ment.

His mother, Sarah Ford, defcended of an ancient race of fubftantial yeomanry in Warwickshire, was the fifter of Dr. Jofeph Ford, a phyfician of confiderable eminence, and father of the famous Cornelius Ford, Chaplain to Lord Chesterfield, fuppofed to be the Parfon in Hogarth's "Modern Midnight Converfation," a man of great parts, but of very profligate manners. She was a woman of diftinguished understanding, prudence, and piety. They were well advanced in years when they married, and had only another child, named Nathaniel, who feems to have fucceeded his father in his bufinefs; but died in 1737, in the 25th year of his

age.

During the period of infancy, all children are prodigies of form and underftanding to their parents. With a natural fondness, they exaggerate every symptom of fenfe into the perfection of wif

dom, and defcribe every feature with an adventitious grace. If the object of their admiration fhould at more mature years become diftinguished for excellence, it is hoped that we may believe wonders of the child, because we have feen greatness in the man, Hence, in our fondness for the marvellous, the traditions of the nurfery, refpecting fuch perfons, are amplified beyond the bounds of credibility, and recited with all the confidence of truth.

Every great genius muft begin with a prodigy; and it is not to be fuppofed that Johnfon fhould be without atteftations of these miracles of early genius, which are believed by fome to be as neceffary to the attainment of future pre-eminence, as that fruits should be preceded by the blossom. Among other stories of his infant precocity generally circulated, and generally believed, we are told by Mrs. Piozzi, and Sir

John Hawkins, that, at the age of three years, he trod by accident upon one of a brood of eleven ducks, and killed it, and upon that occafion made the following verses :

Here lies good master duck,

Whom Samuel Johnson trod on;
If it had liv'd, it had been good luck,
For then we'd had an odd one.

This prodigy is fcarcely exceeded by the bees on Plato's lips, or the doves that covered the infant poet with leaves and flowers; for how fhould a child of three years old make regular verfes, and in alternate rhyme? The internal evidence is fufficient to counterbalance any teftimony that these verfes could be the production of a child of fuch an early age. But, fortunately, credulity is relieved from the burden of doubt, by Johnson's having himself assured Mr. Bofwell, that they were made by his father, who wifhed them to pafs for his

fon's. He added, "my father was a foolish old man, that is to fay, foolish in talking of his children."

He derived from his parents, or from an unwholesome nurse, the diftemper called the King's Evil. Jacobites at that time believed in the efficacy of the royal touch. His mother, yielding to this fuperftitious notion, in her anxiety for his cure, when he was two years old (by the advice of Sir John Floyer, then a phyfician at Litchfield), carried him to London, where he was actually touched by Queen Anne. But the disease, too obftinate to yield to remedies more powerful, greatly disfigured his countenance, naturally harsh and rugged, impaired his hearing, and deprived him of the fight of his left eye.

He was first taught to read English by Dame Oliver, a widow, who kept a school for young children in Litchfield. His next inftructor, in English, was a master whom

he familiarly called Tom Brown, who he faid "published a fpelling-book, and dedicated it to the UNIVERSE." He began to learn Latin in the free-fchool of Litchfield, at firft under the care of Mr. Hawkins, the under-mafter, whom he has defcribed as

a man skilful in his little way." In about two years, he rose to be under the tuition of Mr. Hunter, the head-mafter, a very refpectable teacher, and a worthy man; but who, according to his account, was very fevere, and wrong headedly fevere." He had for his fchool-fellows Dr. James, inventor of the fever-powder, Mr. Lowe, canon of Windfor, Dr. Taylor, rector of Afhbourne, and Mr. Hector, furgeon in Birmingham, with whom he contracted a particular intimacy.

While at fchool, he is faid by Mr. Hector to have been indolent and averfe from ftudy. But the procraftination of his duties feems neither to have prevented the