As time went on, there awakened in Madam Piozzi a longing for the larger life of Streatham, and her husband, always anxious to accomplish her wishes, decided that she should return to the scene of her former triumphs; but Dr. Johnson, the keystone of her social arch, was gone, and there was no one to take his place. Her husband was a cultured gentleman, but he was not to the English manner born.
The attempt was made, however, and on the seventh anniversary of their wedding day Streatham was thrown open. Seventy people sat down to dinner, the house and grounds were illuminated, and the villagers were made welcome. A thousand people thronged through the estate. One might have supposed that a young lord had come into his own.
It was a brave effort, but it was soon seen to be unavailing. A man’s fame may be like a shuttle-cock, having constantly to be struck to prevent its falling; but not a woman’s. She had lost caste by her marriage. It was not forgotten that her husband was “a foreigner,” that he had been a “fiddler”; while his wife had been the object of too much ridicule, the subject of too many lampoons.
But the lady had resources within herself; she was an inveterate reader and she had tasted the joys of authorship. She now published a volume of travels and busied herself with several other works, the very names of which are forgotten except by the curious in such matters.
While she was thus engaged a bitter and scandalous attack was made upon her by Baretti. Now, Baretti was a liar, and in proof of her good sense and forgiving disposition, I offer in evidence the entry that she made in her journal when she heard of his death. “Baretti is dead. Poor Baretti!... he died as he lived, less like a Christian than a philosopher, leaving no debts (but those of gratitude) undischarged and expressing neither regret for the past nor fear for the future.... A wit rather than a scholar, strong in his prejudices, haughty in spirit, cruel in anger. He is dead! So is my enmity.”
On another occasion she contrived to quiet a hostile critic who had ridiculed her in verse; much damage may be done by a couplet, as she well knew, and the lines,—
See Thrale’s grey widow with a satchel roam
And bring in pomp laborious nothings home,—
were not nice, however true they might be. Madam Piozzi determined to take him in hand. She contrived at the house of a friend to get herself placed opposite to him at a supper-table, and after observing his perplexity with amusement for a time, she raised her wine-glass to him and proposed the toast, “Good fellowship for the future.” The critic was glad to avail himself of the dainty means of escape from an awkward situation.
However, it was evident that life at Streatham could not be continued on the old scale. Funds were not as plentiful as in the days of the great brewmaster; so after a few years, when her husband suggested their retiring to her native Wales, she was glad to fall in with the idea. A charming site was selected, and a villa built in the Italian style after her husband’s design. It was called “Brynbella,” meaning beautiful brow; half Welsh and half Italian, like its owners. I fancy their lives were happier here than they had been elsewhere, for they built upon their own foundation. Piozzi had his piano and his violin, and the lady busied herself with her books; while the monotony of existence was pleasantly broken by occasional visits to Bath, where they had many friends.
And during these years, letters and notes, comment and criticism, dropped from her pen like leaves from a tree in autumn. She lived over again in memory her life in London, reading industriously, and busy in the pleasant and largely profitless way which tends to make days pass into months and months into years and leave no trace of their passing. She must always have had a pen in her hand: it goes without saying that she had kept a diary; in those days everyone did, and most had less than she to record. It was Dr. Johnson who suggested that she get a little book and write in it all the anecdotes she might hear, observations she might make, or verse that might otherwise be lost. These instructions were followed literally, but no little book sufficed. She filled many large quarto volumes, six of which, entitled “Thraliana,” passed through the London auction rooms in 1908, bringing £2050. One volume, which perhaps does not belong to the series, but which in every way accords with Dr. Johnson’s suggestion, formed part of the late A. M. Broadley’s collection until, at his death, it passed with several other items, into that of the writer.