father. Miss Thrale is a very fine girl, about fourteen years of age,
but cold and reserved, though full of knowledge and intelligence.
"Soon after, Mrs. Thrale took me to the library; she talked a little
while upon common topics, and then, at last, she mentioned 'Evelina.'
"I now prevailed upon Mrs. Thrale to let me amuse myself, and she
went to dress. I then prowled about to choose some book, and I saw,
upon the reading-table, 'Evelina.' I had just fixed upon a new
translation of Cicero's 'Lælius,' when the library door was opened,
and Mr. Seward entered. I instantly put away my book, because I
dreaded being thought studious and affected. He offered his service
to find anything for me, and then, in the same breath, ran on to
speak of the book with which I had myself 'favoured the world!'
"The exact words he began with I cannot recollect, for I was actually
confounded by the attack; and his abrupt manner of letting me know he
was _au fait_ equally astonished and provoked me. How different from
the delicacy of Mr. and Mrs. Thrale!"
A high French authority has laid down that good breeding consists in
rendering to all what is socially their due. This definition is
imperfect. Good breeding is best displayed by putting people at their
ease; and Mrs. Thrale's manner of putting the young authoress at her
ease was the perfection of delicacy and tact.
If Johnson's entrance on the stage had been premeditated, it could
hardly have been more dramatically ordered.
"When we were summoned to dinner, Mrs. Thrale made my father and me
sit on each side of her. I said that I hoped I did not take Dr.
Johnson's place;--for he had not yet appeared.
"'No,' answered Mrs. Thrale, 'he will sit by you, which I am sure
will give him great pleasure.'
"Soon after we were seated, this great man entered. I have so true a
veneration for him, that the very sight of him inspires me with
delight and reverence, notwithstanding the cruel infirmities to which
he is subject; for he has almost perpetual convulsive movements,
either of his hands, lips, feet, or knees, and sometimes of all
together.
"Mrs. Thrale introduced me to him, and he took his place. We had a
noble dinner, and a most elegant dessert. Dr. Johnson, in the middle
of dinner, asked Mrs. Thrale what was in some little pies that were
near him.
"'Mutton,' answered she, 'so I don't ask you to eat any, because I
know you despise it.'
"'No, Madam, no,' cried he: 'I despise nothing that is good of its
sort; but I am too proud now to eat of it. Sitting by Miss Burney
makes me very proud to-day!'
"'Miss Burney,' said Mrs. Thrale, laughing, 'you must take great care
of your heart if Dr. Johnson attacks it; for I assure you he is not
often successless.'
"'What's that you say, Madam?' cried he; 'are you making mischief
between the young lady and me already?'
"A little while after he drank Miss Thrale's health and mine, and
then added:
"'Tis a terrible thing that we cannot wish young ladies well, without
wishing them to become old women.'"
Madame D'Arblay's memoirs are sadly defaced by egotism, and gratified
vanity may have had a good deal to do with her unqualified admiration
of Mrs. Thrale; for "Evelina" (recently published) was the unceasing
topic of exaggerated eulogy during the entire visit. Still so acute
an observer could not be essentially wrong in an account of her
reception, which is in the highest degree favourable to her newly
acquired friend. Of her second visit she says:
"Our journey was charming. The kind Mrs. Thrale would give courage to
the most timid. She did not ask me questions, or catechise me upon
what I knew, or use any means to draw me out, but made it her
business to draw herself out--that is, to start subjects, to support
them herself, and take all the weight of the conversation, as if it
behoved her to find me entertainment. But I am so much in love with
her, that I shall be obliged to run away from the subject, or shall
write of nothing else.
"When we arrived here, Mrs. Thrale showed me my room, which is an
exceeding pleasant one, and then conducted me to the library, there
to divert myself while she dressed.
"Miss Thrale soon joined me: and I begin to like her. Mr. Thrale was
neither well nor in spirits all day. Indeed, he seems not to be a
happy man, though he has every means of happiness in his power. But I
think I have rarely seen a very rich man with a light heart and light
spirits."
The concluding remark, coming from such a source, may supply an
improving subject of meditation or inquiry; if found true, it may
help to suppress envy and promote contentment. Thrale's state of
health, however, accounts for his depression independently of his
wealth, which rested on too precarious a foundation to allow of
unbroken confidence and gaiety.
"At tea (continues the diarist) we all met again, and Dr. Johnson was
gaily sociable. He gave a very droll account of the children of Mr.
Langton--
"'Who,' he said, 'might be very good children if they were let alone;
but the father is never easy when he is not making them do something
which they cannot do; they must repeat a fable, or a speech, or the
Hebrew alphabet; and they might as well count twenty, for what they
know of the matter: however, the father says half, for he prompts
every other word. But he could not have chosen a man who would have
been less entertained by such means.'
"'I believe not!' cried Mrs. Thrale: 'nothing is more ridiculous than
parents cramming their children's nonsense down other people's
throats. I keep mine as much out of the way as I can.'
"'Yours, Madam,' answered he, 'are in nobody's way; no children can
be better managed or less troublesome; but your fault is, a too great
perverseness in not allowing anybody to give them anything. Why
should they not have a cherry, or a gooseberry, as well as bigger
children?'
"Indeed, the freedom with which Dr. Johnson condemns whatever he
disapproves, is astonishing; and the strength of words he uses would,
to most people, be intolerable; but Mrs. Thrale seems to have a
sweetness of disposition that equals all her other excellences, and
far from making a point of vindicating herself, she generally
receives his admonitions with the most respectful silence."
But it must not be supposed that this was done without an effort.
When Boswell speaks of Johnson's "accelerating her pulsation," she
adds, "he checked it often enough, to be sure."
Another of the conversations which occurred during this visit is
characteristic of all parties:
"We had been talking of colours, and of the fantastic names given to
them, and why the palest lilac should be called a _soupir étouffé_.
"'Why, Madam,' said he, with wonderful readiness, 'it is called a
stifled sigh because it is checked in its progress, and only half a
colour.'
"I could not help expressing my amazement at his universal readiness
upon all subjects, and Mrs. Thrale said to him,
"'Sir, Miss Burney wonders at your patience with such stuff; but I
tell her you are used to me, for I believe I torment you with more
foolish questions than anybody else dares do.'
"'No, Madam,' said he, 'you don't torment me;--you teaze me, indeed,
sometimes.'
"'Ay, so I do, Dr. Johnson, and I wonder you bear with my nonsense.'
"'No, Madam, you never talk nonsense; you have as much sense, and
more wit, than any woman I know!'
"'Oh,' cried Mrs. Thrale, blushing, 'it is my turn to go under the
table this morning, Miss Burney!'
"'And yet,' continued the Doctor, with the most comical look, 'I have
known all the wits, from Mrs. Montagu down to Bet Flint!'
"'Bet Flint,' cried Mrs. Thrale; 'pray who is she?'
"'Oh, a fine character, Madam! She was habitually a slut and a
drunkard, and occasionally a thief and a harlot.'
"'And, for heaven's sake, how came you to know her?'
"'Why, Madam, she figured in the literary world, too! Bet Flint wrote
her own life, and called herself Cassandra, and it was in verse. So
Bet brought me her verses to correct; but I gave her a half-a-crown,
and she liked it as well.'
"'And pray what became of her, Sir?'
"'Why, Madam, she stole a quilt from the man of the house, and he had
her taken up: but Bet Flint had a spirit not to be subdued; so when
she found herself obliged to go to jail, she ordered a sedan chair,
and bid her footboy walk before her. However, the boy proved
refractory, for he was ashamed, though his mistress was not.'
"'And did she ever get out of jail again, Sir?'
"'Yes, Madam; when she came to her trial, the judge acquitted her.
"So now," she said to me, "the quilt is my own, and now I'll make a
petticoat of it."[1] Oh, I loved Bet Flint!'
"Bless me, Sir!' cried Mrs. Thrale, 'how can all these vagabonds
contrive to get at _you_, of all people?'
"'Oh the dear creatures!' cried he, laughing heartily, 'I can't but
be glad to see them!'"
[Footnote 1: This story is told by Boswell, roy. 8vo, edit. p. 688.]
Madame D'Arblay's notes (in her Diary) of the conversation and mode
of life at Streatham are full and spirited, and exhibit Johnson in
moods and situations in which he was seldom seen by Boswell. The
adroitness with which he divided his attentions amongst the ladies,
blending approval with instruction, and softening contradiction or
reproof by gallantry, gives plausibility to his otherwise paradoxical
claim to be considered a polite man.[1] He obviously knew how to set
about it, and (theoretically at least) was no mean proficient in that
art of pleasing which attracts
"Rather by deference than compliment,
And wins e'en by a delicate dissent."
[Footnote 1: "When the company were retired, we happened to be
talking of Dr. Barnard, the provost of Eton, who died about that
time; and after a long and just eulogium on his wit, his learning,
and goodness of heart--'He was the only man, too,' says Mr. Johnson,
quite seriously, 'that did justice to my good breeding; and you may
observe that I am well-bred to a degree of needless scrupulosity. No
man,' continued he, not observing the amazement of his hearers, 'no
man is so cautious not to interrupt another; no man thinks it so
necessary to appear attentive when others are speaking; no man so
steadily refuses preference to himself, or so willingly bestows it on
another, as I do; nobody holds so strongly as I do the necessity of
ceremony, and the ill effects which follow the breach of it: yet
people think me rude; but Barnard did me justice.'"--_Anecdotes_. "I
think myself a very polite man,"--_Boswell_. 1778.]
Sir Henry Bulwer (in his "France") says that Louis the Fourteenth was
entitled to be called a man of genius, if only from the delicate
beauty of his compliments. Mrs. Thrale awards the palm of excellence
in the same path to Johnson. "Your compliments, Sir, are made seldom,
but when they are made, they have an elegance unequalled; but then,
when you are angry, who dares make speeches so bitter and so cruel?"
"I am sure," she adds, after a semblance of defence on his part, "I
have had my share of scolding from you." _Johnson_. "It is true, you
have, but you have borne it like an angel, and you have been the
better for it." As the discussion proceeds, he accuses her of often
provoking him to say severe things by unreasonable commendation; a
common mode of acquiring a character for amiability at the expense of
one's intimates, who are made to appear uncharitable by being thus
constantly placed on the depreciating side.
Some years prior to this period (1778) Mrs. Thrale's mind and
character had undergone a succession of the most trying ordeals, and
was tempered and improved, without being hardened, by them. In
allusion to what she suffered in child-bearing, she said later in
life that she had nine times undergone the sentence of a
convict,--confinement with hard labour. Child after child died at the
age when the bereavement is most affecting to a mother. Her husband's
health kept her in a constant state of apprehension for his life, and
his affairs became embarrassed to the very verge of bankruptcy. So
long as they remained prosperous, he insisted on her not meddling
with them in any way, and even required her to keep to her
drawing-room and leave the conduct of their domestic establishment to
the butler and housekeeper. But when (from circumstances detailed in
the "Autobiography") his fortune was seriously endangered, he wisely
and gladly availed himself of her prudence and energy, and was saved
by so doing. I have now before me a collection of autograph letters
from her to Mr. Perkins, then manager and afterwards one of the
proprietors of the brewery, from which it appears that she paid the
most minute attention to the business, besides undertaking the
superintendence of her own hereditary estate in Wales. On September
28, 1773, she writes to Mr. Perkins, who was on a commercial
journey:--
"Mr. Thrale is still upon his little tour; I opened a letter from you
at the counting-house this morning, and am sorry to find you have so
much trouble with Grant and his affairs. How glad I shall be to hear
that matter is settled at all to your satisfaction. His letter and
remittance came while I was there to-day.... Careless, of the 'Blue
Posts,' has turned refractory, and applied to Hoare's people, who
have sent him in their beer. I called on him to-day, however, and by
dint of an unwearied solicitation, (for I kept him at the coach side
a full half-hour) I got his order for six butts more as the final
trial."
Examples of fine ladies pressing tradesmen for their votes with
compromising importunity are far from rare, but it would be difficult
to find a parallel for Johnson's Hetty doing duty as a commercial
traveller. She was simultaneously obliged to anticipate the
electioneering exploits of the Duchess of Devonshire and Mrs. Crewe;
and in after life, having occasion to pass through Southwark, she
expresses her astonishment at no longer recognising a place, every
hole and corner of which she had three times visited as a canvasser.
After the death of Mr. Thrale, a friend of Mr. H. Thornton canvassed
the borough on behalf of that gentleman. He waited on Mrs. Thrale,
who promised her support. She concluded her obliging expressions by
saying:--"I wish your friend success, and I think he will have it: he
may probably come in for two parliaments, but if he tries for a
third, were he an angel from heaven, the people of Southwark would
cry, 'Not _this_ man, but Barabbas.'"[1]
[Footnote 1: Miss Laetitia Matilda Hawkins vouches for this
story.--"Memoir, &c." vol. i. p.66, note, where she adds:--"I have
heard it said, that into whatever company she (Mrs. T.) fell, she
could be the most agreeable person in it."]
On one of her canvassing expeditions, Johnson accompanied her, and a
rough fellow, a hatter by trade, seeing the moralist's hat in a state
of decay, seized it suddenly with one hand, and clapping him on the
back with the other, cried out, "Ah, Master Johnson, this is no time
to be thinking about hats." "No, no, Sir," replied the Doctor, "hats
are of no use now, as you say, except to throw up in the air and
huzzah with;" accompanying his words with the true election halloo.
Thrale had serious thoughts of repaying Johnson's electioneering aid
in kind, by bringing him into Parliament. Sir John Hawkins says that
Thrale had two meetings with the minister (Lord North), who at first
seemed inclined to find Johnson a seat, but eventually
discountenanced the project. Lord Stowell told Mr. Croker that Lord
North did not feel quite sure that Johnson's support might not
sometimes prove rather an incumbrance than a help. "His lordship
perhaps thought, and not unreasonably, that, like the elephant in the
battle, he was quite as likely to trample down his friends as his
foes." Flood doubted whether Johnson, being long used to sententious
brevity and the short flights of conversation, would have succeeded
in the expanded kind of argument required in public speaking. Burke's
opinion was, that if he had come early into Parliament, he would have
been the greatest speaker ever known in it. Upon being told this by
Reynolds, he exclaimed, "I should like to try my hand now." On
Boswell's adding that he wished he _had_, Mrs. Thrale writes:
"Boswell had leisure for curiosity: Ministers had not. Boswell would
have been equally amused by his failure as by his success; but to
Lord North there would have been no joke at all in the experiment
ending untowardly."
He was equally ready with advice and encouragement during the
difficulties connected with the brewery. He was not of opinion with
Aristotle and Parson Adams, that trade is below a philosopher[1]; and
he eagerly buried himself in computing the cost of the malt and the
possible profits on the ale. In October 1772, he writes from
Lichfield:
[Footnote 1: "Trade, answered Adams, is below a philosopher, as
Aristotle proves in his first chapter of 'Politics,' and unnatural,
as it is managed now."--_Joseph Andrews_.]
"Do not suffer little things to disturb you. The brew-house must be
the scene of action, and the subject of speculation. The first
consequence of our late trouble ought to be, an endeavour to brew at
a cheaper rate; an endeavour not violent and transient, but steady
and continual, prosecuted with total contempt of censure or wonder,
and animated by resolution not to stop while more can be done. Unless
this can be done, nothing can help us; and if this be done, we shall
not want help. Surely there is something to be saved; there is to be
saved whatever is the difference between vigilance and neglect,
between parsimony and profusion. The price of malt has risen again.
It is now two pounds eight shillings the quarter. Ale is sold in the
public-houses at sixpence a quart, a price which I never heard of
before."
In November of the same year, from Ashbourne:
"DEAR MADAM,--So many days and never a letter!--_Fugere fides,
pietasque pudorque_. This is Turkish usage. And I have been hoping
and hoping. But you are so glad to have me out of your mind.[1]
"I think you were quite right in your advice about the thousand
pounds, for the payment could not have been delayed long; and a short
delay would have lessened credit, without advancing interest. But in
great matters you are hardly ever mistaken."
[Footnote 1: This tone of playful reproach, when adopted by Johnson
at a later period, has been cited as a proof of actual
ill-treatment.]
In May 17, 1773:
"Why should Mr. T---- suppose, that what I took the liberty of
suggesting was concerted with you? He does not know how much I
revolve his affairs, and how honestly I desire his prosperity. I hope
he has let the hint take some hold of his mind."
In the copy of the printed letters presented by Mrs. Thrale to Sir
James Fellowes, the blank is filled up with the name of Thrale, and
the passage is thus annotated in her handwriting:
"Concerning his (Thrale's) connection with quack chemists, quacks of
all sorts; jumping up in the night to go to Marlbro' Street from
Southwark, after some advertising mountebank, at hazard of his life,"
In "Thraliana":
"18_th July_, 1778.--Mr. Thrale overbrewed himself last winter and
made an artificial scarcity of money in the family which has
extremely lowered his spirits. Mr. Johnson endeavoured last night,
and so did I, to make him promise that he would never more brew a
larger quantity of beer in one winter than 80,000 barrels[1], but my
Master, mad with the noble ambition of emulating Whitbread and
Calvert, two fellows that he despises,--could scarcely be prevailed
on to promise even _this_, that he will not brew more than four score
thousand barrels a year for five years to come. He did promise that
much, however; and so Johnson bade me write it down in the
'Thraliana';--and so the wings of Speculation are clipped a
little--very fain would I have pinioned her, but I had not strength
to perform the operation."
[Footnote 1: "If he got but 2_s._ 6_d._ by each barrel, 80,000 half
crowns are £10,000; and what more would mortal man desire than an
income of ten thousand a year--five to spend, and five to lay up?"]
That Johnson's advice was neither thrown away nor undervalued, may be
inferred from an incident related by Boswell. Mr. Perkins had hung up
in the counting-house a fine proof of the mezzotinto of Dr. Johnson
by Doughty; and when Mrs. Thrale asked him, somewhat flippantly, "Why
do you put him up in the counting-house?" Mr. Perkins answered,
"Because, Madam, I wish to have one wise man there." "Sir," said
Johnson, "I thank you. It is a very handsome compliment, and I
believe you speak sincerely."
He was in the habit of paying the most minute attention to every
branch of domestic economy, and his suggestions are invariably marked
by shrewdness and good sense. Thus when Mrs. Thrale was giving
evening parties, he told her that though few people might be hungry
after a late dinner, she should always have a good supply of cakes
and sweetmeats on a side table, and that some cold meat and a bottle
of wine would often be found acceptable. Notwithstanding the
imperfection of his eyesight, and his own slovenliness, he was a
critical observer of dress and demeanour, and found fault without
ceremony or compunction when any of his canons of taste or propriety
were infringed. Several amusing examples are enumerated by Mrs.
Thrale:
"I commended a young lady for her beauty and pretty behaviour one
day, however, to whom I thought no objections could have been made.
'I saw her,' said Dr. Johnson, 'take a pair of scissors in her left
hand though; and for all her father is now become a nobleman, and as
you say excessively rich, I should, were I a youth of quality ten
years hence, hesitate between a girl so neglected, and a _negro_.'
"It was indeed astonishing how he _could_ remark such minuteness with
a sight so miserably imperfect; but no accidental position of a
riband escaped him, so nice was his observation, and so rigorous his
demands of propriety. When I went with him to Litchfield, and came
downstairs to breakfast at the inn, my dress did not please him, and
he made me alter it entirely before he would stir a step with us
about the town, saying most satirical things concerning the
appearance I made in a riding-habit; and adding, ''Tis very strange
that such eyes as yours cannot discern propriety of dress: if I had a
sight only half as good, I think I should see to the centre.'
"Another lady, whose accomplishments he never denied, came to our
house one day covered with diamonds, feathers, &c., and he did not
seem inclined to chat with her as usual. I asked him why? when the
company was gone. 'Why, her head looked so like that of a woman who
shows puppets,' said he, 'and her voice so confirmed the fancy, that
I could not bear her to-day; when she wears a large cap, I can talk
to her.'
"When the ladies wore lace trimmings to their clothes, he expressed
his contempt of the reigning fashion in these terms: 'A Brussels
trimming is like bread-sauce,' said he, 'it takes away the glow of
colour from the gown, and gives you nothing instead of it; but sauce
was invented to heighten the flavour of our food, and trimming is an
ornament to the manteau, or it is nothing. Learn,' said he, 'that
there is propriety or impropriety in every thing how slight soever,
and get at the general principles of dress and of behaviour; if you
then transgress them, you will at least know that they are not
observed.'"
Madame D'Arblay confirms this account. He had just been finding fault
with a bandeau worn by Lady Lade, a very large woman, standing six
feet high without her shoes:
"_Dr. J._--The truth is, women, take them in general, have no idea of
grace. Fashion is all they think of. I don't mean Mrs. Thrale and
Miss Burney, when I talk of women!--they are goddesses!--and
therefore I except them.
"_Mrs. Thrale._--Lady Lade never wore the bandeau, and said she never
would, because it is unbecoming.
"_Dr. J. (laughing.)_--Did not she? then is Lady Lade a charming
woman, and I have yet hopes of entering into engagements with her!
"_Mrs. T._--Well, as to that I can't say; but to be sure, the only
similitude I have yet discovered in you, is in size: there you agree
mighty well.