278 Recollections of Dr. Johnson
(swarming x , I think, was the phrase) the largest there. ' Why, I can swarm it now,' replied Dr. Johnson, which excited a hearty laugh (he was then, I believe, between fifty and sixty) ; on which he ran to the tree, clung round the trunk, and ascended to the branches, and, I believe, would have gone in amongst them, had he not been very earnestly entreated to descend ; and down he came with a triumphant air, seeming to make nothing of it.
At another time, at a gentleman's seat in Devonshire, as he and some company were sitting in a saloon, before which was a spacious lawn, it was remarked as a very proper place for running a Race. A young lady present boasted that she could outrun any person ; on which Dr. Johnson rose up and said, ' Madam, you cannot outrun me ; ' and, going out on the Lawn, they started. The lady at first had the advantage ; but Dr. John son happening to have slippers on much too small for his feet, kick'd them off up into the air, and ran a great length without them, leaving the lady far behind him, and, having won the victory, he returned, leading Her by the hand, with looks of high exultation and delight 2 .
It was at this place where the lady of the House before a large company at Dinner address'd herself to him with a very audible voice, ' Pray, Dr. Johnson, what made you say in your Dictionary that the Pastern of a Horse was the knee of an \sic\ Horse 3 ? J
- Ignorance, madam, ignorance,' answered Johnson. And I was
told that at another time at the same table, when the lady was pressing him to eat something 4 , he rose up with his knife in his hand, and loudly exclaim'd, ' I vow to God I cannot eat a bit more,' to the great terror, it was said, of all the company. I did not doubt of the gentleman's veracity who related this. But I was rather surprised at this expression from Johnson ; for never
1 Swarming, in this sense, is not This blunder is the stranger as in in Johnson's Dictionary. Miss Rey- Bailey's Dictionary, which he had nolds in one of her manuscripts writes before him when writing his own, warming. pastern is correctly defined.
2 From Paris he wrote : ' I ran 4 Bos well records in his Tour : a race in the rain this day, and beat ' I must take some merit from my Baretti.' Life, ii. 386. See Letters, contriving that he shall not be asked ii. 363, n. I, for his race with his friend twice to eat or drink anything (which Payne. always disgusts him).' Life, v. 264.
3 Ante, i. 182 n. ; Life, i. 293, 378. See ante, ii. 184 n.
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