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Lady Morgan’s Memoirs
Sydney Owenson to Thomas Charles Morgan, December [1811]
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
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Preface
Vol. I Contents.
Prefatory Address
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV
Chapter XXVI
Chapter XXVII
Chapter XXVIII
Chapter XXIX
Chapter XXX
Chapter XXXI
Chapter XXXII
Chapter XXXIII
Chapter XXXIV
Chapter XXXV
Chapter XXXVI
Chapter XXXVII
Chapter XXXVIII
Vol. I Index
Vol. II Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter IV
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV
Chapter XXVI
Chapter XXVII
Chapter XXVIII
Chapter XXIX
Chapter XXX
Chapter XXXI
Chapter XXXII
Chapter XXXIII
Chapter XXXIV
Chapter XXXV
Chapter XXXVI
Chapter XXXVII
Chapter XXXVIII
Chapter XXXIX
Chapter XL
Vol. II Index
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Thursday, 11 o’clock, [1811].

I perceive it is easier to command your obedience than to endure it. You have taken me now, au pied de la lettre. Three weeks back you would have made another commentary on the text and tortured it into any sense but that in which you have now taken it. However, I submit uncomplaining, though not unrepining. Ah! my dear Morgan, les absens ont toujours tort, and that passion which, a month past, I feared might urge on its disappointment to exile, or even perhaps to worse, has now flown lightly over, like a summer gale, which leaves on the air scarce a trace of its fleeting fragrance. Well, “Thou canst not say ’twas I did it.” The inequalities, the inconsistency of my manner and my letters, the quick alternation from
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tenderness to reproach, from affection to indifference, the successive glow of hope and chill of despair, the brilliant playfulness of one moment, the gloomy affliction of the next—these were accessory, but not final, causes of your alienation, for your love, like your religion, is a tangible creed; faith alone will not nourish it, you must have the Real Presence; you must touch to believe, you must enjoy to adore, and in the absence of the goddess you will erect the golden calf, sooner than waste your homage upon an invisible object. Dearest, I have divined you well.

You will say, “My sweetest Glorvina, I would love you if I could; but how am I to find you? catch, if I can the Cynthia of the moment.” And, dearest Morgan, you say true; but am I to blame if I am unhappy? “Who would be a wretch for ever?” and if you know the objects and the interests that alternately tear my heart, you would much less blame than pity me. In the morning, when I come down to breakfast, the dear faces I have so long looked on, turned on me with such smiles of tenderness, the family kiss, the little gossip that refers to the social pleasures of the former evening,—my whole heart is theirs,—I say, “no, I will not, cannot, part from you for ever.” Then all disperse; your letter comes, your reproaches, your suspicion! divided between tenderness and resentment; wanting to give you force, but overcome by my own weakness—I know not what I write. My feelings struggle and combat, and I sink under it. Again—perhaps I go out—the brilliant assembly, where every member is my friend
BETWEEN CUP AND LIP.497
or my acquaintance, every smile pointed to me, every hand is stretched out to me, and where all is the perfect intelligence of old acquaintanceship, mingled with Irish wit and Irish cordiality. The reverse of the picture—the dreary country, the stately, cold magnificence, and the imposed silence; the expected affliction, and where I too often find ridicule substituted for that admiration now too necessary to me. Again you rush on me, and all is forgotten. Your true, disinterested love! your passionate feelings! your patience! you long endurance of all my faults! your generous and noble feelings! your talents, your exclusive devotion to me! then, my whole soul is yours! Father, sister, home, friends, country, all are forgotten, and I enter again upon life with you; I struggle again for subsistence; I resign ease and comfort, and share with you a doubtful existence. I give up my career of pleasure and vanity to sink into privacy and oblivion; and the ambition of the authoress and the woman is lost in the feelings of the mistress and the wife.

It was thus I felt yesterday, five minutes after my cold letter to you. After dinner I threw myself on the couch and heard the clock strike seven, and I was transported into the little angular room! To surprise us all, the door opened, and, carried in between two old servants, appeared the dear father—papa! Hot cake ordered for tea, and a boiled chicken for supper. We tuned the harp and piano, and Clarke would play his flute in such time and tune as it pleased God! There never was such a family picture. In the
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midst of it all, papa said, “I am thinking, my dears, that if God ever restores me the use of my hands, I will write a treatise on Irish music for Morgan!!” Again, when he was going back to his room, he leaned on my shoulders to walk to the door,—“you are my support Now, my little darling,” and he burst into tears. Such, dearest, are the feelings alternately awakened in a heart so vitally alive to impressions of tenderness and affection, that in its struggles between contending emotions it is sometimes ready to burst. Oh, then, pity me, and forgive me; bear with me, examine the source and cause of my faults, and you will see them in that sensibility which makes a part of my physical structure, and which time and circumstances have fatally fed and nourished. You do not expect, do not deserve, perhaps do not wish to be bored, with this letter, yet I shall send it; keep it by you, and when you are angry with me, read, and forgive!

When the postman knocked, I said, “Ah! the rascal, after all his impertinent, icy Strabane letter, he has written.” I flew to meet it—burst it open with a smile of triumph. It was from Lord Abercorn! the smile disappeared, and, with a sigh I sat down to write this; while you, perhaps, without one thought of the Glorvina, are writing verses on the charms of Lady Carberry.

Poor dear papa! The consequence of his little frolic last night are, that he is confined to his bed today, and symptoms of gout in his head. I am going to see him. God bless you.

S. O.