“Old Thrale, however, as these fine writers call him,—­then a young fellow, and, like his uncle, eminent for personal beauty,—­made himself so useful to Mr. Halsey that the weight of the business fell entirely on him; and while Edmund was canvassing the borough and visiting the viscountess, Ralph Thrale was getting money both for himself and his principal:  who, envious of his success with a wench they both liked but who preferred the young man to the old one, died, leaving him never a guinea, and he bought the brewhouse of Lord and Lady Cobham, making an excellent bargain, with the money he had saved.”

[Footnote 1:  In “Thraliana” she says:  “strolled to London with only 4_s._ 6_d._ in his pocket.”]

When, in the next page but one, Boswell describes Thrale as presenting the character of a plain independent English squire, she writes:  “No, no!  Mr. Thrale’s manners presented the character of a gay man of the town:  like Millamant, in Congreve’s comedy, he abhorred the country and everything in it.”

In “Thraliana” after a corresponding statement, she adds:  “He (the elder Thrale) educated his son and three daughters quite in a high style.  His son he wisely connected with the Cobhams and their relations, Grenvilles, Lyttletons, and Pitts, to whom he lent money, and they lent assistance of every other kind, so that my Mr. Thrale was bred up at Stowe, and Stoke and Oxford, and every genteel place; had been abroad with Lord Westcote, whose expenses old Thrale cheerfully paid, I suppose, who was thus a kind of tutor to the young man, who had not failed to profit by these advantages, and who was, when he came down to Offley to see his father’s birthplace, a very handsome and well accomplished gentleman.”

After expatiating on the advantages of birth, and the presumption of new men in attempting to found a new system of gentility, Boswell proceeds:  “Mr. Thrale had married Miss Hester Lynch Salusbury, of good Welsh extraction, a lady of lively talents, improved by education.  That Johnson’s introduction into Mr. Thrale’s family, which contributed so much to the happiness of his life, was owing to her desire for his conversation, is a very probable and the general supposition; but it is not the truth.  Mr. Murphy, who was intimate with Mr. Thrale, having spoken very highly of Dr. Johnson, he was requested to make them acquainted.  This being mentioned to Johnson, he accepted of an invitation to dinner at Thrale’s, and was so much pleased with his reception both by Mr. and Mrs. Thrale, and they so much pleased with him, that his invitations to their house were more and more frequent, till at last he became one of the family, and an apartment was appropriated to him, both in their house at Southwark and in their villa at Streatham.”

Long before this was written, Boswell had quarrelled with Mrs. Thrale (as it is most convenient to call her till her second marriage), and he takes every opportunity of depreciating her.  He might at least, however, have stated that, instead of sanctioning the “general supposition” as to the introduction, she herself supplied the account of it which he adopts.  In her “Anecdotes” she says: