Her fugitive pieces, mostly in verse, thrown off from time to time at all periods of her life, are numerous; and the best of them that have been recovered will be included in these volumes.  In a letter to the author of “Piozziana,” she says:—­“When Wilkes and Liberty were at their highest tide, I was bringing or losing children every year; and my studies were confined to my nursery; so, it came into my head one day to send an infant alphabet to the ’St. James Chronicle’:—­

  “’A was an Alderman, factious and proud;
  B was a Bellas that blustered aloud, &c.’

“In a week’s time Dr. Johnson asked me if I knew who wrote it?  ’Why, who did write it, Sir?’ said I.  ‘Steevens,’ was the reply.  Some time after that, years for aught I know, he mentioned to me Steevens’s veracity!  ‘No, no;’ answered H.L.P., anything but that;’ and told my story; showing him by incontestable proofs that it was mine.  Johnson did not utter a word, and we never talked about it any more.  I durst not introduce the subject; but it served to hinder S. from visiting at the house:  I suppose Johnson kept him away.”

It does not appear that Steevens claimed the Alphabet; which may have suggested the celebrated squib that appeared in the “New Whig Guide,” and was popularly attributed to Mr. Croker.  It was headed “The Political Alphabet; or, the Young Member’s A B C,” and begins: 

  “A was an Althorpe, as dull as a hog: 
  B was black Brougham, a surly cur dog: 
  C was a Cochrane, all stripped of his lace.”

What widely different associations are now awakened by these names!  The sting is in the tail: 

  “W was a Warre, ’twixt a wasp and a worm,
  But X Y and Z are not found in this form,
  Unless Moore, Martin, and Creevey be said
  (As the last of mankind) to be X Y and Z.”

Amongst Miss Reynolds’ “Recollections” will be found:—­“On the praises of Mrs. Thrale, he (Johnson) used to dwell with a peculiar delight, a paternal fondness, expressive of conscious exultation in being so intimately acquainted with her.  One day, in speaking of her to Mr. Harris, author of ‘Hermes,’ and expatiating on her various perfections,—­the solidity of her virtues, the brilliancy of her wit, and the strength of her understanding, &c.—­he quoted some lines (a stanza, I believe, but from what author I know not[1]), with which he concluded his most eloquent eulogium, and of these I retained but the two last lines:—­

  ’Virtues—­of such a generous kind,
  Pure in the last recesses of the mind.’”

[Footnote 1:  Dryden’s Translation of Persius.]

The place assigned to Mrs. Thrale by the popular voice amongst the most cultivated and accomplished women of the day, is fixed by some verses printed in the “Morning Herald” of March 12th, 1782, which attracted much attention.  They were commonly attributed to Mr. (afterwards Sir W.W.) Pepys, and Madame d’Arblay, who alludes to them complacently, thought them his; but he subsequently repudiated the authorship, and the editor of her Memoirs believes that they were written by Dr. Burney.  They were provoked by the proneness of the Herald to indulge in complimentary allusions to ladies of the demirep genus: