Today was the day of the Sheriff's Ride, a grand Lichfield tradition, in pursuit of which the Sheriff, riding on horseback and followed by a train of other riders – these days including many on bicycles – perambulates the city (in former times county) boundary, in a less hands-on version of 'beating the bounds'. I was up too late, and with too much to do, to see this year's procession, but I am heartily glad the tradition survives: 'How but in custom and ceremony are innocence and beauty born?' (as Yeats put it).
Samuel Johnson's father, Michael, happened to be Sheriff in the year of his son's birth, and led the ceremonial ride – presumably on a sturdy mount, as Michael was built on much the same generous lines as Sam; indeed Mrs Piozzi described him as 'a man of still larger size and greater strength than his son'. After the ride, Johnson recalled, his father 'feasted the citizens with uncommon magnificence'. Michael Johnson was at that point approaching the apogee of his career as bookseller, businessman and widely respected local worthy. Sadly, in the years to come, he declined into genteel poverty, largely as a result of his lax business habits, a falling-off in the book trade, and the expenses of a growing family. Johnson, who spoke little of his parents, recalled that 'My father had much vanity, which his adversity hindered from being fully exerted.' Both his father and his mother are buried in St Michael's church, Lichfield, where a memorial stone in the nave floor carries a long Latin epitaph composed by their son in 1784, the year of his death and of his last visit to Lichfield.
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