In 1784, when Sir Ashton Lever petitioned the House of Commons for a lottery for his museum, Mr. Thomas Waring made the following declaration before the Committee to whom the petition was referred:--“That he had been manager of Sir Ashton’s collection ever since it had been brought to London in the year 1775; that it had occupied twelve years in forming; and that there were upwards of twenty-six thousand articles. That the money received for admission amounted, from February 1775 to February 1784, to about £13,000, out of which £660 had been paid for house-rent and taxes.” Sir Ashton Lever proposed that his whole museum should go together, and that there should be 40,000 tickets at one guinea each.[316] [Illustration: BARTHOLOMEW FAIR] Few people would believe that so lately as this year, the Duke of Dorset, Lord Winchilsea, Lord Talbot, Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Howe, Mr. Damer, Hon. Mr. Lennox, and the Rev. Mr. Williams played at cricket in an open field near White Conduit House.[317] Who could have conjectured that Du Val’s Lane, branching from Holloway, within memory so notoriously infested with highwaymen that few people would venture to peep into it even in mid-day, should, in 1831, be lighted with gas?[318] In 1784, Nathaniel Hillier’s[319] collection of prints was sold by Christie: they were well selected as to impression, but much deteriorated in value by Mr. Hillier’s attachment to strong coffee, with which he had stained them. It has been acknowledged by one of the family that, what with the expense of staining, mounting, and ruling, his collection only brought them one-fifth of the cost of the prints in the first instance. Dr. Samuel Johnson also died this year [1784]; during the time the surgeon was engaged in opening his body, Sir John Hawkins, Knight, was in the adjoining room seeing to the weighing of the Doctor’s tea-pot, in the presence of a silversmith, whom Sir John, as an executor, had called upon to purchase it.[320] 1805. “Mr. Townley presents his compliments to Mr. West, and requests that, when he sees Mr. Lock[321] at his house, he will be so good as to deliver to him the packet sent herewith, containing two prints from Homer’s head,--Mr. T. not knowing where Mr. Lock lives in town. The drawing representing the ‘Triumphs of Bacchus’ by Rubens,[322] in the eighth night’s sale at Greenwood’s, differing much from the bas-relief in the Borghese Villa, from which Caracci is supposed to have composed his picture of that subject in the Farnese Gallery,[323] Mr. T. has no intention to bid for it. “PARK ST., WESTMINSTER, _21st Feb. 1787_.” * * * * *