Johnson drank Mrs. Thrale's tea. That he was as old as he
had the credit of being, I have the evidence of my own senses (and I
am seldom mistaken in a person's age), of his own family, and his own
word; and it is incredible that so old a person, and one so
apparently near the grave, would deceive about his age.
The testimony of the very aged is always to be received without
question, as Alexander Hamilton once learned. He was trying a
land-title with Aaron Burr, and two of the witnesses upon whom Burr
relied were venerable Dutchmen, who had, in their youth, carried the
surveying chains over the land in dispute, and who were now aged
respectively one hundred and four years and one hundred and six
years. Hamilton gently attempted to undervalue their testimony, but
he was instantly put down by the Dutch justice, who suggested that
Mr. Hamilton could not be aware of the age of the witnesses.
My old man (the expression seems familiar and inelegant) had indeed
an exaggerated idea of his own age, and sometimes said that he
supposed he was going on four hundred, which was true enough, in
fact; but for the exact date, he referred to his youngest son,--a
frisky and humorsome lad of eighty years, who had received us at the
gate, and whom we had at first mistaken for the veteran, his father.
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