at intervals; and, as we have seen, Johnson, notwithstanding his insensibility to music, had read and appreciated the Musical Tours. Writing Dr. Burney’s Memoirs in extreme old age, his daughter seems to have thought that Johnson had already accompanied her father to Winchester to put his youngest son, Richard, under the care of the then Head Master of that day, Joseph Warton; and that he had also, before this date, interested himself to procure Dr. Burney access to the libraries at Oxford. But her memory must have led her astray, for both these things, as is plain from Boswell, belong to 1778, while Miss Burney’s “first sight” of the great man demonstrably took place on the 20th March, 1777,25 and came about in this wise. Dr. Burney had been invited by Mr. and Mrs. Thrale to give lessons in music to their eldest daughter, Queenie, afterwards Viscountess Keith. Report says that the lessons were not a great success, since Mrs. Thrale was in the habit of interrupting them sadly in order to talk politics and literature with the clever Historian of Music. But, as usual, Dr. Burney speedily became a favourite with all the household; and, as Johnson was then staying at Streatham, one of the results was a joint visit by the Doctor and Mrs. Thrale to St. Martin’s Street, which visit was promptly reported by Fanny for consumption at Chessington. It took place fourteen years before Boswell’s book, and as printed in the Early Diary of 1889, exhibits a fresher version than that put forward later by the writer herself in the Memoirs of her father. No excuse therefore is needed for giving it the preference here.
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1
This was Fanny Burney’s later friend, – the beautiful Mrs. Crewe of Reynolds, and the “Amoret” of Sheridan and Charles Fox.
2
Memoirs of Dr. Burney, 1832, i. 134.
3
Dr. Birkbeck Hill’s Boswell’s Johnson, 1887, i. 420. In a note communicated by Burney in 1799 to the third edition of Boswell’s book, he dates this performance “1769,” when (he says) he resided at Norfolk. But his memory must have deceived him, for according to the Annual Register for 1763, the Burlesque was performed at Ranelagh on June 10 in that year, having been previously published as a pamphlet, which is to be found in the British Museum; and it figures among the new books for June, 1763, in the Gentleman’s Magazine. The point is a trifling one, only important here because the success of the Ode has been advanced as one of the things which decided its composer to leave Lynn for London in 1760.
4
Admiral Burney’s recollections are referred to in Hood’s “Preface” to the separate issue of The Dream of Eugene Aram published in 1831, with William Harvey’s illustrations.
5
Memoirs of Dr. Burney, 1832, ii. 170-1.
6
Crisp’s Virginia was published anonymously by Tonson in 1754 with a dedication to the writer’s friends, the Earl and Countess of Coventry.
7
The Cunning Man (i. e.
1
This was Fanny Burney’s later friend, – the beautiful Mrs. Crewe of Reynolds, and the “Amoret” of Sheridan and Charles Fox.
2
Memoirs of Dr. Burney, 1832, i. 134.
3
Dr. Birkbeck Hill’s Boswell’s Johnson, 1887, i. 420. In a note communicated by Burney in 1799 to the third edition of Boswell’s book, he dates this performance “1769,” when (he says) he resided at Norfolk. But his memory must have deceived him, for according to the Annual Register for 1763, the Burlesque was performed at Ranelagh on June 10 in that year, having been previously published as a pamphlet, which is to be found in the British Museum; and it figures among the new books for June, 1763, in the Gentleman’s Magazine. The point is a trifling one, only important here because the success of the Ode has been advanced as one of the things which decided its composer to leave Lynn for London in 1760.
4
Admiral Burney’s recollections are referred to in Hood’s “Preface” to the separate issue of The Dream of Eugene Aram published in 1831, with William Harvey’s illustrations.
5
Memoirs of Dr. Burney, 1832, ii. 170-1.
6
Crisp’s Virginia was published anonymously by Tonson in 1754 with a dedication to the writer’s friends, the Earl and Countess of Coventry.
7
The Cunning Man (i. e. fortune-teller or soothsayer) was produced at Drury Lane in 1766 when Rousseau came to England, but it was coldly received (Biographia Dramatica, 1812, ii. 145).
8
In Letter lxiv. of Evelina, Miss Burney, applying this locution to Lord Orville, attributes it to Marmontel. The above passage is printed in the “Introduction” to the Diary and Letters, 1892, i. pp. xi-xii.
9
Oxford Journal, 23 June 1769.
10
Dr. Birkbeck Hill (Boswell’s Johnson, 1887, iv. 186 n.) seems, perhaps not unnaturally, to doubt this, as Burney “writes chiefly of music.” But it is confirmed by a passage in the Early Diary, 1889, i. 212. “He [Baretti] told my father that Dr. Johnson.. has read both his Tours with great pleasure, and has pronounced him to be one of the first writers of the age for travels!” Moreover, in the second Tour, the author was less chary of personal anecdote. In Edward FitzGerald’s letters, he draws Carlyle’s attention to some of the very interesting particulars which the second Tour contains concerning Frederick the Great (More Letters of Edward FitzGerald, 1901, p. 67). But Carlyle, who quotes the visit to Voltaire from the first Tour, does not mention the second at all.
11
Lord Macaulay relied upon the fact, mentioned in the Dedication to The Wanderer (p. xxii), that Dr. Burney’s large library only contained one novel, Fielding’s Amelia. But, as Mrs. Ellis pertinently remarks, “Novels were brought into the house if they did not abide in it.”
12
Catherine Hyde was still living in Fanny Burney’s day; and Fanny saw her at Covent Garden Theatre in January, 1773, when Mason’s ElfridaСКАЧАТЬ
<p>25</p>
Early Diary, 1889, ii. 153; Birkbeck Hill’s Johnson’s Letters, 1892, ii. 5, and note.
