'Dr. Burney related to Dr. Johnson the partiality which his writings had
excited in a friend of Dr. Burney's, the late Mr. Bewley, well known
in Norfolk by the name of the Philosopher of Massingham: who, from the
Ramblers and Plan of his Dictionary, and long before the authour's
fame was established by the Dictionary itself, or any other work, had
conceived such a reverence for him, that he urgently begged Dr. Burney
to give him the cover of the first letter he had received from him, as
a relick of so estimable a writer. This was in 1755. In 1760, when Dr.
Burney visited Dr. Johnson at the Temple in London, where he had then
chambers, he happened to arrive there before he was up; and being shewn
into the room where he was to breakfast, finding himself alone,
he examined the contents of the apartment, to try whether he could
undiscovered steal anything to send to his friend Bewley, as another
relick of the admirable Dr. Johnson. But finding nothing better to his
purpose, he cut some bristles off his hearth-broom, and enclosed them
in a letter to his country enthusiast, who received them with due
reverence. The Doctor was so sensible of the honour done him by a man
of genius and science, to whom he was an utter stranger, that he said to
Dr. Burney, "Sir, there is no man possessed of the smallest portion of
modesty, but must be flattered with the admiration of such a man. I'll
give him a set of my Lives, if he will do me the honour to accept
of them." In this he kept his word; and Dr. Burney had not only the
pleasure of gratifying his friend with a present more worthy of his
acceptance than the segment from the hearth-broom, but soon after of
introducing him to Dr. Johnson himself in Bolt-court, with whom he had
the satisfaction of conversing a considerable time, not a fortnight
before his death; which happened in St. Martin's-street, during his
visit to Dr. Burney, in the house where the great Sir Isaac Newton had
lived and died before.'