Doctor's coming," if she had already thrown him off and
finally broken with him? That she was afraid, and had reason to be
so, is quite consistent with my theory, quite inconsistent with Lord
Macaulay's and the critic's. Johnson's letter (No. 3) is that of a
coarse man who had always been permitted to lecture and dictate with
impunity. Her letter (No. 4) is that of a sensitive woman, who, for
the first time, resents with firmness and retorts with dignity. The
sentences I have printed in italics speak volumes. "Never did I
oppose your will, or control your wish, nor can your unmitigated
severity itself lessen my regard." There is a shade of submissiveness
in her reply, yet, on receiving it, he felt as a falcon might feel if
a partridge were to shew fight. Nothing short of habitual deference
on her part, and unrepressed indulgence of temper on _his_, can
account for or excuse his not writing before this unexpected check as
he wrote after it. If he had not been systematically humoured and
flattered, he would have seen at a glance that he had "no pretence to
resent," and have been ready at once to make the best return in his
power for "that kindness which soothed twenty years of a life
radically wretched." She wrote him a kind and affectionate farewell;
and there (so far as we know) ended their correspondence. But in
"Thraliana" she sets down:

"_Milan, 27th Nov_. 1784.--I have got Dr. Johnson's picture here, and
expect Miss Thrale's with impatience. I do love them dearly, as ill
as they have used me, and always shall. Poor Johnson did not _mean_
to use me ill. He only grew upon indulgence till patience could
endure no further."

In a letter to Mr. S. Lysons from Milan, dated December 7th, 1784,
which proves that she was not frivolously employed, she says:

"My next letter shall talk of the libraries and botanical gardens,
and twenty other clever things here. I wish you a comfortable
Christmas, and a happy beginning of the year 1785. Do not neglect Dr.
Johnson: you will never see any other mortal so wise or so good. I
keep his picture in my chamber, and his works on my chimney."

"Forgiveness to the injured doth belong,
But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong."

What he said of her can only be learned from her bitter enemies or
hollow friends, who have preserved nothing kindly or creditable.

Hawkins states that a letter from Johnson to himself contained these
words:--"Poor Thrale! I thought that either her