The concealed author of Lyrick Odes, by Peter Pindar, Esquire, is one Woolcot, a clergyman, who abjured the gown, and now lives in Great Queen Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, under the character of a physician. He is likewise author of a scurrilous epistle lately published, addressed to James Boswell, Esq., March 4th, 1786. He is noted for impudence, lewdness, and almost every species of profligacy.
Dr. Johnson was no admirer of the Duke of Buckingham’s Rehearsal. On a high eulogium being once pronounced upon it in his presence, he said: “It had not wit enough to keep it sweet; it had not sufficient vitality to preserve it from putrefaction.”
Mrs. Thrale has caught something of this story and marred it in the telling, as she has many other of her anecdotes of the Doctor just now published. On the whole, however, the publick is indebted to her for her lively, though very inaccurate and artful, account of Dr. Johnson.
After Pope’s death, Lord Bolingbroke, in consequence of a clause in his will, had the command of his study. Among the sweepings was the following Satire, which was left unfinished by the poet. It fell after Bolingbroke’s death into the hands of a kinsman or friend of his, and has since by some strange accident strayed into Ireland. I saw it there about the year 1774, in the possession of the Rev. Dr.
