CHAP. viii.j THE CLUB AND ITS FIRST MEMBERS.
very interesting to all men. The self-complacent young ir«3.
Scot could hardly have opened it better, than by showing ML 33,
how much his coolness and self-complacency could bear.
He rallied from the shock; and, though he did not open his
mouth again, very widely opened his ears, and showed eager-
ness and admiration unabated.
" Don't be uneasy," said Davies, following him to the
door as he went away : " I can see he likes you very well."*
So emboldened, the " giant's den" itself was daringly
invaded after a few days; and the giant, among other
unusual wrays of showing his benevolence, took to praising
Garrick this time. After that, the fat little pompous figure
now eager to make itself the giant's shadow, might be seen
commonly on the wait for Mm at his various haunts : in
ordinaries at the social dinner hour, or by Temple-bar in
the jovial midnight watches (Johnson's present habit, as he
tells us himself, was to leave Ms chambers at four in the
afternoon, and seldom to return till two in the morning) to
tempt Mm to the Mitre. They supped at that tavern for the
first time on the 25th of June; but Boswell, who tells us
what passed, has failed to tell us at what particular dish it was
of their " good supper," or at what glass of the " two bottles "
of port they disposed of, that Johnson suddenly roared across
the table, " Give me your hand; I have taken a liking to
you." They talked of Goldsmith. He was a somewhat uneasy
subject to Boswell, who could not comprehend how he had
managed to become so great a favourite with so great a man.
For he had published absolutely nothing with Ms name
(Boswell himself had just published " Newmarket, a Tale ");
he was a man that as yet you never heard of, but as " one
" Dr. Goldsmith;" and all who knew Mm seemed to know that
* Soswett, ii. 168.