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 28 Extracts from James Boswell's Letters

country; where he thinks that I might be able to save so as gradually to relieve myself. But, alas ! I should be absolutely miserable. In the mean time, such are my projects and sanguine expectations, that you know I purchased an estate which was given long ago to a younger son of our family, and came to be sold last autumn, and paid for it 25007. i$ool. of which I borrow upon itself by a mortgage. But the remaining iooo/. I cannot conceive a possibility of raising, but by the mode of annuity ; which is, I believe, a very heavy disadvantage. I own it was imprudent in me to make a clear purchase at a time I was sadly straitened ; but if I had missed the opportunity, it never again would have occurred, and I should have been vexed to see an ancient appanage, a piece of, as it were, the flesh and blood of the family, in the hands of a stranger. And now that I have made the purchase, I should feel myself quite despicable should I give it up.

f In this situation, then, my dear Sir, would it not be wise in me to accept of iooo guineas for my Life of Johnson, supposing the person who made the offer should now stand to it, which I fear may not be the case ; for two volumes may be considered as a disadvantageous circumstance ? Could I indeed raise iooo/. ' upon the credit of the work, I should incline to game, as Sir Joshua says x ; because it may produce double the money, though Steevens kindly tells me that I have over-printed, and that the curiosity about Johnson is now only in our own circle 2. Pray decide for me ; and if, as I suppose, you are for my taking the offer, inform me with whom I am to treat. In my present state of spirits, I am all timidity. Your absence has been a severe stroke to me. I am at present quite at a loss what to do. Last week they gave me six sheets 3. I have now before me in proof p. 456 4 : yet I have above 100 pages of my copy remaining, besides his death, which is yet to be written,

1 Perhaps gamble, a word not in 2 For Steevens's malignancy see

Johnson's Dictionary (where gam- Life, iii. 281.

bier, though given, is called ' a cant 3 48 pages, as the first edition was

word '), was in common use, and in quarto.

Reynolds was singular in sticking to 4 Vol. iii. p. 223 of my edition, an old-fashioned word.

and

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