while
discussing authors with friends Lamb said,--"There is Dr. Johnson: I
have no curiosity; no strange uncertainty about him."

Johnson's restraint in the use of alcoholic drinks is in contrast with
Lamb's indulgence. But Johnson's intemperate tea-drinking makes him
one with Lamb in his struggle with tobacco. In writing to Coleridge
for advice on smoking, Lamb asks: "What do you think of smoking? I
want your sober _average noon opinion_ of it.... May be the truth is,
that _one_ pipe is wholesome, _two_ pipes toothsome, _three_ pipes
noisome, _four_ pipes fulsome, _five_ pipes quarrelsome; and that's
the _sum_ on't. But that is deciding rather upon rhyme than reason."
And Telfourd tells us that when Parr saw Lamb puffing like some
furious enchanter, he asked how he had acquired the power of smoking
at such a rate. Lamb replied, "I toiled after it, sir, as some men
toil after virtue."

VII

THE DEATH OF DR. JOHNSON

By common consent Boswell's _Life of Johnson_ takes first place as a
biography. Some critics go so far as to say that the excellence of the
biography is to be accounted for by the deficiency in the character of
Boswell; that Boswell was such a blind and whole-souled worshiper of
Johnson that he exposed the faults of his subject with the same zeal
with which he published the virtues. This may be true. Whether true or
not, it is not an altogether bad quality. Many of us think that the
biographies of our modern men of letters would have more vivacity and
lifelikeness were they to contain an occasional glimpse of the hero
when he is not on the parade ground. The biography of Tennyson by his
son, Lord Hallam, would be far more convincing had the son given us
occasional pictures of the poet when he was not at his best. But,
perhaps, it is too much to hope that a reverent and admiring son can
give the world a vital, impartial, and comprehensive life of his
father.

Boswell has given us a full account of Johnson's last days. The gruff
old lexicographer had lived a robust life; he had faced many
temptations, and had not always retired from the conflict victorious.
On the whole, however, he had lived an exemplary life, but like many
another good man he had a dread of dying; he feared he might not meet
the last foe as worthily as a man of his character and reputation
should. But this was a groundless fear. For when the last illness was
upon him, he asked his physician to tell him plainly whether there w