[234] Gibbon was always careful, if not elaborate, in his dress.
George Colman the younger, in his _Random Records_ (1830), vol.
i. pp. 121, 122, describes his meeting as a boy with Gibbon and
Johnson:--
"On the day I first sat down with Johnson, in his rusty brown,
and his black worsteads, Gibbon was placed opposite to me in a
suit of flower'd velvet, with a bag and sword." The "costume," he
adds in a note, "was not extraordinary at this time, (a little
overcharged, perhaps, if his _person_ be considered,) when
almost every gentleman came to dinner in full dress." "Each," he
continues, "had his measured phraseology; and Johnson's famous
parallel, between Dryden and Pope, might be loosely parodied, in
reference to himself and Gibbon. Johnson's style was grand, and
Gibbon's elegant; the stateliness of the former was sometimes
pedantick, and the polish of the latter was occasionally finical.
Johnson march'd to kettle-drums and trumpets; Gibbon moved to
flutes and hautboys; Johnson hew'd passages through the Alps,
while Gibbon levell'd walks through parks and gardens. Maul'd as
I had been by Johnson, Gibbon pour'd balm upon my bruises, by
condescending, once or twice, in the course of the evening, to
talk with me; the great historian was light and playful, suiting
his matter to the capacity of the boy;--but it was done _more
suá_ (sic); still his mannerism prevail'd;--still he tapp'd his
snuff-box,--still he smirk'd, and smiled; and rounded his periods
with the same air of good-breeding, as if he were conversing with
men.--His mouth, mellifluous as Plato's, was a round hole, nearly
in the centre of his visage."
[235] Word erased.
196.
_To his Stepmother._
Bentinck Street, April 23rd, 1774.