time that the painter ever worked in oils. He was, moreover, able to draw on the reminiscences of his old friend, Mr. Arthur Hughes, who, though not one of the Pre-Raphaelite Brothers, lived in great intimacy with them. A considerable portion of these letters had already appeared under his editing in four papers contributed to the Atlantic Monthly during the preceding year. In 1898 he published nothing, with the exception of a small selection from the letters of Johnson and Lord Chesterfield, which formed a volume in a series entitled Eighteenth Century Letters under the general editorship of Mr. Brimley Johnson. For some time, however, he had been engaged in preparing a series of unpublished letters written by Swift to Knightley Chetwode between 1714 and 1731. The book appeared in 1899. The knowledge gained in the editing of these letters doubtless did much to prepare the way for the view which he takes of the Dean's character in his notes to Johnson's life of Swift. In 1899 two articles by him, Boswell's Proof Sheets1 and The Boswell Centenary, were included in a collection of papers on Dr. Johnson written by members of the Johnson Club, and published in book form under the title of Johnson Club Papers by Various Hands. Since Birkbeck Hill had been a member of the Johnson Club, serving as Prior in 1891 and 1892, the meetings at the Cheshire Cheese and elsewhere were a source of much pleasure to him; he especially enjoyed the visits he made to Lichfield, Bath, Ashbourne, Stratford, or other places associated with Johnson, in company with the members of the Club. In 1900 his last work was published-an edition of Gibbon's Autobiography under the title of The Memoirs of the Life of Edward Gibbon, a title found by him in Gibbon's handwriting on the manuscript of the various sketches of the Autobiography now preserved in the British Museum. In this edition one of his chief aims was to throw light on Gibbon's character from his own writings and correspondence. For the text he made use of both the first and the second editions of Lord Sheffield's version Respect for Mr. Murray's copyright checked emendations; but, as is the case with all Birkbeck Hill's work, the Memoirs are enriched with copious footnotes and appendices. During the last three years of his life he gave his time and Boswell's Proof Sheets first appeared in the Atlantic Monthly. 2 Founded Dec. 13, 1884. strength to completing the edition of Johnson's Lives of the Poets. His own increasing ill health and that of his wife often compelled him to lay the work aside; but after every check he resolutely returned to his labours, with the result that on his death the work was almost ready for the printer's hands. A few additions and some research, rendered comparatively easy by the precision with which he worked and the good order in which his papers were kept, were alone needed. In the spring of 1902 the health of his wife, which had been for some years previously the cause of much anxiety to him, began rapidly to fail. She was a woman of marked intellectual ability, and, with the aid of her rare forethought, courage, and firmness of character, he had weathered many of the troubles of life. It was a source of comfort to him, during the brief span of life left, that his own failing strength had permitted him to tend and watch over her till the last. She died in their pleasant little country home at Aspley Guise on Oct. 30, 1902. The blow fell heavily on Birkbeck Hill. Yet it was hoped that there were, in spite of his own infirmities, some years of quiet work before him. It was not to be. Hardly four months did he survive her. He died at Hampstead, in his daughter's home, on Feb. 27, 1903, at the age of sixty-seven. BIBLIOGRAPHY Dr. Johnson: His Friends and His Critics. London, 1878. Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica, edited with a Preface, Introduction, and Notes. London, 1879. The Life of Sir Rowland Hill and the History of Penny Postage, by Sir Rowland Hill and his nephew, George Birkbeck Hill, 2 vols. London, 1880. Colonel Gordon in Central Africa, 1874-9. From original Letters and Documents. Edited by George Birkbeck Hill. London, 1881. Second edition, 1884. Boswell's Life of Johnson, including Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides and Johnson's Diary of a Journey into North Wales, edited by George Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L., Pembroke College, Oxford. 6 vols. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1887. Johnson: History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia, edited with Introduction and Notes by George Birkbeck Hill. Clarendon Press Series. Oxford, 1887. Goldsmith: The Traveller, edited with Introduction and Notes. Clarendon Press Series. Oxford, 1888. Letters of David Hume to William Strahan, now first edited with Notes, Index, &c. By G. Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L., Pembroke College. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1888. Wit and Wisdom of Samuel Johnson, selected and arranged by George Birkbeck Hill. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1888. Footsteps of Dr. Johnson (Scotland), by George Birkbeck Hill, with Illustrations by Lancelot Speed. London, 1890. Lord Chesterfield's Worldly Wisdom. Selections from his Letters and Characters, arranged and edited by George Birkbeck Hill. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1891. Letters of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., collected and edited by George Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L., Pembroke College, Oxford. 2 vols. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1892. Writers and Readers. London, 1892. Harvard College by an Oxonian. New York and London, 1894. Talks about Autographs. Boston and New York, 1896. Johnsonian Miscellanies, arranged and edited by George Birkbeck Hill, D.C.L., LL.D., Honorary Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford. 2 vols. Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1897. Letters of Dante Gabriel Rossetti to William Allingham, 1854-70. London, 1897. Included in Johnson Eighteenth Century Letters. Johnson: Lord Chesterfield. London, 1898. Contributed articles and reviews to the following magazines and newspapers:-Macmillan, Cornhill, Contemporary, Atlantic Monthly, Times, Saturday Review, Pall Mall Gazette, and Speaker. THE AUTHOR'S ADVERTISEMENT TO THE THIRD EDITION' HE Booksellers having determined to publish a Body of English Poetry I was persuaded to promise them In the first edition (PREFACES BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL TO THE WORKS OF THE ENGLISH POETS. BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. London. 1779-81, 12mo. Io vols.) the advertisement is dated March 15, 1779. 2 [Mr. Edward Dilly, the bookseller, writing to Boswell on Sept. 26, 1777, gives the following account of 'this plan so happily conceived' in the early part of that year-'The first cause that gave rise to this undertaking, I believe, was owing to the little trifling edition of The Poets, printing by the Martins, at Edinburgh, and to be sold by Bell, in London. Upon examining the volumes which were printed, the type was found so extremely small, that many persons could not read them; not only this inconvenience attended it, but the inaccuracy of the press was very conspicuous. These reasons, as well as the idea of an invasion of what we call our Literary Property, induced the London Booksellers to print an elegant and accurate edition of all the English Poets of reputation, from Chaucer to the present time. 'Accordingly a select number of the most respectable booksellers met on the occasion; and, on consulting together, agreed that all the proprietors of copy-right in the various Poets should be summoned together; and when their opinions were given, to proceed immediately on the business. Accordingly a meeting was held, consisting of about forty of the most respectable booksellers of London, when it was agreed that an elegant and uniform edition of The English Poets should be immediately printed, with a concise account of the life of each authour, by Dr. Samuel Johnson; and that three persons should be deputed to wait upon Dr. Johnson, to solicit him to undertake the Lives, viz., T. Davies, Strahan, and Cadell. The Doctor very politely undertook it, and seemed exceedingly pleased with the proposal. As to the terms, it was left entirely to the Doctor to name his own: he mentioned two hundred guineas it was immediately agreed to; and a farther compliment, I believe, will be made him. A committee was likewise appointed to engage the best engravers, viz., Bartolozzi, Sherwin, Hall, etc. Likewise another committee for giving directions about the paper, printing, etc., so that the whole will be conducted with spirit, and in the best manner, with respect to authourship, editorship, engravings, etc., etc. My brother will give you a list of the Poets we mean to give, many of which are within the time of the Act of Queen Anne, which Martin and Bell cannot give, as they have no property in them; the proprietors are almost all the booksellers in London, of consequence.' Boswell's Life of Johnson, ed. by G. Birkbeck Hill, iii. 110. Johnson had bargained for two hundred guineas, and the book |