Page:Johnsonian Miscellanies II.djvu/277

 Sir Joshua, I have often thought, never exhibited i a more striking proof of his excellence in portrait-Painting, than in giving Dignity to Dr. Goldsmith's countenance, and yet pre serving a strong likeness 1. For on the contrary his Aspect from head to foot impress'd every one at first sight with an idea of his being a low mechanic; particularly, I believe, a journeyman tailor 2. A little concurring instance of this I well remember. One Day at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, in company with some gentlemen and Ladies, he was relating how he had been insulted by some gentlemen he had accidently met (I think at a Coffee- House). l The fellow,' he said 'took me for a tailor!' on which all the Party either laugh'd aloud or shew'd they suppress'd a laugh 3.

This little anecdote of Goldsmith is similar to that which Mr. Boswell relates of Johnson's having told him that a gentle- v woman had offer'd him a shilling for handing her across a street. But I thought it not a little surprising that he should add, ' No person would have believed this, if Johnson had not said it himself 4 .'

Dr. Johnson seem'd to have much more kindness for Gold-

1 C. R. Leslie points out 'that the 3 In one of Miss Reynolds's manu- ideal drapery of this portrait and the scripts the story is introduced as view of the face almost exactly corre- follows : ' Dr. Goldsmith was indeed spond to the painter's treatment of very ugly, he had a vulgar mean his very early portrait of his own aspect, more the look of a journey- father.' Leslie and Taylor's Reynolds, man taylor from head to foot than i. 361. any man I ever saw, which created


 * I remember Miss Reynolds said a faugh throughout a pretty large

of this portrait that it was a very company of gentlemen and ladies, on

great likeness of the Doctor, but the his saying he had been insulted,' &c. most nattered picture she ever knew 4 Miss Reynolds misunderstood

her brother to have painted.' North- Boswell, who wrote : ' This, if told

cote's Reynolds, i. 326. by most people, would have been

2 * His person was short, his coun- thought an invention ; when told by tenance coarse and vulgar, his deport- Johnson, it was believed by his friends ment that of a scholar awkwardly as much as if they had seen what affecting the easy gentleman.' Life, passed. 3 Life, ii. 434. Boswell was i. 413. 'His face,' says Dr. Percy, thinking of the improbability of such < was marked with strong lines of a thing happening to any one. The thinking. His first appearance was gentlewoman, it must be remembered, not captivating.' Goldsmith's Misc. < wa s somewhat in liquor.'

Works, i. 117.

smith,

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