Page:English laws for women in the nineteenth century.djvu/99

87 ; my sentences became a confused alternation of angry loudness, and husky attempts to speak. I saw nothing—but the husband of whose mercenary nature Lord Melbourne himself had warned me I judged too leniently; nothing but the Gnome,—proceeding again to dig away, for the sake of money, what remnant of peace, happiness, and reputation, might have rested on the future years of my life. Turning up as he dug—dead sorrows, and buried shames, and miserable recollections—and careless who was hurt by them, so long as he evaded payment of a disputed annuity, and stamped his own signature as worthless!

I tried, at first confusedly enough (as the broken sentences in the reports showed), but afterwards as connectedly as I could, to explain that Lord Melbourne had left me nothing in his will; that I believed he could not, his property being strictly entailed; that I had never been his mistress; that I was young enough, and more than young enough, to be his daughter^ and that he had never treated me otherwise than as a friend: that the trial of 1836 was based on a false accusation; and that Lord Melbourne had given his word of honour when living, to that effect: that, dying, he had left nothing but a letter solemnly repeating that denial; recommending me to the generosity of his brother, and stating the amount of provision he wished made for me: that his brother and his sister had abided by and fulfilled his intentions, because his memory was dear to them; and none but my husband had ever accused him of baseness. That I received what he had wished me to receive, but that I held no legal security to oblige any one to pay it; "not even such a security as the contract Mr Norton had mocked me with; drawn up by a lawyer and signed by that lawyer and my husband": that Lord Melbourne had relied on his family showing me this kindness after he was gone, on account of the disgrace and misery I had most unjustly endured in his name; and that they had done so. And certainly (if I may add to the acknowledgment of