Mr. Piozzi, was gone to Brighthelmstone, where she hoped we should meet, for though he had lost his voice, his musical powers were enchanting, and that I should find him a companion likely to lighten the burden of life to me, as he was just a man to my natural taste. This letter is existing now, and that was her expression. Mr. Thrale found his performance on the forte-piano so superior to everything then heard in England, and in short took such a fancy to his society, that we were seldom apart, except while Mr. Piozzi was studying to compose the six fine sonatas, that he dedicated to his favorite pupil, Miss Child, afterwards Lady Westmoreland. His voice strengthened by sea-bathing, but never recovered the astonishing powers he brought with him first from Italy. I fancied they would have returned when we went abroad together four years after, but they never did; and he was contented in future to delight, without surprising, his hearers, unless they had indeed taste enough to understand that unrivalled manner of singing, which he as tenor, and Pacchierotti as soprano, had completely to themselves.

Mr. Piozzi was the son of a gentleman of Brescia in Lombardy, who meant him for the Church and educated him accordingly; but he resisted the celibat, escaped from those who would have made him take the vows, and, as his uncle said, "Ah, Gabrieli, thou wilt never get nearer the altar than the organ-loft," so it proved. He ran from the Venetian state to Milan, where Marchese D'Araciel proved his constant friend and protector, and encouraged him in his fancy for trying Paris and London, instead of being a burden to his parents, who had fourteen children, a limited income, and many pecuniary uneasinesses. Whilst here, his fame reached the Queen of France, who sent for him and Sacchini, the great opera composer, and it was when they came back loaded with presents and honors and emoluments that Dr. Johnson congratulated me on having got Piozzi again. Sacchini returned and died at Paris, but Piozzi staid (till I drove him from me), notwithstanding all the offers of the Court of France, when I was living at Bath, "deserted, spiritless, afflicted, fallen."

DOMESTIC TRIALS.

HER letter written in Passion Week, 1783 ("Letters," Vol. II. p. 253), was in answer to one from Dr. Johnson, dwelling on his own ailments exclusively, and complaining of neglect. He says: "You can hardly think how bad I have been whilst you were in all your altitudes at the opera, and all the fine places, and thinking little of me." She replies: "My health, my children, and my fortune, dear Sir, are fast coming to an end, I think, so my sorrows. Harriet is dead, and Cicely is dying."

Her manuscript commentary on these passages is :

not

"Dear Harriet died of measles, hooping-cough, and strumous swellings in the neck and throat, 1783. Lucy had fallen a sacrifice to the same train of evils; and Cecilia, now Mrs. Mostyn, had her health so shaken after the date of this letter, that it was with the utmost difficulty she recovered. Mr. Piozzi and I had made what we considered as our final parting in London about a month before, when I requested him to tame the newspapers by quitting England, and leave me to endure my debts, my distractions, and the bitter reproaches of my family as I could. He had given up all my letters, promises, &c., into Miss Thrale's hands (now Lady Keith). You laughed when I told you that his expression was: Take it to you your mamma, and make it of her a countess; it shall kill me, I know, but it shall kill her too.' Miss Thrale took the papers, and turned her back on him, I remember. Well! Sir Lucas Pepys alone knew the true state of my heart. He pitied me, kept my secret inviolable, behaved like a brother to me, and told all the inquirers that I was very ill indeed, and that he had advised Bath.

"To Bath I went, and Piozzi prepared for his melancholy journey, having first lent me a thousand pounds, for which I remitted the interest to Italy, and our ladies said I had bought him off with their money; so the calumny outlived even our separation. He had not left London when I was summoned to attend the two little girls at Mrs. Ray's school, Russel House, Streat

ham; but I refused another painful interview, however earnestly my lover begged it. I breakfasted with Sir Lucas Pepys; told him my heroism, and never knew, till Piozzi told me after he returned to England, that he had been sitting at a front window of some public-house on the road all that dreadful Saturday, to see my carriage pass backwards and forwards to where the children resided. O what moments! O what moments! but I went back to Bath. We lived in Russel Street, where I found my three eldest daughters at their work and their drawings. I think they scarcely said,' How d'ye do? or how does Cecilia do?' and we went on together without either rough words or smooth ones. Dr. Staker, to whom Pepys had recommended the care of my health, cut his own throat, and Doctors Woodward (of the pretty house in Gay Street) and Dobson, from Liverpool, were our medical advisers.

"Doctor Johnson never came to look for me at Streatham, where I lodged during Cecy's danger; and I would not go into London for fear of encountering Piozzi's eyes somewhere. So I only stopped at Pepys' house for an hour, close to Hyde Park, and away to Bath again, where one curious thing befell me, and You have heard of many severities shown me, now hear of one man like yourself. My maid came to me halfalarmed, half-pleasant somehow, and said: 'I have had a king's messenger sent to me, Madam; but here's the letter, and the man is gone again. I offered him money, but he had orders to take none.'

but one.

"The letter said: :

"MADAM, Let nothing add to your present pain, as no one surely deserves so much happiness. Your letter is gone safe; I transmitted the amiable contents to Mr. Piozzi, who will receive it in due time; but you should be careful not to send another packet unpaid for, unless you would direct it to me. Your signing no name, and dating, forced me to peruse every word of a letter in three languages, which no one could so have written but Mrs. Thrale, to whom I wish all that such merit and virtue, &c., &c., &c.'

666

"JACKSON,

Comptroller of the Foreign Post Office.'

"He had directed the letter to my maid!

"We left our cards with this gentleman as soon as we were married, of course, and he made us a fine dinner and a grand entertainment, and I saw for the first time my kind friend and admirer, Mr. Jackson. Poor fellow! he soon died, but not till Mr. Piozzi had sung with his daughter, and given him all the pleasure he was capable of receiving in the last stage of life, and a miserable state of health."

SECOND MARRIAGE.

IN Dr. Johnson's last letter to her (ante, p. 76), he says: "Prevail on Mr. Piozzi to settle in England." In reference to this advice she writes:

Dr. Johnson's advice corresponded exactly with Mr. Piozzi's intentions. He was impatient to show Italy to me and me to the Italians, but never meant to forbear bringing his wife home again, and showing he had brought her. Well aware of the bustle his marriage made, it was his most earnest wish that every doubt of his honor and of my happiness should be dispelled; so that whilst our ladies and Madame D'Arblaye, that was Miss Burney, and Baretti, and all the low Italians of the Haymarket who hated my husband, were hatching stories how he had sold my jointure, had shut me up in a convent, &c., we made our journey to our residence in Italy as showy as we possibly could. All the English at every town partook of our hospitality; the inhabitants came flocking, nothing loth, and we sent presents to our beautiful daughters by every hand that would carry them. Miss Thrale was of age by now, and I left Miss Nicholson, the bishop's granddaughter, whom they appeared to like exceedingly, with them, but she soon quitted her post on observing that they gave people to understand she was a cast mistress of dear Piozzi, who never saw her face out of their company, except once at a dinner visit.

But I have not told you our parting. That I resided at Bath, these letters are a proof; that my residence was a wretched one, needs no asserting. Insults at home, and spiteful expressions in every letter from the guardians, broke my spirits quite down; and letters from my grieving lover, when they did come, helped to render my life miserable. I meant not to call him home till all my debts were paid; and my uncle's widow, Lady Salusbury, had threatened to seize upon my Welsh estate if I did not repay her money, lent by Sir Thomas Salusbury to my father; money