The particulars of this
confederation, and of its triumphant success, are amusingly told by
Cumberland in his memoirs.
"We were not over-sanguine of success, but perfectly determined to struggle
hard for our author. We accordingly assembled our strength at the
Shakespeare Tavern, in a considerable body, for an early dinner, where
Samuel Johnson took the chair at the head of a long table, and was the life
and soul of the corps: the poet took post silently by his side, with the
Burkes, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Fitzherbert, Caleb Whitefoord, and a phalanx
of North British, predetermined applauders, under the banner of Major
Mills, all good men and true. Our illustrious president was in inimitable
glee; and poor Goldsmith that day took all his raillery as patiently and
complacently as my friend Boswell would have done any day or every day of
his life. In the meantime, we did not forget our duty; and though we had a
better comedy going, in which Johnson was chief actor, we betook ourselves
in good time to our separate and allotted posts, and waited the awful
drawing up of the curtain. As our stations were preconcerted, so were our
signals for plaudits arranged and determined upon in a manner that gave
every one his cue where to look for them, and how to follow them up.
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