“The President and I got to Litchfield about ten o’clock
that night; and the next morning, before my companion was
up, I strolled about the city with one of the waiters, in
search of
Dr. Johnson’s good negro, Frank Barber, who, I had been
told, lived there; but, upon inquiry, I found that his
residence was in a village four or five miles off: I
saw, however, the house where Dr. Johnson was born; and
where his father, ‘an old bookseller,’ died. The house
is stuccoed; has five sash windows in front; and pillars
before it. It is in a broad street, and is the best house
thereabouts, though it is now a grocer’s shop!
“I next went to the Garrick mansion; which has been
repaired, stuccoed, enlarged, and sashed. Peter Garrick,
David’s elder brother, died nearly two years ago, leaving
all his property to the apothecary who had attended him:
but the will was disputed and set aside not long since;
it having been proved at a trial, that the testator
was insane at the time the will was made; so that Mrs.
Doxie, Garrick’s sister, a widow with a numerous family,
recovered the house and £30,000. She now lives in it with
her children, and has been able to set up her carriage.
The inhabitants of Litchfield were so pleased with the
decision of the Court, that they illuminated the streets,
and had public rejoicings on the occasion.
“I next tried to find the abode of Dr. James, inventor
of the admirable fever powder, which so often has saved
the life of our dear Susan, and of others without number;
but the ungrateful Litchfieldites knew nothing about him!
I could find only one old man who remembered or knew
even that he was a native of the town! ‘The man who has
lengthened life’ to be forgotten at his natal place! and
already!
“The Cathedral here is the most complete and beautiful
Gothic building I ever saw. The outside was very ill-used
by the fanatics of the last century; but there are three
perfect spires still standing, and more than fifty
whole-length figures of saints in their original niches.
The choir is exquisitely beautiful. A fine new organ is
erected, and was well played. I never heard the cathedral
service so well performed, to that instrument only,
before. The services and anthems were of middle-aged
music, neither too old and dry, nor too modern and
light; the voices subdued, and exquisitely softened and
sweetened to the building.
“I found here a monument to Garrick; and another just
by it to Johnson. The former put up by Garrick’s widow;
the latter by Johnson’s friends. Both are beautiful, and
alike in every particular of workmanship.”
Note of Dr. Burney’s, in a memorandum book of this year,
1797:
“I beg that my pilgrimage to Litchfield, in 1797, may
somewhere be recorded in my Memoirs, from memorandums made
on the spot, after visiting the house where Dr. Johnson was
born, and his father kept a bookseller’s shop; the house where
Garrick lived, and his elder brother died; and seeking in vain
for the birth-place, or at least residence, of Dr. James.”