Page:An Essay on the Life and Genius of Samuel Johnson.djvu/141

 " own imagination." He added, "that he never wrote any part of his work with equal velocity." "Three columns of the magazine in an hour," he said, "was no uncommon effort; which was faster than most persons could have transcribed that quantity. In one day, in particular, and that not a very long one, he wrote twelve pages, more in quantity than ever he wrote at any other time, except in the Life of Savage, of which forty-eight pages, in octavo, were the production of one long day, including a part of the night."

In the course of the conversation, he asked whether any of the family of Faden, the printer, were living. Being told that the geographer, near Charing Cross, was Faden's son, he said, after a short pause, "I borrowed a guinea of his father near thirty years ago; be so good as to take this, and pay it for me."

Wishing to discharge every duty, and every obligation, Johnson recollected another debt of ten pounds, which he had borrowed from his friend, Mr. Hamilton, the printer, about twenty years before. He sent the money to Mr. milton