St. Martin's St.,
Nov. 14.
... I had a very unpleasant morning after I left you. When the coach
and I had waited upon my father, I made the visit I mentioned to you. O
what a visit!--all that I pre-supposed of attack, inquiry, and acrimony,
was nothing to what passed. Rage more intemperate I have not often
seen; and the shrill voice of feeble old age, screaming with unavailing
passion is horrible. She had long looked upon Mrs. Thrale as a kind of
protege, whom she had fondled as a child, and whose fame, as she grew
into notice, she was always proud to hear of, and help to exalt. She is
a woman (I can well attest!) of most furious passions herself, however
at liberty she thinks she may be to show no sort of mercy to those of
another.
Once, had I been less disturbed, I could have laughed; for she declared
with great vehemence, that if she had suspected “the wretch of any
intention to marry the man, she would have ordered her own postchaise,
and followed her to prevent it!”
Alas, poor Lady F.
She then called upon me, to hear my story; which, most painfully to
myself, I related. She expressed herself very sorry for me, till I came
to an avowal of my letter after the marriage she then flew out into new
choler. “I am amazed you would write to her, Miss Burney! I wonder you
could think of it any more.”
I told her, I had thought myself so much indebted to her patience with
my opposition to all her views and wishes for the whole tine of her long
conflict, that, although I was the first to acknowledge her last action
indefensible, I should be the last to forget all that had made me love
her before it was committed.
This by no means satisfied her, and she poured forth again a torrent of
unrelenting abuse. Some company, at last, came in, and I hastily took
my leave. She called after me to fix some day for a longer visit; but
I pretended not to hear, and ran down stairs, heartily resolving that
necessity alone should ever force me into her presence again.
When I came home--before I could get upstairs--I was summoned to Miss
Streatfield, whom I met with as little pleasure as Lady F., since I had
never seen her, nor indeed anybody, from the time this cruel transaction
has been published. Not that I dreaded her violence, for she is as
gentle as a lamb but there were causes enough for dread of another
nature. However fortunately and unexpectedly, she never named the
subject, but prattled away upon nothing but her own affairs; and so,
methinks, have I done too, and just as if I knew you wished to hear
them. Do you?--I ask only for decency's sake.