Shalum, the Visit to the Exchange, and the Visit to the Abbey,
are known to everybody. But many men and women, even of highly
cultivated minds, are unacquainted with Squire Bluster and Mrs
Busy, Quisquilius and Venustulus, the Allegory of Wit and
Learning, the Chronicle of the Revolutions of a Garret, and the
sad fate of Aningait and Ajut.

The last Rambler was written in a sad and gloomy hour. Mrs
Johnson had been given over by the physicians. Three days later
she died. She left her husband almost broken-hearted. Many
people had been surprised to see a man of his genius and learning
stooping to every drudgery, and denying himself almost every
comfort, for the purpose of supplying a silly, affected old woman
with superfluities, which she accepted with but little gratitude.
But all his affection had been concentrated on her. He had
neither brother nor sister, neither son nor daughter. To him she
was beautiful as the Gunnings, and witty as Lady Mary. Her
opinion of his writings was more important to him than the voice
of the pit of Drury Lane Theatre or the judgment of the Monthly
Review. The chief support which had sustained him through the
most arduous labour of his life was the hope that she would enjoy
the fame and the profit which he anticipated from his Dictionary.
She was gone; and in that vast labyrinth of streets, peopled by
eight hundred thousand human beings, he was alone. Yet it was
necessary for him to set himself, as he expressed it, doggedly to
work. After three more laborious years, the Dictionary was at
length complete.

It had been generally supposed that this great work would be
dedicated to the eloquent and accomplished nobleman to whom the