Johnson had his faithful servant, Frank: Mr. Pickwick his Sam. The two sages equally revelled in travelling in post-chaises and staying at inns; both made friends with people in the coaches and commercial rooms. There are also some odd accidental coincidences which help in the likeness. Johnson was constantly in the Borough, and we have a good scene with Mr. Pickwick at the White Hart in the same place. Mr. Pickwick had his widow, Mrs. Bardell; and Johnson his in the person of the fair Thrale. Johnson had his friend Taylor at Ashbourne, to whom he often went on visits, always going down by coach; while Mr. Pickwick had his friend Wardle, with whom he stayed at Manor Farm, in Kent. We know of the review at Rochester which Mr. Pickwick and friends attended, and how they were charged by the soldiery. Oddly enough Dr. Johnson attended a review also at Rochester, when he was on a visit to his friend Captain Langton. Johnson, again, found his way to Bath, went to the Assembly Rooms, etc.; and our friend Mr. Pickwick, we need not say, also enjoyed himself there. In Boswell's record we have a character called Mudge, an "out of the way" name; and in Pickwick we find a Mudge. George Steevens, who figures so much in Boswell's work, was the author of an antiquarian hoax played off on a learned brother, of the same class as "Bill Stumps, his mark." He had an old inscription engraved on an unused bit of pewter--it was well begrimed and well battered, then exposed for sale in a broker's shop, where it was greedily purchased by the credulous virtuoso. The notion, by the way, of the Club button was taken from the Prince Regent, who had his Club and uniform, which he allowed favourites to wear. There is a story in Boswell's Biography which is transferred to "Pickwick," that of the unlucky gentleman who died from a surfeit of crumpets; Sam, it will be recollected, describes it as a case of the man "as killed hisself on principle."