using this narrative, my dears, I have referred but
little to her who was in my thoughts night and day, and whose locket I
wore, throughout all those years, next my heart. I used to sit out under
the stars at Gordon's Pride, with the river lapping at my feet, and
picture her the shining centre of all the brilliant scenes I had left,
and wonder if she still thought of me.

Nor have I mentioned that faithful correspondent, and more faithful
friend, Lord Comyn. As soon as ever I had obtained from Captain Daniel
my mother's little inheritance, I sent off the debt I owed his Lordship.
'Twas a year before I got him to receive it; he despatched the money
back once, saying that I had more need of it than he. I smiled at this,
for my Lord was never within his income, and I made no doubt he had
signed a note to cover my indebtedness.

Every letter Comyn writ me was nine parts Dolly, and the rest of his
sheet usually taken up with Mr. Fox and his calamities: these had fallen
upon him very thick of late. Lord Holland had been forced to pay out a
hundred thousand pounds for Charles, and even this enormous sum did not
entirely free Mr. Fox from the discounters and the hounds. The reason
for this sudden onslaught was the birth of a boy to his brother Stephen,
who was heir to the title. "When they told Charles of it," Comyn wrote,
"said he, coolly: 'My brother Ste's son is a second Messiah, born for
the destruction of the Jews.'"

I saw no definite signs, as yet, of the conversion of this prodigy,
which I so earnestly hoped for. He had quarrelled with North, lost his
place on the Admiralty, and presently the King had made him a Lord of
the Treasury, tho' more out of fear than love. Once in a while, when he
saw Comyn at Almack's, he would desire to be remembered to me, and he
always spoke of me with affection. But he could be got to write to no
one, said my Lord, with kind exaggeration; nor will he receive letters,
for fear he may get a dun.

Alas, I got no message from Dorothy! Nor had she ever mentioned my name
to Comyn. He had not seen her for eight months after I left England,
as she had been taken to the Continent for her health. She came back to
London more ravishing than before, and (I use his Lordship's somewhat
extravagant language) her suffering had stamped upon her face even more
of character and power. She had lost much of her levity, likewise. In
short, my Lord declared, she was more of the queen than ever, and the
myst