Edward Cave,
under the name of SYLVANUS URBAN, had attracted the notice and esteem of
Johnson, in an eminent degree, before he came to London as an adventurer
in literature. He told me, that when he first saw St. John's Gate, the
place where that deservedly popular miscellany was originally printed,
he 'beheld it with reverence.'
It appears that he was now enlisted by Mr. Cave as a regular coadjutor
in his magazine, by which he probably obtained a tolerable livelihood.
At what time, or by what means, he had acquired a competent knowledge
both of French and Italian, I do not know; but he was so well skilled in
them, as to be sufficiently qualified for a translator. That part of his
labour which consisted in emendation and improvement of the productions
of other contributors, like that employed in levelling ground, can be
perceived only by those who had an opportunity of comparing the original
with the altered copy. What we certainly know to have been done by him
in this way, was the Debates in both houses of Parliament, under the
name of 'The Senate of Lilliput,' sometimes with feigned denominations
of the several speakers, sometimes with denominations formed of the
letters of their real names, in the manner of what is called anagram, so
that they might easily be decyphered.
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