again at his own house in Clarges-street, this H—— T——’s antecedents,
which of course I did not learn until long after. To begin with, he
was a friend of L——’s, which comprises every other infamy,—and to show
himself worthy of so being, he had been dismissed from some Hospital,
to which he was surgeon. Not only the stipulated four days, but nine,
had elapsed, without my hearing from Mr. T—— the result of the note he
had made me write. I then wrote to him to enquire the reason of this?
His reply did not even allude to the subject, but was a rigmarole
about the weather; as if he had been writing to an idiot, who did not
require a rational answer to any question they had asked. So I again
wrote to say—that having been so grossly outraged I was not going to be
insulted and fooled by him, and that if he did not send me a definite
and explicit reply to the note I had written at his urgent request
before the following Tuesday, or the following Wednesday, I should call
at his house, and according to the answer I then received, should know
how to act. Now my plan was, that in case of again being fooled by these
wretches, to take two of Sir LIAR’S infamous letters with me, which he
has denied upon oath; the one, a threat before the publication of my
first book, saying, “_he would ruin me if I published that, or any other
book_”—the other a letter he had written me after one of his tigerish
onslaughts, in which he had frightfully bitten my cheek, in which he
says, “You have been to me perfection as a wife, I have eternally
disgraced myself, I shall go abroad, change a name which is odious to
me,—take £200 a year, and leave you all the rest.” Fancy that selfish,
pompous Sybarite, profligate brute, on £200 a year! But saying is _one_
thing and doing another, as his friend DIZZY and my Lord DERBY know.
By these letters I was determined to seek the only redress left to me
that could not in the _onset_ be tampered with, that of a common woman;
by going to a London Police office, letting the Magistrate read them,
and stating my Lord DERBY’S _creditable_ Colonial Secretary’s recent
persecutions, which statement he could not prevent being taken down by
the reporters, and appearing in all the next day’s papers. This was my
plan, in case that loathsome ruffian, Sir L——, was insane enough not
to accede to the ridiculously moderate and lenient terms I had offered
him, after his life-long, dastardly, and fiendish rascality. Well, on
the Tuesday evening, having heard nothing further from T——, Mrs. CLARK
and I set off for London. With my usual good fortune, the Great Western,
and all the neighbouring Hotels, were full, and we could only get rooms
at a horrid dirty hole, opposite the Marble-arch, where we arrived at 8
in the morning. After washing, dressing, and breakfasting, we set off
for C—— street, getting out at the corner of Piccadilly, and telling
the brougham to wait there; and as St. James’s clock was striking 12 on
Wednesday, 22nd of June, 1858—for GOD knows I never can forget the day!—I
knocked at Mr. H—— T——’s door. We were shown up into the drawing-room.
Presently the fellow came to us—holding out _both_ his hands (which, of
course, I did not see, but retained mine to hold my parasol;) saying he
was delighted to see me (no doubt), and hoped I was come to dine with
him!!! “Mr. T——,” said I, “I have neither come to dine with you nor to be
fooled by you. I come to know what you have done with that note, which
you so entreated me to write, proposing terms to Sir EDWARD L——.” “That
note! that note!—let me see,” said he, tapping his forehead, as if he had
to go back into the night of ages to find out _what_ note I alluded to.
And after this piece of by-play—he said, suddenly, “Oh! oh! that note you
wrote at Taunton. I gave it to L——.” I now knew what to expect. “But
you had better, in his interest, communicate with Sir EDWARD L——, and
tell him I _must_ have a definite answer one way or the other, for which
I shall call at six o’clock this evening. Good morning.” I then went to
call upon Miss R——, and she asked to come with me, to be present when I
returned to T——’s; and fortunately I gave her Sir LIAR’S two infamous
letters to take care of, lest I, in my agitation, should drop or mislay
them. At six, she, Mrs. CLARKE, and I, again drove to the corner of C——
street, and there got out. As we did so, I observed an impudent-looking,
snub-nosed man, who was walking up and down, and stared at me in the
most impudent and determined manner, as if he had been watching for
us, as afterwards turned out to be the case. We were again shown up
into the drawing-room at T——’s, but _this_ time the folding-doors were
closed between the two rooms, and we heard the murmuring of low voices
in the back room. After being kept waiting more than half an hour, I
rang the bell and told the servant to say, “That if I could not see Mr.
T——, I must go.” The wretch then soon after made his appearance, saying
he had been detained by patients; and soon after him stalked into the
room a tall, raw-boned, hay-coloured-hair Scotchman, who I subsequently
learned was an apothecary of the name of R——, keeping a druggist’s shop
in Fenchurch-street (another friend of L——’s, of course, and the second
with T——, who signed the certificate of my insanity!—he never having
seen me, or I him before, and I never having once spoken to him!). This
fellow, like all the other employees, began talking of—quite _a propos
de bottes_—Sir LIAR’S extraordinary cleverness! Whereupon, Miss R——,
in a passion, took his cheek-biting letter out of her pocket, and read
it to him, adding, “Perhaps you” think this brutality another proof of
his cleverness?” “Evidently a man of great sensibility!!” said the lean
apothecary when she had finished. I could not stand this, and finding I
was to get no answer about the letter from T——, I said to Miss R—— and
Mrs. CLARKE, “Come, don’t let us waste any more time in being fooled and
insulted here, we’ll go.” Easier said than done, for upon reaching the
hall we found it literally filled with two mad Doctors, that fellow, his
assistant, the impudent snub-nosed man who had stared so when I got out
of the brougham—two women keepers, one a great Flanders mare of six feet
high, the other a moderate-sized, and nice-looking woman, and a very
idiotic-looking footman of T——’s, with his head against the hall door, to
bar egress, and who seemed to have acquired as an _amateur_ that horrible
Mad Doctor’s trick of rolling his head and never looking _at_ any one,
but over _their_ heads, as if he saw some strange phantasmagoria in the
air above them; and which that fellow had to such a degree, that I am
_certain_ any nervous or weak-minded person would, from sheer physical
irritation, have been driven mad _really_ in a very short time; and no
doubt that is what it is done for. Seeing this blockade, I exclaimed,
“What a set of blackguards;” to which Mr. H——, wagging his head, and
phantom-hunting over mine, with his pale, poached egg-unspeculative
eyes—said, “I beg you’ll speak like a lady—Lady L——.” “I am treated so
like one, that I certainly ought,” I replied. Hearing a loud talking in
the dining-room, into which Mrs. C—— had been summoned by T——, I walked
into it, in time to hear her very energetically saying, “I wont,” to some
proposition they were making to her, and seeing a side door that led
into a back room again, I looked in, and there saw that precious brace
of scoundrels, Sir LIAR, COWARD, SWINDLER himself, and “that sublime of
rascals, his Attorney—listening! for the dastardly brute always fights
shy,” with his vizor down, from behind an ambush; but from the stabs
in the back, and the force of the blows, there is no mistaking one’s
antagonists. So, boldly advancing towards him, “You cowardly villain,”
said I, “this is the second time I have confronted you this month; _why_
do you always do your dirty work by deputy, except when you used to
leave the marks of your horse teeth in my flesh; and boldly strike a
defenceless woman.” At this, the reptile rushed, as he had done at the
Hertford hustings, but this time not into Mr. AUSTIN’S flower garden,
but down Mr. H—— T——’s kitchen stairs! and up his area steps! into the
open street. I turned to Miss R——, who had followed me, and said, “See,
the contemptible wretch has taken to his heels.” Whereupon, going into
the hall, she pushed the idiotic footman aside and said, “Whatever
villainy you are paid to practise towards Lady L——, you have no _right_
to detain _me_.” T—— ordered the hall door to be unchained and unlocked,
and she rushed out into the street. Talk of novels! She told me after,
that at the corner of Piccadilly, she stumbled up against a young man,
and said—“Oh sir, for GOD’S sake, get me a cab, they are taking in the
most iniquitous manner a friend of mine to an asylum, the best friend
I ever had, to whom I owe everything, Lady L——, and she is no more mad
than you are.” The young man turned deadly pale, staggered against the
wall, and said in a voice scarcely audible, “I am very sorry I can’t
interfere.”—The young man was my own wretched son!
Meanwhile I, who was again sitting in T——’s hall—said, “Nothing shall get
me out of this.” Whereupon the hall door was opened, and two policemen
were brought in, at which I started to my feet, and said, “Don’t presume
to touch me, I’ll go with these vile men, but the very stones of London
shall rise up against them, and their infamous employers.” “That shall
they,” said Mrs. CLARKE, “they’ll get the worst of it.” She told me
after, that when she had told T—— and L——, in the dining-room, that
a stirring investigation would be made which would be their ruin,
instructed by their infamous employer, they had quite laughed in her
face, and said, “Pooh! nonsense, Lady L—— has lived out of the world
so long, she has _no_ friends, and there can be no investigation made,
and Sir EDWARD is at the top of the tree.” “Well, before you are much
older, you will see whether she has friends or not, and whether this
villainy will pass off with impunity,” she replied. At the advent of
the policemen, I got into H——’s carriage, which was in waiting. He, the
_two_ keepers, Mrs. CLARKE, and myself inside, and the impudent-looking,
snub-nosed assistant on the box. The wretches took me all through the
Park, and as there had been a breakfast at Chiswick that day, it was
crowded; many whom I knew kissed their hands in great surprise to see
me. Ah! thought I, you little know _where_ they are dragging me to!
Arrived at Mr. H——’s stronghold, a very fine house in fine grounds,
which had formerly belonged to the Duke of CUMBERLAND (and which _since_
my incarceration H—— has been obliged to leave, and transfer himself
to London, public indignation having made it too hot for him), as Mrs.
CLARKE knew nothing of London, fortunately I had the presence of mind to
ask the name and _locale_ of my prison, and write it down upon one of my
cards for her, that she might bring me my things from the hotel. I was
then shown upstairs, after she left me, into a large bedroom, with the
_two_ keepers, and the windows duly _nailed_ down, and only opening about
three inches from the top. After kneeling down and praying to GOD in a
perfect agony, I bathed my face in cold water, and the little keeper was
very kind and feeling, and said to me, “Oh pray, my lady, try and keep
calm under this severe trial; it does seem to me to be something very
monstrous, and depend upon it, GOD will never let it go on.” “I know He
will not,” said I, and then looking out at the window, or rather through
it, I saw between 30 and 40 women walking in the grounds. “Are all these
unfortunates incarcerated here?” I asked of the little keeper. “Those,”
said she, rather evasively, “are our ladies; they are out gathering
strawberries.” I then rang the bell, and when it was answered, I said,
“I want to see Mr. H——.” He came, and before I could speak, said, “It’s
a lovely evening. You had better come out and take a walk, Lady L——.”
“Mr. H——,” said I, “I sent for you to _order_ you to remove those two
keepers from my room, for I am _not_ mad _as you_ very well know, and I
won’t be driven mad by being treated as a maniac, and as for walking out,
or associating with those poor creatures out there, if they really are
insane, I’ll not do it, if I am kept in your Mad-house for 10 years.”
“Mad-house, mad-house, nonsense! Lady L——, this is no mad-house, and
those are my children.” “Then you must be a perfect DANAUS,” said I,
“for there are about 50 of them. But if you had a hundred, I again
_order_ you to remove these women from my room, and at your peril disobey
me.” He then told them to leave the room, and went himself soon after.
In about half-an-hour I heard my door unlocked on the outside, and a
gentle knock at the door; I said, “Come in,” and a charming little girl
of about 14, with a pretty gentle expression of face, soft chestnut hair,
and the prettiest and almost dove-like dark hazel eyes I ever saw, came
in with some tea and some strawberries. This was H——’s eldest daughter,
and how he and his odious vulgar wife came by such a child, I can’t
imagine, unless the fairies stole theirs, and left this one in exchange.
This dear little girl, my only consolation while there, conceived a
most violent affection for me, which I heartily returned, for she was a
perfect star in the desert, and with a big fat magnificent tortoiseshell
cat, with the most fascinating manners, a perfect feline CHESTERFIELD!
and the poor cow, which that brute H—— used to leave in an arid field,
under a vertical sun, without water (the pump being _deranged_, like his
patients), were my only comforts; and as I and poor little MARY H—— used
to pump for hours at this crazy pump, till we filled the stone trough for
the poor cow, which used to bound and caper like a dog, when it saw us
coming to the rescue; _this_ was no doubt considered as a strong proof
of my insanity; or at least of my having _water_ on my brain! I never
_would_ go into the grounds with my keepers, only with my dear, gentle,
affectionate little MARY. And moreover Mr. H—— sent _all_ his “children”
to his other Madhouse farther on the road, so that I had the Palladian
Villa all to myself, without even the three kings. The first evening
poor Mrs. CLARKE returned about 10 o’clock with my scanty wardrobe. I
_implored_ her _not_, by way of consulting a lawyer, to go to Mr. H——,
who after the LYNDHURST papers and SELLER’S affair, I believed to be the
thorough rascal he eventually proved himself to be. But unfortunately, at
Miss R——’s instigation, she _did_; for your friends (?) always know your
affairs better than you do yourself. It appeared that two days after I
was incarcerated in Mr. H——’s stronghold, and Mrs. CLARKE had returned
to Taunton to rouse up the people, which she did to good purpose! that
ruffian L—— came down here, and brought with him a solicitor, a Mr. E——
B——, saying he had come for my tin boxes and all my papers! “Then,” said
Mrs. CLARKE, “you won’t have one of them.” Of course, the provincial
attorney thought the great man, and that sacred Mumbo Jumbo of a husband!
(no matter how infamous) ought to be omnipotent, and that she should
give them up. But she would not; and some commercial traveller in the
hotel, hearing the altercation between them, very kindly called her out
of the room, and said, “Ask him to show you his warrant, or authority
for making such a demand. And if the fellow won’t or can’t, then I’ll
know how to deal with him.” She did so, and the wretch said he had his
order in his pocket. “Well then, produce it,” said the traveller, coming
in, “and if you won’t I’ll send for a constable to turn you out of
this.” At which the attorney said, in all humble sycophancy, to L——, “My
dear sir, you had better produce your authority.” But as the wretch, of
course, could not produce what he had not got, he was bundled out neck
and crop by the commercial traveller. But as he went, he turned to Mrs.
CLARKE, clenching his fist, and said, “Take my word for it, you will
never see Lady L—— again, nor will anyone else.” “And take my word for
it, Mr. L——, that this threat of yours will turn out as great a falsehood
as everything else you have ever said,” was her answer. This it was, I
suppose, made my friend feel I should be made away with in the Madhouse;
in which, though no doubt Sir LIAR’S intention, like most utterly
unscrupulous villains, he had overreached himself, for as Mr. H—— was to
get £1,000 a year for keeping me there, it is not likely to oblige his
patron he’d have jeopardized his neck by poisoning me. L—— when going, as
a _pis aller_, turned round and said, “Ah! by-the-by, Mrs. CLARKE, Sir
EDWARD wants to see you, to pay you your bill.” She said, “I’d rather
forfeit every shilling of my bill, than stay one instant in the room with
such a villain. He need not fear, I’ll take care to have my bill paid,
and no thanks to him.”
At H——’s the rule of the house was about two inches of candle to go to
bed with, for fear of some mad incendiary, and then the door double
locked upon you outside, but as I was _not_ either mad or an incendiary,
and am in the habit of making my ablutions, and reading, and saying my
prayers before I go to bed, I could not do with the two inches, and so
effectually resisted the candle rule, but could do nothing against the
locked door, and therefore was greatly frightened the next morning,
for the first time one awakens in a strange place one cannot for a few
seconds remember where one is; so I was frightened at seeing the great
Flanders mare keeper standing over me, who said, “I came to call you,
but your ladyship seemed in such a happy sleep, I did not like to wake
you.” I told H—— that this must not happen again, but she must wait till
I rang. He then said he meant to get me a _maid_ the next day, which
was a delicate way of putting it, considering that the Flanders mare’s
successor was even more strapping, only dark, and the image, or rather
the _facsimile_, of “The Fair SOPHIA” in CRUIKSHANK’S Ballad of “Lord
BATEMAN,” if she had only worn a turban instead of a cap, and had had a
gold warming-pan of a watch at her side. Her name was SPARROW, but she
never was in the way when I wanted her, her excuse being, the house
had a flat Italian roof, and she used to sit out there to work, the
“_prospec_” was so rural! “But SPARROW,” said I, “you were got to attend
upon me, and so should not, like the rest of your species, sit alone upon
the house-top.” Everything was so atrociously bad in this fine house that
I really could not eat, and I believe H—— began to fear that I should
die upon his hands, so at the end of four or five days he said to me,
“What can I get you? What do you have for breakfast at Taunton?” “What
I am not likely to get here, Mr. H——, an appetite.” But what I really
suffered most from in that intensely hot summer, being a water-drinker,
and the water here being the finest I ever tasted in any part of the
world, was the horrible tepid ditchwater at H——’s; and when I tried the
soda water, that was equally bad. I was also thoroughly wretched without
my clothes and books or a single thing I was accustomed to. H——, it is
true, was _very_ anxious to send for _all_ my goods and chattels to
Taunton, which you may be _quite sure_ I would not let him do; as I told
him it was not worth while for the very short time I was sure public
indignation would allow me to remain incarcerated in his stronghold. One
day Mrs. H——, a thoroughly vulgar, selfish, inane “British _female_,” as
they very properly and zoologicaly call themselves, and who moulted her
h’s in reckless profusion, came and informed me that Mr. H—— was gone
to _H_ascot, and would I like to take a drive with her? I said, “Yes,
I should be very glad indeed to breathe a little fresh air,” for, like
herself, Mr. H—— had made me _Ill_, too, by that eternal phantasmagoria
wagging of his head, and rolling of his eyes. After having _faits mes
premières amies_ with madame, oh! joy, little MARY and I were sent out
to drive alone, so that I really might have made my escape with ease,
only I had given my word I would not. When I had been there about ten
days, those patent humbugs the Commissioners made their visit. They were
Dr. H—— and that vile old Dr. C——, who as Dr. OILY GAMMON ROBERTS said,
would sell his own mother, or do anything else for money; but there to
be sure comes in the literary elements again, for has he not published
some rubbish about ‘Hamlet’? and so it is throughout, even the cheap
and nasty _Daily Telegraph_, or Court plaister, as it is now called,
which began not only by lapidating and crucifying Sir LIAR, but also by
spatchcocking him, on the top of a _column_, like saint somebody, one
of the early martyrs before martyrdom became a civilized institution.
The moment Mr. DICKENS’S chum, the literary scamp and _debauchee_, Mr.
S——, is enrolled on its staff—_il fait volte face_, and began puffing
him in the most barefaced and outrageous manner. The other Commissioner
was Mr. PROCTOR—BARRY CORNWALL, by far the best, and most gentlemanlike
of them—and who listened to my statement with marked attention, saying
with a shrug of the shoulders, “Those letters I confess startled me.” The
letters he alluded to were two I had written to Sir LIAR touching some of
his infamies, for there is no vice that he has left unexhausted, and no
virtue unassumed. But as I told Mr. PROCTOR, the charges in those letters
were no inventions of mine, and I gave him my authority, which was that
when I was at Geneva, my old friend, the _Comtesse Marie de Warenzon_,
came to me one morning and said she had got a letter from her niece, Lady
PEMBROKE, and she must read me one paragraph—“That disgusting wretch Sir
E—— B—— L—— has just been drummed out of Nice—_not_ Vice—for his infamy
with _women_.” Before these Commissioners I turned to that great walrus
H——, who stood like a footman at a respectful distance in their presence,
and I said, “Now Mr. H——, I have been nearly a fortnight in your house,
can you say from your conscience—if you have one?—that I have said, done,
or looked any one thing that could in any way make you think I was not
in the full and clear, and very analytic possession of my intellect?”
H—— wagged his head, twirled his thumbs, and rolled his poached egg orbs
fearfully, phantom-hunting, as he mumbled in a low voice “I’d rather not
give an opinion.” “Of course not,” said I, “having taken the ghost’s word
for a thousand pounds yearly! But pray, if you believe me in any even the
slightest degree insane, how can you reconcile it to your conventionality
towards these gentlemen the Commissioners, to leave your very charming
little daughter unguarded with me _all_ day long, and worse still, allow
her to drive with me alone! when from one minute to another, I might do
her some grievous bodily harm, or make my escape with ease.” At this,
without wasting a reply on me, Mr. H——, began sonorously clearing some
imaginary obstruction in his throat, and reminded the Commissioners that
they would be late for the train. I may as well tell you here, what of
course I only heard from her and others after, _i.e._, that Miss RYVES it
was, after rushing out of T——’s house, and nearly stumbling over Mr. L——,
who drew up, and sent to the papers a true and circumstantial account
of my most iniquitous kidnapping and incarcerations, which the infamous
time-serving _Times_, of course, did not insert; she also wrote to the
Hertford papers, to say she had been for years witness to, and cognisant
of Sir EDWARD’S persecutions of me, and my maid was (and thank GOD _is_)
still living, who had been witness to his personal brutalities in former
times, and in short, that out of Hell there was not such an iniquitous
pair as my Lord DERBY’S Colonial Secretary, and his Attorney L——. Now
_pray bear these facts well in mind_. I may also as well here mention
a circumstance touching Miss RYVES, which from its absurd triviality I
should have indubitably have forgotten, but for the infamous lie that
unscrupulous ruffian, Sir EDWARD, founded upon it, in converting this
parasite into a relation!!!! of mine with whom I had gone abroad by my
own choice!!—The circumstance to which I allude, is this. My father’s
maternal grandfather, Lord MASSEY, was godfather to Miss RYVES’S father!
whereupon she and her brothers (now, poor young men, both dead) called
themselves MASSEY RYVES; but I really don’t think that even in Ireland,
that land of cousins, the most distant relationship could be fabricated
out of that! otherwise, _I_ am related to the GRATTANS, as the great
GRATTAN was my mother’s godfather, and very fond of her. But England
being the land of _cozening_, that King of Cozeners and Swindlers, Sir
EDWARD ——, actually had the effrontery to forge a relationship between me
and his tool, to suit his own ever nefarious purposes. What matter who
detected and laughed at the cheat? Lord MELBOURNE used to say that “if a
lie lived only _half an hour_, it would do its work,” and upon this plan
has Sir LIAR acted all his life, which, I suppose, is what he would call
“_Half hours with the best Authors_,” to wit, the Devil and himself. The
Sunday after the humbug visit of the Commissioners, an oppressively hot
day, the door was unlocked, and Mr. HYDE tottered into my room, for he
was then suffering from softening of the brain (but certainly not of the
heart), the complaint of which he afterwards died. His hands were full
of papers, and he said, in his bluff, bull-dog way, “Well! I’ve seen Sir
EDWARD in Downing-street.” “Dear me,” said I, “you seem quite overpowered
with the honour!” “I saw him yesterday,” said he, “and though it’s almost
too bad to show you, yet you must see it; I mean the statement he and L——
drew up for the Commissioners respecting your insanity.”
[Illustration: ROSINA, LADY LYTTON.]
This precious piece of documentary rascality set forth that both my
father and mother died mad—— Now my father had had one of the most
absurdly splendid public funerals for a Commoner that ever was seen,
being Grand Master of some Masonic Lodge—and ostentatious burials are
not generally bestowed on lunatics; and my poor mother having been only
ten years dead, anyone could have refuted _that_ lie. But like all the
villainous lies, they were only fabricated for the _few_, and for the
_dark_, and never allowed to appear in the honest searching light of
publicity. This tissue of lies went on to say that I had attempted to
commit suicide!! and that the family insanity in me had developed itself
in _delirium tremens_!!!! from my intemperate habits!!!!!! “The dastardly
fiend!” I exclaimed, “so the sacrilegious monster would even desecrate
my poor mother’s and father’s graves! for what? to bury his life-long
victim alive in a Madhouse. It is true, but worse, far worse than that,
this unscrupulous demon would, without one touch of remorse, brand
with a triple hereditary taint of insanity his only son! at least his
only legitimate son, who will have the quite sufficient misfortune of
inheriting the name of so infamous a father.” “Yes—’pon my soul it’s too
bad,” said the Attorney, “but I’m happy to tell you that I have now got
you the £500 a-year for _your_ life.” I knew by this, though all papers
but the conveniently reticent _Times_ had been kept from me, that the
public indignation must be astir, and making things rather unpleasant for
my Lord DERBY’S creditable Colonial Secretary, in which I was right, for
I afterwards heard that not only the people here were holding committees
and meetings every day on the outrage of which I had been the victim;
and the Somersetshire Yeomanry were determined upon going mounted to
London, and pulling his house about his ears if I were not released;
but that his Butler could literally scarcely stand under the loads of
letters he had to bring in every morning of imprecations and threats,
by no means _anonymous_, and as poor Prince ALBERT was then living (for
our little selfish, sensuous, inane and carnal Queen would not care
if all her subjects were equally distributed in Madhouses, or pounded
in mortars), my Lord DERBY was sent for in hot haste by her Majesty,
and told, either I must be instantly set at liberty or his Colonial
Secretary must resign; for the outrage, or rather the scandal, was too
great; for _that’s_ the only thing they dread, being quite of TARTUFFE’S
opinion _que pecher en secret n’est pas pecher, ce ne que l’eclat qui
fait le crime_. Now, my woman’s intuition and common sense told me that
something of this sort must be going on, or I should never have heard a
syllable of the £500 for my life. So in reply to Mr. HYDE’S _obliging
communication_, I said; “What! are they trying to make me out an idiot
as well as a maniac, that they, or you, should suppose after such an
irreparable culminating outrage as he has inflicted upon me by this
incarceration, I will let that scoundrel Sir EDWARD off on the beggarly
pittance I would have accepted before it? and oblige him by vegetating
upon it in the exile of some living tomb, for the rest of the life he has
so poisoned at every source. No thank you.” “Well,” said the Attorney,
who had at that time received his bribe, to say nothing of breathing the
air of Downing-street, and being brought into _personal_ contact with
the Magnates of THE PARTY, which would do to brag among the snobocracy
of Ely-place, Highgate, and Langport for the rest of his life. “Well,”
said he, “Sir EDWARD has shown me his rental, and how he is tied up, and
he really cannot”—“Pray Mr. HYDE,” said I, interrupting him; “_are_ you
Sir EDWARD’S solicitor or mine?” Whereupon, not finding it convenient
or agreeable to endure any probing, he scrambled up all his papers, and
said, taking out his watch—“Bless me, I shall lose the train,” and darted
off out of the room.
The next day, Dr. OILY GAMMON ROBERTS, whom I had known a long time,
called upon me. He had just had the supreme felicity of becoming Lord
PALMERSTON’S medical attendant, and is just the smooth, mellifluous,
double-dealing, Jesuitical personage, who would be happy to accept
a reversionary emetic from any of the peers or peeresses whom he
attends, (or) though an infidel, to do any amount of canting with Lord
SHAFTESBURY in Exeter Hall in the morning, or any amount of pimping for
Lady SHAFTESBURY all the evening. The dear Conservatives having fallen
upon evil days, _via_ their Colonial Secretary, was of course nuts to
the dear Whigs, though as far as any amount of dirty work, back-stair
climbing, and athletic, indefatigable, political, and every other sort
of jobbery, the two parties are in reality “_one_ concern;” and having
the same “bonnets,” during their alternate ins and outs, always know the
exact thimble the pea lurks under. Well, Dr. OILY GAMMON came, and his
manner was a perfect emulsion of almonds when I told him of Mr. HYDE’S
audacious proposition about the £500 a year. He urged me to be firm and
not take a doit less than a thousand a year; which, as he truly said, was
little enough after such an outrage. “For which,” said I, “no money could
compensate.” “Very true,” said he, and after assuring me of the universal
indignation and sympathy my case had excited, he took his departure,
promising soon to call again. The plot was now evidently thickening, for
the next morning the fair SOPHIA, alias SPARROW, came twittering into
my room, and said a groom had ridden out in such haste that the horse
was covered with foam to tell Mr. H. he must go to London without a
_moment’s_ delay; and “I cannot but think and hope,” said she, “that it
means some good to your ladyship.” About five o’clock H. returned from
town, more fat, frowsy, head-wagging, and eye-rolling, than ever; but
desperately civil! and _aux petits soins_, and asked me if I would like
a drive as far as Richmond? I said, “Yes, amazingly, provided Miss H.
went with us.” “Oh yes, certainly,” said he, with a smile, or rather a
dyspeptic leer, which he meant to be half _prevenant_, half paternal, but
which only made him look as
“Hyenas in love are supposed for to look, or
A something between ABELARD and old BLUCHER.”