Note 1160 — A JOURNEY

Boswell, briefly mentioning the tour which Johnson made to Wales in the year 1774 with Mr. and Mrs. Thrale, says:—'I do not find that he kept any journal or notes of what he saw there' (ante, ii. 285). A journal had been kept however, which in 1816 was edited and published by Mr. Duppa. Mrs. Piozzi, writing in October of that year, says that three years earlier she had been shewn the MS. by a Mr. White, and that it was genuine. 'The gentleman who possessed it seemed shy of letting me read the whole, and did not, as it appeared, like being asked how it came into his hands.' Hayward's Piozzi, ii. 177. According to Mr. Croker (Croker's Boswell, p. 415) 'it was preserved by Johnson's servant, Barber. How it escaped Boswell's research is not known.' A fragment of Johnson's Annals, also preserved by Barber, had in like manner never been seen by Boswell; ante, i. 35, note 1. The editor of these Annals says (Preface, p. v):—'Francis Barber, unwilling that all the MSS. of his illustrious master should be utterly lost, preserved these relicks from the flames. By purchase from Barber's widow they came into the possession of the editor.' It seems likely that Barber was afraid to own what he had done; though as he was the residuary legatee he was safe from all consequences, unless the executors of the will who were to hold the residue of the estate in trust for him had chosen to proceed against him. Mr. Duppa in editing this Journal received assistance from Mrs. Piozzi, 'who,' he says (Preface, p. xi), 'explained many facts which could not otherwise have been understood.' A passage in one of her letters dated Bath, Oct. 11, 1816, shows how unfriendly were the relations between her and her eldest daughter, Johnson's Queeny, who had married Admiral Lord Keith. 'I am sadly afraid,' she writes, 'of Lady K.'s being displeased, and fancying I promoted this publication. Could I have caught her for a quarter-of-an-hour, I should have proved my innocence, and might have shown her Duppa's letter; but she left neither note, card, nor message, and when my servant ran to all the inns in chase of her, he learned that she had left the White Hart at twelve o'clock. Vexatious! but it can't be helped. I hope the pretty little girl my people saw with her will pay her more tender attention.' Three days later she wrote:—'Johnson's Diary is selling rapidly, though the contents are bien maigre, I must confess. Mr. Duppa has politely suppressed some sarcastic expressions about my family, the Cottons, whom we visited at Combermere, and at Lleweney.' Hayward's Piozzi, ii. 176-9. Mr. Croker in 1835 was able to make 'a collation of the original MS., which has supplied many corrections and some omissions in Mr. Duppa's text.' Mr. Croker's text I have generally followed.