Indeed, we must have
often observed how inferiour, how much like a child a man appears, who
speaks a broken tongue. When Sir Joshua Reynolds, at one of the dinners
of the Royal Academy, presented him to a Frenchman of great distinction,
he would not deign to speak French, but talked Latin, though his
Excellency did not understand it, owing, perhaps, to Johnson's English
pronunciation: yet upon another occasion he was observed to speak French
to a Frenchman of high rank, who spoke English; and being asked the
reason, with some expression of surprise,--he answered, 'because I think
my French is as good as his English.' Though Johnson understood French
perfectly, he could not speak it readily, as I have observed at his
first interview with General Pauli, in 1769; yet he wrote it, I imagine,
pretty well.
Here let me not forget a curious anecdote, as related to me by Mr.
Beauclerk, which I shall endeavour to exhibit as well as I can in that
gentleman's lively manner; and in justice to him it is proper to add,
that Dr.
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