ither, indeed, has a
man of any extent of thinking for a mere verse-maker, in whose numbers,
however perfect, there is no poetry, no mind. The china was beautiful,
but Dr. Johnson justly observed it was too dear; for that he could have
vessels of silver, of the same size, as cheap as what were here made of
porcelain.

I felt a pleasure in walking about Derby such as I always have in
walking about any town to which I am not accustomed. There is an
immediate sensation of novelty; and one speculates on the way in which
life is passed in it, which, although there is a sameness every where
upon the whole, is yet minutely diversified. The minute diversities in
every thing are wonderful. Talking of shaving the other night at Dr.
Taylor's, Dr. Johnson said, 'Sir, of a thousand shavers, two do not
shave so much alike as not to be distinguished.' I thought this
not possible, till he specified so many of the varieties in
shaving;--holding the razor more or less perpendicular;--drawing long
or short strokes;--beginning at the upper part of the face, or the
under;--at the right side or the left side. Indeed, when one considers
what variety of sounds can be uttered by the windpipe, in the compass
of a very small aperture, we may be convinced how many degrees of
difference there may be in the application of a razor.

We dined with Dr. Butter, whose lady is daughter of my cousin Sir John
Douglas, whose grandson is now presumptive heir of the noble family of
Queensberry. Johnson and he had a good deal of medical conversation.
Johnson said, he had somewhere or other given an account of Dr.
Nichols's discourse De Animia Medica. He told us 'that whatever a man's
distemper was, Dr. Nichols would not attend him as a physician, if his
mind was not at ease; for he believed that no medicines would have any
influence. He once attended a man in trade, upon whom he found none
of the medicines he prescribed had any effect: he asked the man's wife
privately whether his affairs were not in a bad way? She said no. He
continued his attendance some time, still without success. At length the
man's wife told him, she had discovered that her husband's affairs WERE
in a bad way. When Goldsmith was dying, Dr. Turton said to him, "Your
pulse is in greater disorder than it should be, from the degree of fever
which you have: is your mind at ease?" Goldsmith answered it was not.'

Dr. Johnson told us at tea, that when some of Dr. Dodd's pious friends
were try