'No, no,' replied the Master, drily, 'I can hardly persuade
myself that he _split the table_, though I believe he _divided the
Board_.' Will you send me anything better from Oxford than this? for
there must be no more fastidiousness now; no more refusing to laugh
at a good quibble, when you so loudly profess the want of amusement
and the necessity of diversion."
From him to her:
"Oxford, June 17th, 1782.
"Oxford has done, I think, what for the present it can do, and I am
going slyly to take a place in the coach for Wednesday, and you or my
sweet Queeny will fetch me on Thursday, and see what you can make of
me."
Hannah More met him during this visit to Oxford, and writes, June
13th, 1782: "Who do you think is my principal cicerone at Oxford?
only Dr. Johnson! and we do so gallant it about."
Madame D'Arblay, then at Streatham, writes, June 26th, 1782: "Dr.
Johnson, who had been in town some days, returned, and Mr. Crutchley
came also, as well as my father." After describing some lively
conversation, she adds: "I have _very often_, though I mention them
not, long and melancholy discourses with Dr. Johnson, about our dear
deceased master, whom, indeed, he regrets unceasingly; but I love not
to dwell on subjects of sorrow when I can drive them away, especially
to you (her sister), upon this account as you were so much a stranger
to that excellent friend, whom you only lamented for the sake of
those who survived him." He had only returned that very day, and she
had been absent from Streatham, as she states elsewhere, till "the
Cecilian business was arranged," _i.
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