, I never now shall know, for he
never expressed himself as an offended man to me, except one day when
he was not shaved at the proper hour forsooth, and then I would not
quarrel with him, because nobody was by, and I knew him be so vile a
lyar that I durst not trust his tongue with a dispute. He is gone,
however, loaded with little presents from me, and with a large share
too of my good opinion, though I most sincerely rejoice in his
departure, and hope we shall never meet more but by chance.

"Since our quarrel I had occasion to talk of him with Tom Davies, who
spoke with horror of his ferocious temper; 'and yet,' says I, 'there
is great sensibility about Baretti: I have seen tears often stand in
his eyes.' 'Indeed,' replies Davies, 'I should like to have seen that
sight vastly, when--even butchers weep.'"

[Footnote 1: In "The Streatham Portraits." (See Vol. II.)]

His intractable character appears from his own account of the
rupture:

"When Madam took it into her head to give herself airs, and treat me
with some coldness and superciliousness, I did not hesitate to set
down at breakfast my dish of tea not half drank, go for my hat and
stick that lay in the corner of the room, turn my back to the house
_insalutato hospite_, and walk away to London without uttering a
syllable, fully resolved never to see her again, as was the case
during no less than four years; nor had she and I ever met again as
friends if she and her husband had not chanced upon me after that
lapse of time at the house of a gentleman near Beckenham, and coaxed
me into a reconciliation, which, as almost all reconciliations prove,
was not very sincere on her side or mine; so that there was a total
end of it on Mr. Thrale's demise, which happened about three years
after."[1]

[Footnote 1: The European Magazine, 1788.]

The monotony of a constant residence at Streatham was varied by trips
to Bath or Brighton; and it was so much a matter of course for
Johnson to make one of the party, that when (1776), not expecting him
so soon back from a journey with Boswell, the Thrale family and
Baretti started for Bath without him, Boswell is disposed to treat
their departure without the lexicographer as a slight:

"This was not showing the attention which might have been expected to
the 'guide, philosopher, and friend;' the _Imlac_ who had hastened
from the country to console a distressed mother, who he understood
was very anxious for his return. They had,