To your friendly accusation I am glad I can plead not guilty with a
safe conscience. Dodsley told me in the Spring that the plates from
Mr. Bentley's designs were worn out, and he wanted to have them copied
and reduced to a smaller scale for a new edition. I dissuaded him from
so silly an expense, and desired he would put in no ornaments at all.
The "Long Story" was to be totally omitted, as its only use (that of
explaining the prints) was gone: but to supply the place of it in
bulk, lest my works should be mistaken for the works of a flea, or a
pismire, I promised to send him an equal weight of poetry or prose:
so, since my return hither, I put up about two ounces of stuff, viz.,
the "Fatal Sisters," the "Descent of Odin" (of both which you have
copies), a bit of something from the Welch, and certain little Notes,
partly from justice (to acknowledge the debt where I had borrowed
anything), partly from ill temper, just to tell the gentle reader that
Edward I was not Oliver Cromwell, nor Queen Elizabeth the Witch of
Endor. This is literally all; and with all this, I shall be but a
shrimp of an author. I gave leave also to print the same thing at
Glasgow; but I doubt my packet has miscarried, for I hear nothing of
its arrival as yet.
To what you say to me so civilly, that I ought to write more, I reply
in your own words (like the Pamphleteer, who is going to confute you
out of your own mouth), What has one to do when turned of fifty, but
really to think of finishing? However, I will be candid (for you seem
to be so with me), and avow to you, that till four-score-and-ten,
whenever the humor takes me, I will write, because I like it; and
because I like myself better when I do so. If I do not write much, it
is because I can not. As you have not this last plea, I see no reason
why you should not continue as long as it is agreeable to yourself,
and to all such as have any curiosity or judgment in the subject you
choose to treat. By the way let me tell you (while it is fresh) that
Lord Sandwich, who was lately dining at Cambridge, speaking (as I am
told) handsomely of your book, said, it was pity you did not know that
his cousin Manchester had a genealogy of Kings, which came down no
lower than to Richard III, and at the end of it were two portraits of
Richard and his son, in which that king appeared to be a handsome man.
I tell you it as I heard it; perhaps you may think it worth inquiring
into....
Mr. Boswell's book[40] I was going to recommend to you, when I
received your letter: it has pleased and moved me strangely, all (I
mean) that relates to Paoli. He is a man born two thousand years after
his time! The pamphlet proves what I have always maintained, that any
fool may write a most valuable book by chance, if he will only tell us
what he heard and saw with veracity. Of Mr. Boswell's truth I have not
the least suspicion, because I am sure he could invent nothing of this
kind. The true title of this part of his work is, a Dialogue between a
Green-Goose and a Hero.