'Een Beytie Hollansche'

Dutch Compositions

[p. 28]

13: c. 20 February

Mynheer Johnson, zoo vermaard ter oorzaak van zyn engelsche wordenboek en anderen werken, onder welken is Rasselas, Prins van Abyssinie, dat in het hollansche taal oversetten is, heeft myn een brief uyt Londen geschryft waarin hy veel keurigheyd uytdrug om de wyzen, hoe die Aarmin in die seeven Provincien onderhouden zyn, te kennen.

Als het zall alltyds myn vermaak en hovaerdy wierden Mynheer Johnson te verpligten, Ik heb verscheyden heeren vraagen zoo dat ik moet een reght kennis van dit Zaak hebben.

Ik Vind dat die Wyzen zyn vershillinden in die verschillenden Provincien, en zelfs in die verschillenden Steeden zoodat Ik moet een Boek in folio hebben, zoud Ik zyn alle te schryven denken. Mar ik sall beeter doen. Eeen van die ouderlingen van Het engelsche kerk in deze Staad heeft veel wegen die aarmins zaagen te doenen. Hy heeft myn belooven een vool verhaal daarof. Ik sall het te Mynheer Johnson zenden, zoo dat hy can die regulatien t' Utreght zien en van dezen hy can een bezeffing van die anderen hebben.

Ik verwach dit brief deze week. Het sall in hollansche wierden, mar ik howp dat Ik sall it heel well overzetten in engelsche.

[p. 29]

13: c. 20 February

Mr Johnson, so famous on account of his English Dictionary and other works, including Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia, which has been translated into Dutch,^20. has written me a letter from London,^21. in which he says he would very much like to know how the poor are supported in the Seven Provinces.

As I shall always be pleased and proud to oblige Mr Johnson, I have asked several gentlemen, so that I will have proper knowledge of this matter.

I find that different Provinces, and even different towns, have different ways, so that I would have to take a folio volume were I to write about them all. But I shall do better. One of the elders of the English Church^22. in this city has much to do with the affairs of the poor. He has promised me a full account of them. This I shall send to Mr Johnson, so that he can see the Utrecht regulations, from which he will be able to have some idea of the others.

This letter I expect this week. It will be in Dutch, but I hope that I will be able to translate it into English.

20. Johnson's Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia was translated into Dutch by Egbert Buys and published in Amsterdam by Dirk onder de Linden in 1760. The only known copy of this translation is in the USA (in 1963 in a private collection in New Jersey: see the account by L.F. Powell in the Times Literary Supplement, 20 September 1963, 712).

21. See in Boswell's Life of Johnson, a letter dated 8 December 1763, which ends: ‘It will be a favour if you can get me any books in the Frisick language, and can inquire how the poor are maintained in the Seven Provinces.’ This seems to have triggered off Boswell's French discourse on poverty, the opening of which is given in Boswell in Holland, 156-57. However, Boswell adds in the Life ‘That I am sorry to observe, that neither in my own minutes, nor in my letters to Johnson which have been preserved by him, can I find any information how the poor are maintained in the Seven Provinces.’

22. According to the Yale typescript, ‘probably Dr Louis Tissot, who was a member of the English Church ('members of the English church at Utrecht 1763' in Bapt. reg. Eng. Ref. Ch., Utr. Arch. 434, no p. no.) and director of the Utrecht Dolhuis, or madhouse (J.P.T. van der Lith, Geschiedenis van het Krankzinnigen-Gesticht te Utrecht, 1863, p. 54). He later accompanied JB on visits to the madhouse and the orphanage.’