Fanny Hill - Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure

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"Then Cleland; curious figure," wrote James Boswell in his London diary on October 14, 1769, as he listed somé of the more memorable personages he had encountered during the course of a long and busy day. Addressing himself, an odd Boswellian habit, he recorded that he had "thought how 'twould have struck you somé years ago." Boswells second, and apparently his last, mention of this curious fígure was made on Marcii 31, 1772. "I called on Mr. Garrick," he wrote, "at his house in the Adelphi. I found him like a little minister of state, standing in the middle of a room . . . surrounded with several people, and among them old Cleland, in his youth the author of the Woman of Pleasure, that most licentious and inflaming book, and now the grave and prolix Parlementarian in the newspapers. He is the son of Will Honeycomb of the Spectator. He is a fine sly malcontent. Garrick was talking vainly of his being appointed executor of a clergyman by 'that great man, Lord Camden/ 'Not a very great man/ grumbled Cleland." After which, Boswell, feeling that his host was far too preoccupied to spare him all the attention that he deserved, bade a ceremonious farewell and went his way. John Cleland, at the time, was a man of sixty-three, and the exciting narrative that Boswell remembered was over two decades old. He had been born in 1709, and, although the facts of his parentage are obscure, was probably the son of a certain William Cleland, a Scotsman who had held a modestly profítable public office, which he lost owing to a change of government, had frequented literary circles and been closely acquainted with Alexander Pope. The wríter gave him his picture by Jervas and a copy of his translation of Homer, inscribed: Mr. Cleland, who reads all other books, will please read this from his affectionate friend. . . . John Cleland appears to have been proud of his father, and, in later life, is said to have kept his portrait Vissza