rote a letter by advice of her
counsel, authorizing him to withdraw the suit on these conditions, and
early in June she signed a "general release," professing afterwards to
be entirely ignorant of the nature of the instrument. Indeed the unhappy
woman cared more for an expression of regret from her enslaver than for
any pecuniary solace, and she received no money, although her lawyer
did, when the general release was signed. When she discovered the nature
of the instrument she was extremely indignant and demanded from Mr.
James the telegrams and letters in his possession which had been sent to
her by her worshiper in the heyday of their passion. The lawyer
hesitated and delayed, and finally, being pressed by a friend and
kinsman of the unhappy lady, said, "I won't give them up unless I have
an order from the court." Subsequently he claimed that he had destroyed
these tell-tale documents, and that the "general release" authorized the
proceedings.

She now consulted another law firm, but her case came to nothing, and
meantime her former adorer, now grown fiercely hostile, instituted
proceedings in the Supreme Court, for the purpose of procuring a
perpetual injunction to forever restrain her from harassing him with
such suits. This was in 1870, in the early days of March, when the
writer saw her last, and conversed with her on her wrongs. Her picture
lives in his recollection yet: The soft, large brown eyes, half sad and
half voluptuous in their tenderness; the soft, pleading face, with a
refinement--even a sort of nobleness--that had outlived the sacrifice of
her virtue and reputation. To the last she was a lady of extreme
sweetness of manner, and a fascinating and interesting conversationalist.

Another notable man, now also a member of the "great majority"--a
renowned Shakespearean critic, author and censor in the domain of
_belles-lettres_--brought great trouble and humiliation upon himself by
an amour with a ridiculously plain-looking and by no means young woman.
He had naturally, perhaps, a _penchant_ in that direction, for on the
appearance of the Lydia Thompson troupe of original British blondes in
this city, he wrought himself into a fervor of passionate folly over the
statuesque Markham, and designated her in his Erosian outpourings as
"she of the vocal velvet voice." There may have been some excuse for
this passing delirium, and many others were touched by it, Pauline
Markham was a singularly beautiful girl, an