads me not, a man of the name of Povey, who, by the way, was a great improver of that useful project, the Penny Poft, and died within my memory. Having a scheming head, a plausible tongue, and a ready pen, he prevailed on his fellow-members to undertake the above publication, foreign as it was to the nature of their inftitution. In Strype's continuation of Stow's Survey, I find the following article respecting this fociety: all perfons taking out policies for infurance, must pay two fhillings and fix-pence per quar'ter; and, befides their infurance, fhall have a book, called the Hiftorical Regifter, left every quarter at 'their house.'

The Historical Register gave also an account of the proceedings of Parliament: the firft volume contains the speeches in both houses, on the debate on the Septennial Bill; but, fo great is the caution obferved in drawing them up, that none of thofe in the House of Lords are appropriated, otherwife, than by fuch words

as

The original inventor thereof was one Mr. Dockwra, a citizen of fuch eminence, that he stood for the office of Chamberlain, against Sir Wm. Fazakerley.

as thefe:

A noble Duke stood up, and said,'

This fpeech was anfwered by a Northern Peer,' and other fuch vague defignations. In thofe in the House of Commons, the names of the speakers, Mr. Shippen, Mr. Hampden, Sir Richard Steele, and others are given, without any artifices of concealment.

This publication was continued to the year 1737, inclufive, and may be fuppofed to have been fuperfeded by the Gentleman's Magazine, which was then rising very faft in its reputation.

From the Historical Register the hint was taken, of a publication, entitled the Grub-street Journal,* which, befides a brief account of public occurrences, contained criticisms and cenfures of dull and profane or immoral books and pamphlets, as alfo original effays and letters to the editors. The chief conductors of it, were, Dr. John Martyn, then a young physician, afterwards profeffor of botany in the univerfity of Cambridge, and Dr. Ruffel, alfo a phyfician; the former affumed the name Bavius, and the latter Mævius. Its firft publication was in January, 1730, and it meeting with encouragement, Cave projected an improvement thereon in a pamphlet

* Mention is often made, in the Dunciad and other modern books, of Grub-street writers and Grub-street publications, but the terms are little understood: the following historical fact will explain them: During the ufurpation, a prodigious number of feditious and libellous pamphlets and papers, tending to exasperate the people, and encrease the confufion in which the nation was involved, were from time to time published. The authors of these were for the most part, men whose indigent circumftances compelled them to live in the suburbs and most obfcure parts of the town; Grub-street then abounded with mean and old houses, which were let out in lodgings, at low rents, to persons of this defcription, whose occupation was the publishing anonymous trea fon and flander. One of the original inhabitants of this street was Fox the Martyrologift, who, during his abode there, wrote his Acts and Monuments. It was alfo rendered famous by having been the dwelling-place of Mr. Henry Welby, a gentleman of whom it is related in a printed narrative that he lived there forty years without being seen of any.

pamphlet of his own, and in the following year gave to the world the first number of the Gentleman's Magazine, with a notification that the fame would be continued monthly, incurring thereby a charge of plagiarism, which, as he is faid to have confeffed it, we may fuppofe he did not look upon as criminal*.

Johnson had not by his letter, herein before inserted, fo attached himself to Cave, as not to be at liberty to enter into a closer engagement with any other person: he, therefore, in 1736, made overtures to the Rev. Mr. Budworth, then mafter of the grammar fchool at Brerewood, in Staffordshire, and who had been bred under Mr. Blackwall, at Market Bofworth, to become his affiftant; but Mr. Budworth thought himself under a neceffity of declining them, from an apprehenfion that those convulfive motions to which Johnson through life was fubject, might render him an object of imitation, and poflibly of ridicule, with his pupils.

It may be remembered that in a preceding page, Johnfon is faid to have refided for fome months, in the year 1734, in the houfe of a perfon named Jarvis, at Birmingham. To this circumftance, by a conjecture not improbable, may be referred an important event of of his life. At that time there dwelt at Birmingham a widow, the relict of Mr. Porter a mercer, who dying, left her, if not well jointured, fo provided for, as made a match with her to a man in Johnson's circumstances defirable: report fays, fhe was rather advanced in years; it is certain that she had a fon and daughter grown up; the former was in the laft war a captain in the navy, and his fifter, lately dead, inherited from him a handfome fortune, acquired in the course of a long fervice. Of her perfonal charms little can now be remembered: Johnson has celebrated them in an inscription on her tomb

* Memoirs of the fociety of Grub-street. Preface, page xii. et feqq.

tomb at Bromley; but, confidering his infirmity, and admitting the truth of a confeffion, faid to have been made by him, that he never faw the human face divine,' it may be queftioned, whether himself was ever an eye-witness to them. The infcription further declares her to have been of the family of Jarvis, and gives colour to a fuppofition that fhe was either a fifter or other relation of the Jarvis above-mentioned.

With this perfon he married, his age being then about twenty-feven. Her fortune, which is conjectured to have been about eight hundred pounds, placed him in a state of affluence, to which before he had been a ftranger. He was not fo imprudent as to think it an inexhauftable mine; on the contrary, he reflected on the means of improving it. His acquifitions at school and at the university, and the improvement he had made of his talents in the ftudy of the French and Italian languages, qualified him in an eminent degree, for an instructor of youth in claffical literature; and the reputation of his father, and the connections he had formed in and about Lichfield, pointed out to him a fair profpect of fucceeding in that useful poffeffion.

There dwelt in the above-mentioned city, a very respectable gentleman, Mr. Gilbert Walmsley, register of the ecclefiaftical court of the bishop thereof, to whofe. houfe, in his fchool and alfo in his univerfity vacations, Johnson was a welcome guest: the fame person was alfo a friend of captain Garrick, who had for fome time been refident at Lichfield, and, by confequence, of Mr. David Garrick, his fon. His character is fo well pourtrayed by Johnson, and represents in fuch lively colours his friendship for him, that it would be injuftice to omit the infertion of it, as given in the life of Edmund Smith:

• Of Gilbert Walmsley, thus presented to my mind, let me indulge myself in the remembrance. I knew

him very early; he was one of the first friends that literature procured me; and, I hope that, at leaft, my gratitude made me worthy of his notice.

He was of an advanced age, and I was only not a 'boy; yet he never received my notions with con⚫tempt. He was a whig, with all the virulence and • malevolence of his party; yet difference of opinion ⚫ did not keep us apart: I honoured him, and he en⚫ dured me.

He had mingled with the gay world, without ex⚫emption from its vices or its follies, but had never ne

glected the cultivation of his mind; his belief of reve⚫lation was unshaken; his learning preferved his prin'ciples; he grew firft regular, and then pious.

His studies had been fo various, that I am not able to name a man of equal knowledge. His acquaintance with books was great, and what he did not immediately know, he could at leaft tell where to find. Such was his amplitude of learning, and fuch his copi⚫oufnefs of communication, that it may be doubted whether a day now paffes, in which I have not some ❝ advantage from his friendship.

At this man's table I enjoyed many chearful and ⚫ instructive hours, with companions, fuch as are not ⚫ often found; with one who has lengthened, and one who has gladdened life; with Dr. James, whofe fkill in phyfic will be long remembered; and with David Garrick, whom I hoped to have gratified with this character of our common friend: but what are the hopes of man! I am disappointed by that stroke. of death, which has eclipfed the gaiety of nations, and impoverished the public ftock of harmless plea• fure.'

The benevolent person, so gratefully remembered in the above encomium, knowing the abilities of Johnson, encouraged him in his defign of becoming a teacher of literature: