English: Unfinished proof. The three biographers of Johnson sit under his bust, which frowns down at them from a high rectangular pedestal. Mrs. Thrale (left) and Boswell (right) sit facing each other; she leans back, her head turned in 'profil perdu' towards Johnson (who looks at her); she holds a large open book, the pages headed 'Memoirs \ Life of Dr Johnson'; her pen is in her right hand. Boswell writes busily in an open book on whose left page is depicted a bear on its hind legs, holding a large stick, a chain attached to its muzzle. Between them is a small table at a corner of which Boswell writes. At its farther side, with his back to the bust, sits Courtenay scratching his forehead in perplexity, his elbow supported on a book inscribed 'Joe Miller'. Beneath the design is etched:

'Three Authors in three Sister Kingdoms born,
The Shrine of Johnson with their Works adorn
The first a female Friend with letterd Pride,
Bares those Defects which Friendship ought to hide,
B .... ll to Genius gives a Monsters Air
And shews his Johnson as Men shew a Bear,
C.......y to Merit as to Grammar true,
Blurrs with bad Verse the Worth he never knew
O could the Sage whose Fame employs their Pen
Visit his great Biographers again
His two good Friends would find him d . . . d uncivil
And he would drive the Poet to the Devil' June 1786

Etching