intrusted his forebodings to Miss Burney, and declared that Streatham
was lost to him for ever.

At last, in the end of August, the crisis came. Mrs. Thrale's lawsuit
had gone against her. She thought it desirable to go abroad and save
money. It had moreover been "long her dearest wish" to see Italy, with
Piozzi for a guide. The one difficulty (as she says in her journal at
the time), was that it seemed equally hard to part with Johnson or to
take him with her till he had regained strength. At last, however she
took courage to confide to him her plans for travel. To her extreme
annoyance he fully approved of them. He advised her to go; anticipated
her return in two or three years; and told her daughter that he should
not accompany them, even if invited. No behaviour, it may be admitted,
could be more provoking than this unforeseen reasonableness. To nerve
oneself to part with a friend, and to find the friend perfectly ready,
and all your battery of argument thrown away is most vexatious. The poor
man should have begged her to stay with him, or to take him with her; he
should have made the scene which she professed to dread, but which would
have been the best proof of her power. The only conclusion which could
really have satisfied her--though she, in all probability, did not know
it--would have been an outburst which would have justified a rupture,
and allowed her to protest against his tyranny as she now proceeded to
protest against his complacency.

Johnson wished to go to Italy two years later; and his present
willingness to be left was probably caused by a growing sense of the
dangers which threatened their friendship. Mrs. Thrale's anger appears
in her journal. He had never really loved her, she declares; his
affection for her had been interested, though even in her wrath she
admits that he really loved her husband; he cared less for her