The Diary and Collected Letters of Madame D'Arblay, Frances Burney. Frances Burney
Amiss!—what a Word! Oh that I had been present to have answered it! My father stayed, I suppose, half an hour, and then was coming away. He again took his hand, and encouraged him to come again to him; and when he was taking leave, said—“Tell Fanny to pray for me!”
Ah! dear Dr. Johnson! might I but have your prayers! After which, still grasping his hand, he made a prayer for himself,—the most fervent, pious, humble, eloquent, and touching, my father says, that ever was composed. Oh, would I had heard it! He ended it with Amen! in which my father joined, and was echoed by all present. And again, when my father was leaving him, he brightened up, something of his arch look returned, and he said—“I think I shall throw the ball at Fanny yet!”
Little more passed ere my father came away, decided, most tenderly, not to tell me this till our party was done.
This most earnestly increased my desire to see him; this kind and frequent mention of me melted me into double sorrow and regret. I would give the world I had but gone to him that day! It was, however, impossible, and the day was over before I knew he had said what I look upon as a call to me. This morning,154 after church time, I went. Frank155 said he was very ill, and saw nobody; I told him I had understood by my father the day before that he meant to see me. He then let me in. I went into his room up stairs; he was in his bedroom. I saw it crowded, and ran hastily down. Frank told me his master had refused seeing even Mr. Langton. I told him merely to say I had called, but by no means to press my admission. His own feelings were all that should be consulted; his tenderness, I knew, would be equal, whether he was able to see me or not.
I went into the parlour, preferring being alone in the cold, to any company with a fire. Here I waited long, here and upon the stairs, which I ascended and descended to meet again with Frank, and make inquiries; but I met him not. At last, upon Dr. Johnson’s ringing his bell, I saw Frank enter his room, and Mr. Langton follow. “Who’s that?” I heard him say; they answered, “Mr. Langton,” and I found he did not return.
Soon after, all the rest went away but a Mrs. Davis, a good sort of woman, whom this truly charitable soul had sent for to take a dinner at his house. I then went and waited with her by the fire; it was, however, between three and four o’clock before I got any answer. Mr. Langton then came himself. He could not look at me, and I turned away from him. Mrs. Davis asked how the doctor was? “Going on to death very fast!” was his mournful answer. “Has he taken,” said she, “anything?” “Nothing at all! We carried him some bread and milk—he refused it, and said—‘The less the better.’” She asked more questions, by which I found his faculties were perfect, his mind composed, and his dissolution was quick drawing on. . . .
I could not immediately go on, and it is now long since I have written at all; but I will go back to this afflicting theme, which I can now better bear.
Mr. Langton was, I believe, a quarter of an hour in the room before I suspected he meant to speak to me, never looking near me. At last he said—
“This poor man, I understand, ma’am, desired yesterday to see you.”
“My understanding that, sir, brought me here today.”
“Poor man! it is a pity he did not know himself better, and that you should have had this trouble.”
“Trouble!” cried I; “I would have come a hundred times to see him the hundredth and first!”
“He hopes, now, you will excuse him; he is very sorry not to see you; but he desired me to come and speak to you myself, and tell you he hopes you will excuse him, for he feels himself too weak for such an interview.”
I hastily got up, left him my most affectionate respects, and every good wish I could half utter, and ran back to the coach. Ah, my Susy! I have never been to Bolt-court since! I then drove to poor Miss Strange,156 to make inquiries of the maid but Andrew ran out to the coach door, and told me all hope was at an end. In short, the next day was fatal to both!—the same day!
December 20.—This day was the ever-honoured, ever-lamented Dr. Johnson committed to the earth. Oh, how sad a day to me! My father attended, and so did Charles.157 I could not keep my eyes dry all day; nor can I now, in the recollecting it; but let me pass over what to mourn is now so vain!
December 30.—In the evening I went to Mrs. Chapone. I was late, on account of the coach, and all her party was assembled. This was the first time I had seen any of them, except Mrs. Ord, since last spring. I was received with the utmost kindness by them all, but chiefly by Mrs. Chapone herself, who has really, I believe, a sincere regard for me. I had talk with all of them, except Mrs. Levison, with whom I have merely a courtesying acquaintance. But I was very sad within; the loss of dear Dr. Johnson—the flight of Mrs. Thrale, the death of poor Miss Kitty Cambridge, and of poor, good Miss Strange,—all these home and bosom strokes, which had all struck me since my last meeting this society, were revolving in my mind the whole time I stayed.
Sir Lucas Pepys talked to me a great deal of Mrs. Thrale, and read me a letter from her, which seems to shew her gay and happy. I hope it shews not false colours. No one else named her——but poor Dr. Johnson was discussed repeatedly. How melancholy will all these circumstances render these once so pleasant meetings.
122 “Memoirs of Dr. Burney,” vol. ii. p. 110.
123 The physician, afterwards Sir Lucas Pepys.
124 A character in “Cecilia.”
125 The master of the ceremonies.
126 Philip Metcalf, elected member of Parliament for Horsham, together with Mr. Crutchley, in 1784.
127 Miss Burney had seen this gentleman a few days previously and thus speaks of him in her “Diary.”—“Mr. Kaye of the Dragoons,—a baronet’s son, and a very tall, handsome, and agreeable-looking young man; and, is the folks say, it is he for whom all the belles here are sighing. I was glad to see he seemed quite free from the nonchalance, impertinence of the times.”
128 Afterwards Countess of Cork and Orrery.
129 The Thrales and Fanny were now again in London, whither they returned from Brighton, November 20. Mrs. Thrale had taken a house in Argyle-street,
130 Lady Margaret Cavendish Harley, daughter of Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford; married, in 1734, to the second Duke of Portland, She inherited from her father a taste for literature. She was the constant associate of Mrs. Delaney, and an old friend of Mr. Crisp. Of Mrs. Delany we shall give some account hereafter
131 Mrs. Greville’s maiden name was Frances Macartney.
132 The miserly guardian of Cecilia, in Fanny’s novel. Among the “Fragments of the journal of Charlotte Anne Burney,” appended to the “Early Diary,” occurs the following passage, written at the end of 1782. “Fanny’s Cecilia came out last summer, and is as much liked and read I believe as any book ever was. She had 250 pounds for it from Payne and Cadell. Most people say she ought to have had a thousand. It is now going into the third edition, though Payne owns that they printed 2,000 at the first edition, and Lowndes told me five hundred was the common number for a novel.” (“Early Diary,” vol. ii. P. 307.)
133 Richard Burke, the only son of the great Edmund. He died in 1794, before his father.
134 Sir Joshua Reynolds was then in his sixtieth year; he was born in 1723.
135 She copied pictures cleverly and painted portraits.
136 Probably the Hon. Thomas Erskine, afterwards Lord Chancellor.
137 Richard Owen Cambridge, a gentleman admired for his wit in conversation, and esteemed as an author. “He wrote a burlesque poem called ‘The Scribleriad,’ and was a principal contributor to the periodical paper called ‘The World.’” He died in 1802, at his villa on the banks of the Thames, near Twickenham, aged eighty-five years.