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Lady Morgan’s Memoirs
Journal entries: March 1835
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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This pretty district, the principality of his highness the Duke of Westminster, is just the locale that suits me, hanging on the verge of the world’s bustle, not in it. The district of fashion, with all the advantages of seclusion; a garden before, though a royal one, and space and fresh air everywhere. In short, I am charmingly lodged. Yesterday, Morgan and I dined with Lord and Lady Charleville; left my dear Olivia at home. Lady Charleville growing finer by time,—noble, better and pleasanter. Lord Charleville a fearful monument of vitality, surviving all but its infirmities. His son, Lord Tullamore, a Lord in Waiting, a Tory, a dandy, an exclusive. He talked to me of the class and order to which he belonged! I told him the Irish story of the Baymishes of Cork, which set them all in fits of laughter, and even the servants were obliged to rush out of the room to hide their faces: so much for the class and order to which I belong.

March 2.—Received, to-day, a most gracious and
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grateful letter from Monsieur Northomel (Secretary of State for Belgium), conveying his thanks and those of his friends, for my Belgium novel; and says, all the journals are loud in its praise. Another, from the Minister of the Interior to the same effect. I am so glad they like my little Béguine.

Last night I met Moore at Lady Stepney’s—looking old and ill—much out of spirits, and, he says, weary of London after a few days’ residence. He had come to publish his History of Ireland, but Longman and Co. found it was not half bulky enough, so he was sent back to enlarge it. He would not sing. I delivered a message to him from Lady Charleville. “Tell him he must, as an historian, rectify an error in the life of Lord Edward Fitzgerald.” He praises Lord Camden (then Viceroy) for giving Lady Louisa Conolly permission to see the dying Lord Edward; and he accuses Lord Clare of cruelty for refusing her permission to do so. The case was the reverse. Lady Louisa threw herself at Lord Camden’s feet, and he refused her petition. Then she flew, in her despair, to Lord Clare, who said, “I cannot—dare not—give you a written permission, but I will go with you to the prison myself.” They went together, at night. When they came to the door of the miserable room, Lord Clare said, “I cannot leave you alone with the prisoner, but I will send away the jailor and leave the door open, and watch before it myself. I shall hear nothing.” Moore seemed much annoyed when I told him this. “I have been bored to death,” he said, “by friends of Lord Clare, about this, already;
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but I saw the letter—had it in my hand—in which Lord Clare refused Lady Louisa peremptorily. I have already mentioned the anecdote alluded to by Lady Charleville in my book, but people do not read it. It is not worth while writing for such a public. I am amazed how I have made my way. People read with their prejudices, not with their intellects”

Last night, after our dinner at Lady Charleville’s we proceeded to Mrs. Skinner’s, Portland Place—ou par example, Parnassus and Port Royal—the Sorbonne and the Antiquarian society—a quadrille. I was the lioness of the night, malgri moi! and there I sat, couched in a sort of a bay window, and there was presented to me all manner of notabilities, and scores of people from all corners of the earth. Amongst others, Mrs. Somerville, the mathematician, all celestial and descended from her solar system, the learned commentator of La Place! and Miss Herschel, member of the Royal Society. Mrs. Somerville struck me to be a simple little woman, middle aged. Had she not been presented to me by name and reputation, I should say one of the respectable twaddling chaperones one meets with at every ball, dressed in a snug mulberry velvet gown and little cap with a red flower. I asked her how she could descend from the stars to mix amongst us? She said she was obliged to go out with her daughter (who was dancing with my niece in the same quadrille). From the glimpse of her last night, I should say there was no imagination, no deep moral philosophy, though a deal of scientific lore and a great deal of bonhomie. She had long wished to know me, and
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I replied, with great truth, I had long revered her, without presuming to appreciate her! So we agreed to know each other better, and we are to go and see each other. She and Dr. Somerville live at Chertsey. What a woman! compared to the flum-flamree novel trash writers of the present day!

Then up comes Bob Montgomery, the poet—he bows to the ground, a handsome little black man. I asked him if he was Satan Montgomery? and he said he was, so we began to be very facetious, and we laughed as if the devil was in us, till he was obliged to make place for Sir Alexander Creighton! physician to the late Emperor of Russia, author of a treatise on Insanity, a most playful and agreeable old gentleman; we knocked up a friendship for life, and should have gone on gossiping nonsense, but for Godwin, to whom Sir Alexander resigned his place. Alas, for Godwin! Caleb Williams Godwin, with whom I almost began my literary life at a dinner at Sir R. Phillips’s, my first publisher! He talked of Curran, Grattan, Hamilton Rowan, whom he had known in Ireland—wit, eloquence, chivalry!—now all dust! Then we got on the subject of his poor son-in-law, Shelley, and his daughter, whom I shall go and see as soon as she comes to town.

Dinner at Mr. Dilke’s—sat near Allan Cunningham—immense fun—Willis, the American poet, and other celebrities.

After our pleasant dinner went on to another congress at Portland place, where we met all the arts and sciences, and where we spent the night on the stairs,
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with the grand Turk (I forget his name) and his suite—I had a deal of fun with them, making Mr. Urquhart, the Turkish traveller, our mutual interpreter. They are coming to see me. Urquhart’s tic is Russia, and the necessity of combining against her; but he is a clever creature!

Dined yesterday at Mr. Courtney’s, M.P., the great epicure,—an exquisite dinner,—but Courtney so occupied with his dishes, he never spoke to his guests. I sat beside one of the greatest wits of the day, Sidney Smith! what a charmer! so natural, so little of a wit titré, so bon enfant, that the delicacy of his wit appears the natural result of a fine organization, and of a happy mind ready to enjoy and to receive as much pleasure from others as he confers upon those with whom he converses. He comes to see me to-morrow.

Yesterday, had a long visit and sofa conversation with Lucien Bonaparte,—his Italian ideas, no monarchy without an aristocracy. The reason France is all, à tors et à travers, is a wish to remove the peerage. He thinks with me, that Cardinal Richelieu was the founder of the revolutionary system. He said it was Richelieu who turned the cold, brave chivalry of France into the valetaille d’anti chambre of an effeminate despot. Speaking of the French, he said, “at the outburst of the Revolution of ’88, there were a good many people in France with common sense. The Emperor used to say to me that the French were essentially a monarchical people, and we used to deny this; but everything he ever said has come out true since.”

April 3.—My journal is gone to the dogs, je n’en
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peut plus. I am so fussed and fidgetted by my dear charming world, that I cannot write. I forget days and dates. Ouf! Last night at Lady Stepney’s—met the Milmans, Lady Charlotte Bury, Mrs. Norton, Rogers, Sidney Smith, and other wits and authors. Amongst others, poor dear Jane Porter; she told me she was taken for me the other night, and talked to as such by a party of Americans! She is tall, lank and lean, and lackadaisical, dressed in the deepest black, with rather a battered black gauze hat, and an air of a regular Melpomene. I am the reverse of all this, et sans vanité, the best dressed woman wherever I go. Last night I wore a blue satin, trimmed fully with magnificent point lace and stomacher, à la Sevigné, light blue velvet hat and feather, with an aigrette of sapphires and diamonds! Voila! The party at the Murchison’s—Lord Jeffreys, the Edinburgh Review—Lockhart, of the Quarterly; Hallam, Middle Ages; Milman, the poet; Mrs. Somerville; &c., &c. Lord Jeffrey came up to me, and we had such a flirtation. When he comes to Ireland, we are to go to Donnybrook Fair together; in short, having cut me down with his tomahawk as a reviewer, he smothers me with roses as a man; and so he comes to see me. I always say of my enemies before we meet, “Let me at them.”