miles off!’ ’Well, well,’ returns she, ’hurry him back, or I myself will send him an express.’  At these words I revived, and have been mending ever since.  This was the first time that any of us had named the name of Piozzi to each other since we had put our feet into the coach to come to Bath.  I had always thought it a point of civility and prudence never to mention what could give nothing but offence, and cause nothing but disgust, while they desired nothing less than a revival of old uneasiness; so we were all silent on the subject, and Miss Thrale thought him dead.”

According to the Autobiography, the daughters did not conclusively relent till the end of April or the beginning of May, when a missive was dispatched for Piozzi, and Mrs. Thrale went to London to make the requisite preparations.

  Mrs. Thrale to Miss F. Burney.

  “Mortimer Street, Cavendish Square,
  “Tuesday Night, May, 1784.

“I am come, dearest Burney.  It is neither dream nor fiction; though I love you dearly, or I would not have come.  Absence and distance do nothing towards wearing out real affection; so you shall always find it in your true and tender H.L.T.

“I am somewhat shaken bodily, but ’tis the mental shocks that have made me unable to bear the corporeal ones.  ’Tis past ten o’clock, however, and I must lay myself down with the sweet expectation of seeing my charming friend in the morning to breakfast.  I love Dr. Burney too well to fear him, and he loves me too well to say a word which should make me love him less.”

Journal (Madame D’Arblay’s) Resumed.

“May 17.—­Let me now, my Susy, acquaint you a little more connectedly than I have done of late how I have gone on.  The rest of that week I devoted almost wholly to sweet Mrs. Thrale, whose society was truly the most delightful of cordials to me, however, at times mixed with bitters the least palatable.

“One day I dined with Mrs. Grarrick to meet Dr. Johnson, Mrs. Carter, Miss Hamilton, and Dr. and Miss Cadogan; and one evening I went to Mrs. Vesey, to meet almost everybody,—­the Bishop of St. Asaph, and all the Shipleys, Bishop Chester and Mrs. Porteous, Mrs. and Miss Ord, Sir Joshua Reynolds and Miss Palmer, Mrs. Buller, all the Burrows, Mr. Walpole, Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs. Grarrick, and Miss More, and some others.  But all the rest of my time I gave wholly to dear Mrs. Thrale, who lodged in Mortimer Street, and who saw nobody else.  Were I not sensible of her goodness, and full of incurable affection for her, should I not be a monster?

* * * * *

“I parted most reluctantly with my dear Mrs. Thrale, whom, when or how, I shall see again, Heaven only knows! but in sorrow we parted—­on my side in real affliction.”