He had a very high opinion of Mrs. Clive's
comick powers, and conversed more with her than with any of them. He
said, "Clive, Sir, is a good thing to sit by; she always understands
what you say." And she said of him, "I love to sit by Dr. Johnson; he
always entertains me." One night, when The Recruiting Officer was acted,
he said to Mr. Holland, who had been expressing an apprehension that Dr.
Johnson would disdain the works of Farquhar; "No, Sir, I think Farquhar
a man whose writings have considerable merit."'
'His friend Garrick was so busy in conducting the drama, that they could
not have so much intercourse as Mr. Garrick used to profess an anxious
wish that there should be. There might, indeed, be something in the
contemptuous severity as to the merit of acting, which his old preceptor
nourished in himself, that would mortify Garrick after the great
applause which he received from the audience. For though Johnson said of
him, "Sir, a man who has a nation to admire him every night, may well be
expected to be somewhat elated;" yet he would treat theatrical matters
with a ludicrous slight.
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