e
printer. If you will come to tea this afternoon we will talk
together about it.[3]

On 30 April he commented further: "Mr. Allen has looked over the
papers and thinks one hundred copies will come to five pounds."
Something, however, made her suspicious of his advice, and on 28 May
there came an end to Johnson's connection with the matter. He wrote:
"I have returned your papers, and am glad that you laid aside the
thought of printing them."

But Miss Reynolds had no intention of permanently giving up her
project. Instead she rewrote parts of the essay which had displeased
her critics, and shortly after Johnson's death proceeded to have 250
copies privately printed, with a dedication to Mrs. Montagu. With
Johnson gone, "The Queen of the Bluestockings" must have appeared the
next best patron. That Mrs. Montagu, while no doubt flattered by the
dedication, was herself not overly enthusiastic about the essay may
be gathered from a letter written to her by Miss Reynolds on 12 July
1785. Miss Reynolds began by insisting that "the slightest hint" of
disapprobation on the part of Mrs. Montagu would "consign the work to
oblivion"; then continued:

I never did entertain any desire to publish it, tho I might
to sell it. And my desire of printing it, originated from a
motive which tho' vain I allow, is an natural vanity I wishd
to leave behind me a respectable memorial of my existence,
which I then flatterd myself this would be. Ten impressions or
twenty at the most, were all I wishd to have taken off. Why I
had so many as 250 was because Dr. Johnson advised me to print
that number, and to sell them, to stand the sale of them was
his expression, but I must do Dr. Johnson the justice to say,
that, that advice was given me with a proviso that no person
was in the secret but himself, for on my informing him to
the contrary, he declined or seemd to decline the affair of
getting them printed for me, which I perceiving sent to him
for the manuscript, foolishly entertaining a slight suspicion
which I much reproach myself for, that some other motives
besides the want of merit in the work had influenced this
change of behaviour. Unluckily from the beginning I made too
great allowance in its favour, from an opinion I had con
too of Dr. Johnsons being strongly prejudiced against womens
literary productions. But I deceived myself. He was sincere,