Burke, in his Retaliation, another person's name stood
in the couplet where Mr. Townshend is now introduced:--
'Though fraught with all learning kept straining his throat,
To persuade Tommy Townshend to lend him a vote.'
It may be worth remarking, among the minutiae of my collection, that
Johnson was once drawn to serve in the militia, the Trained Bands of the
City of London, and that Mr. Rackstrow, of the Museum in Fleet-street,
was his Colonel. It may be believed he did not serve in person; but the
idea, with all its circumstances, is certainly laughable. He upon that
occasion provided himself with a musket, and with a sword and belt,
which I have seen hanging in his closet.
An authour of most anxious and restless vanity being mentioned, 'Sir,
(said he,) there is not a young sapling upon Parnassus more severely
blown about by every wind of criticism than that poor fellow.'
The difference, he observed, between a well-bred and an ill-bred man is
this: 'One immediately attracts your liking, the other your aversion.
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