“he had desired me (says Boswell) to change spreads into burns. I thought this alteration not only cured the fault, but was more poetical, as it might carry an allusion to the shirt by which Hercules was inflamed.”  She has written in the margin:  “Every fever burns I believe; but Bozzy could think only on Nessus’ dirty shirt, or Dr. Johnson’s.”  In another marginal note she disclaims that attention to the Doctor’s costume for which Boswell gives her credit, when, after relating how he had been called into a shop by Johnson to assist in the choice of a pair of silver buckles, he adds:  “Probably this alteration in dress had been suggested by Mrs. Thrale, by associating with whom his external appearance was much improved.”  She writes:  “it was suggested by Mr. Thrale, not by his wife.”

In general his wigs were very shabby, and their foreparts were burned away by the near approach of the candle, which his short-sightedness rendered necessary in reading.  At Streatham, Mr. Thrale’s valet had always a better wig ready, with which he met Johnson at the parlour door when dinner was announced, and as he went up stairs to bed, the same man followed him with another.

One of his applications to Cave for a trifling advance of money is signed Impransus (Dinnerless); and he told Boswell that he could fast two days without inconvenience, and had never been hungry but once.  What he meant by hungry is not easy to explain, for his every day manner of eating was that of a half-famished man.  When at table, he was totally absorbed in the business of the moment; his looks were riveted to his plate, till he had satisfied his appetite; which was indulged with such in-* tenseness, that the veins of his forehead swelled, and generally a strong perspiration was visible.  Until he left off drinking fermented liquors altogether, he acted on the maxim “claret for boys, port for men, brandy for heroes.”  He preferred the strongest because he said it did its work (i.e. intoxicate) the soonest.  He used to pour capillaire into his port wine, and melted butter into his chocolate.  His favourite dishes are accurately enumerated by Peter Pindar: 

Madame Piozzi (loquitur).

  “Dear Doctor Johnson loved a leg of pork,
  And hearty on it would his grinders work: 
  He lik’d to eat it so much over done,
  That one might shake the flesh from off the bone. 
  A veal pye too, with sugar crammed and plums,
  Was wondrous grateful to the Doctor’s gums. 
  Though us’d from morn to night on fruit to stuff,
  He vow’d his belly never had enough.”