In the end he turned quack-doctor. He was knighted by the King of Sweden 'in return for a present to that monarch of his Vegetable System.' He at least thrice attacked Garrick (Murphy's Garrick, pp. 136, 189, 212), who replied with three epigrams, of which the last is well-known:--
'For Farces and Physic his equal there scarce is; His Farces are Physic, his Physic a Farce is.'
Horace Walpole (Letters iii. 372), writing on Jan. 3, 1761, said:--'Would you believe, what I know is fact, that Dr. Hill earned fifteen guineas a week by working for wholesale dealers? He was at once employed on six voluminous works of Botany, Husbandry, &c., published weekly.' Churchill in the Rescind thus writes of him:--
'Who could so nobly grace the motley list, Actor, Inspector, Doctor, Botanist? Knows any one so well--sure no one knows-- At once to play, prescribe, compound, compose?'
Churchill's Poems, i. 6. In the Gent. Mag. xxii. 568, it is stated that he had acted pantomime, tragedy and comedy, and had been damned in all.
[107] Mr. Croker quotes Bishop Elrington, who says, 'Dr. Johnson was unjust to Hill, and showed that he did not understand the subject.' Croker's Boswell, p. 186.
[108] D'Israeli (Curiosities of Literature, ed. 1834, i. 201) says that 'Hill, once when he fell sick, owned to a friend that he had over-fatigued himself with writing seven works at once, one of which was on architecture and another on cookery.' D'Israeli adds that Hill contracted to translate a Dutch work on insects for fifty guineas. As he was ignorant of the language, he bargained with another translator for twenty-five guineas. This man, who was equally ignorant, rebargained with a third, who perfectly understood his original, for twelve guineas.
[109] Gibbon (Misc. Works, v. 442), writing on Dec. 20, 1763, of the Journal des Savans, says:--'I can hardly express how much I am delighted with this journal; its characteristics are erudition, precision, and taste.... The father of all the rest, it is still their superior.... There is nothing to be wished for in it but a little more boldness and philosophy; but it is published under the Chancellor's eye.'
[110] Goldsmith, in his Present State of Polite Learning (ch. xi.), published in 1759, says;--'We have two literary reviews in London, with critical newspapers and magazines without number. The compilers of these resemble the commoners of Rome, they are all for levelling property, not by increasing their own, but by diminishing that of others.... The most diminutive son of fame or of famine has his we and his us, his firstlys and his secondlys, as methodical as if bound in cow-hide and closed with clasps of brass. Were these Monthly Reviews and Magazines frothy, pert, or absurd, they might find some pardon, but to be dull and dronish is an encroachment on the prerogative of a folio.'
[111] See post, April 10, 1766.
[112] Mr. White, the Librarian of the Royal Society, has, at my request, kindly examined the records of the Royal Society, but has not been able to discover what the 'circumstance' was. Neither is any light thrown on it by Johnson's reviews of Birch's History of the Royal Society and Philosophical Transactions, vol. xlix. (ante, i. 309), which I have examined.
[113] 'Were you to converse with a King, you ought to be as easy and unembarrassed as with your own valet-de-chambre; but yet every look, word, and action should imply the utmost respect. What would be proper and well-bred with others much your superior, would be absurd and ill-bred with one so very much so.' Chesterfield's Letters, iii. 203.
[114] Imlac thus described to Rasselas his interview with the Great Mogul:--'The emperor asked me many questions concerning my country and my travels; and though I cannot now recollect anything that he uttered above the power of a common man, he dismissed me astonished at his wisdom, and enamoured of his goodness.' Rasselas, chap. ix. Wraxall (Memoirs, edit. of 1884, i. 283) says that Johnson was no judge of a fine gentleman. 'George III,' he adds, 'was altogether destitute of these ornamental and adventitious endowments.' He mentions 'the oscillations of his body, the precipitation of his questions, none of which, it was said, would wait for an answer, and the hurry of his articulation.' Mr. Wheatley, in a note on this passage, quotes the opinion of 'Adams, the American Envoy, who said, the "King is, I really think, the most accomplished courtier in his dominions."'
[115] 'Dr. Warton made me a most obsequious bow.... He is what Dr. Johnson calls a rapturist, and I saw plainly he meant to pour forth much civility into my ears. He is a very communicative, gay, and pleasant converser, and enlivened the whole day by his readiness upon all subjects.' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, ii. 236. It is very likely that he is 'the ingenious writer' mentioned post, 1780, in Mr. Langton's 'Collection,' of whom Johnson said, 'Sir, he is an enthusiast by rule.' Mr. Windham records that Johnson, speaking of Warton's admiration of fine passages, said:--'His taste is amazement' (misprinted amusement). Windham's Diary, p.