Rosina Bulwer Lytton

“ Well, the reptile T_____ went to town, and his report was that Mr. S_____ had said, "Well, I first knew her years ago, when I was articled to old BICKET. She used to come to our office about a deed of annuity for £200, that a Colonel somebody was settling upon her, and was a lovely young creature then." "But her name, her name, Mr. T_____," I broke in. "Oh, her name," said the wretch, biting his lips and his ears burning scarlet, "why I--a--that is--I ascertained positively that she is a married woman, but I quite failed in finding out her name"!!!!! ”

“ For as long as I can beggar myself in rascally lawyers, whom he can always 'manage,' or trust to the timid, and imbecile milk and waterings of soi-disant friends, who are in reality my worst enemies, and rivet the wrong their pusillanimity succumbs to, the Fiend only laughs at me and them. ”

“ I then, as a pis aller1, got General THOMPSON to present a petition in the House of Commons demanding an inquiry into the fate of the papers sent to Lord LYNDHURST, of which I could obtain no clear or satisfactory account. The poor superannuated Conservative peer, from his place in the House of Lords, mumbled some circumlocution rubbish about his being the last man to be guilty of want of courtesy to a lady.--Hang his courtesy!! ”

“ Well, after the S___LL___ affair, the ruffian tried his old plan of starving me out by not paying the beggarly pittance he professed to give me, though he had been warned by friends (if he has any, for though plenty of cameraderie, there is and can be no friendship among the wicked) and foes, not to drive me to extremities. "Truly," says RICHTER, "the devil invented seeking and his grandmother waiting," and I was nearly worn out with both. The month of June, 1858, had arrived, and the Hertford election was to take place on the 8th, a Wednesday, I think. ”

“ My Lord LYNDHURST, finding I would not be quiet, though the old Tory jobbing attorney Mr. C_____ H_____, under the pretence of setting Mr. PEACOCK to work, but in reality to seize the golden opportunity of scraping personal acquaintance with an old Tory law lord, and by joinning issue with him, to make things pleasant to the party, and crush and gag their victim a little more. ”

“ C_____ my suspicions, she said she would get her out of the town as soon as possible, but first warn the tradespeople about her, or she might run up bills in my name as part of her instructions. "Do," said I, "for I understand she never pays any one." Mrs. C_____ did so--therefore she did not succeed in hiring the assembly or any other rooms for her readings, or getting any pupils. And Mrs. C_____ insisted upon her leaving this hotel, which she did; going to Weston-super-Mare, but forgetting to pay her hotel bill here, which she has never done to this day. ”

“ Only I wish he had not opened with that tag Latin quotation; for though Latin is all very well, and indeed at times necessary for terseness' sake to add force to sense or satire, real feeling generally finds expression in our mother tongue.
After this LYNDHURST swindle of my papers, Miss R_____ went to her brother, who was then in London: this was in the autumn of 1857. The part Mr. H_____ had acted on that occasion first raised my suspicions against him: but alas, what is the use of a phrophetic spirit, when one has nobody to help one? ”

“ I need not tell you, from the day I ordered her out of Llangollen to this, dear Miss G_____ never brought any action against me. No doubt your Orthodox English Conventioanlity is greatly shocked at my "coarse," "violent," "unladylike language"! But you must make some allowance (though English people never do, being wisely and justly only shocked and scandalized at terrible results, while they remain perfectly placid and piano2 upon terrible causes) ”

“ Remarkably true as far as that loathsome brute Sir E_____ is concerned, is JEAN PAUL'S assertion, that the past and the future are written in every face, for what a fiendish past and what a hellish future are written in that worst bad man's face. ”

“ So, finding that I was not the platic, swallow-anything Fool that men think women ought to be, and which for the propagation and comfortable impunity of their vice, too many women are, my Lord LYNDHURST sent down his nephew and private secretary, Mr. ”

“ For truly says ALFONSO KARR, On ne peut avoir de plus grand tort, que d'avoir raison contre tout le monde. Et moi, j'ai ce grand tort la, et on ne me la pardonne pas9.
This contemptible fellow did not again make his appearance till three days before the sham action was to come on. "Let me advixe you, Lady L_____," said the wretch, "to try to stop it by buying off Mrs. S___LL___'s solicitor. I'll manage it for you for a £5 note." "In the first place," said I, gulping down my rage, and trying to be calm, "I think £5 more than all the attorneys in England body and soul are worth. ”

“ But that such being the case, it behoved him for his own honour (?!) to stir in the matter, and find out who had got the letter he wrote to me at Llangollen, out of the Llangollen post-office, and who the woman was who had called for the papers, with the infamous lie that I had sent her. And the first step towards this was to tell the date of the letter he had written to me, and the day, and then the office in London at which the letter had been posted; and next, to employ Mr. ”