The Mysteries of the Court of London Vol. 7 — page 298: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

pe THE MYSTERIEG OF THE COURT. “Yes, lady—I merit these reproaches,” replied Gagoonab ; “and I know that you are acquainted with all my guilt. I am not ignorant that amidet the ravings of delirium my crimes were revealed. But, Oh! suffer me to make the fullest confession now-—to detail everything in connexion with the t—to describe the workings of my morbid, maddened mind during ‘the various atages of my iniquity,—suffer me to do all this, and my con- science will be ensed! Then breathe from your lips a single word of pardon—and you will be con- ferring a meroy upon a fellow-creature who is truly penitent {” e “What have you to confess that is not already known to me, vile woman #” demanded the Queen. “Oh! if you knew how your presence is loath- some to me——” ' “It must be!—for my iniquity ie immense,” re- sponded Sagoonah, with despair still in ber accents and ineffable misery in her looks, “ Byt is there to be no pardon on earth for the sinner, however great that sinner’s crime, and when the ‘contritior is commensurate P’” ° “Speak! What have you to confess?” asked Indora. “You know not, lady, the temptation which | reptil led me on,” proceeded the ayah. “I will not speak of the love which was potent even to mad- ness: but I will speak of the manner in which it prompted me to lend a too willing ear to the words of a fiend in female shape who was eent to tempt me. That woman was Madame Angelique!” Sagoonah then proceeded to relate everything which had at any time occurred between herself and the infamous Frenchwoman, but which we need not recapitulate to the reader—though it may be as well to remind him how Madame Angelique had instigated the ayah to make attempte upon the life of her royal mistress, and how through Sagoonah’s intervention she had attained socess to Indora Sn that occasion when she proposed to the eastern lady the visit to the Duke of Marchmont’s seat of Oaklands. The Queen gras by no means astonished at what she now heard: for Sagoonah’s ravings had prepared her for intelligenoe of this kind: but to Christian and Christina everything was as novel as it was astounding and horrifying. They listened as if it were to some hideous tale of murder avowed in a condemned cell; and as they sat together, the sister clung to her ¢win brother as if to be by bim shielded and protected from some danger that might befal her. As for Indors herself, she listened with a settled cold sternness of look,—a look such as that splendidly handsome countenance had never worn before. It was at first in the deepest mournfulnese that Sagoonah had begun her confessions: but as she proceeded, she grew excited: she interrupted her- self with frequent appeals for pity; —she gave vent to passionate entreaties for pardon—ber self- upbraidings and her declarations of penitence pro- duced an alternation between an almost frousied exaltation and a profouod pathos. = * “Oh! i¢ is all true that I have told yeu, lady {” she cried at the conclusion; “and you see how that fiend of « Hrenchwoman appealed to me through the medium of my weakest pointe to at- tempt all these enormities, Perbaps you may understand her motives better than Is and, Oh! leave hee not unpunished—for she is gne of those T instruments of whom the Evil pint mukee use to whisper dreadfal temptations in the ears of indi- viduals reduced to despair. Ab! that story of the snake—I know that it is scarcely credible; and yet is is all as I have nerrated it! I myself shudder as [ at present retrospect over the fright- ful details. You must remember well the day on which you took Miss Ashton and myself to the beautiful Gardens contdining the wild beasts, the strange birds, and the horrible reptiles? But I will show you how'I ¢ the envenomed cobra ae vie a I omy 20 suxious to prove that everything [ om toting ; correct |’? | ™ : ’ Is wae with the most profound ¢xpitemen th Pogrvee Iu, the distressed, the qn- cling to the idea that by her present veritably making an atonement for her past misdeeds; and she therefore considered i¢ above all‘ thisge necessary that che could con- vince the Queen of her statements in every one of their minutest details, Inspired with this idea, she repeated with excited ejaculation, “ Yes—Z will abo® your ladyship how I brought the hideous M4 6 4 her oP e . ne speaking, Sggoonah suddenly burst from “Whither is she goidg?” oried Obristina, af- frighted*at the vehemence of her manner: “She is frensied |” . The Queen’s firet impulse was to command that the ayah should not be allowed to penetrate into any other part of the villa: but on a second thought she said, “Let her have ber own way: the more perfect she ronders her history the better perhaps will it serve my own purposes. Ono revec lation leads to another; and we will let her's be complete.” “ What frightful thifgs bave we been hearing!” exclaimed Obristina with a shudder; “and though many of them were but the detailed>sapetition of mgich that we knew before-———” “ Yet it is horrible for you, my dear young friends,” added the Queen, compassionatingly, as she looked upon the twins, “to hear them in this elaborate gnd minute form.” Sagoonab &t this moment re-entered the room, bringing with ber that small leathern case, or bag, which served her purpose for the transport of the cobra di capello from the Zoological Gardens to the villa. It was of Hindoo manufacture; and we have already described it as being large enough to contain a small rabbit. It had a cover which lapped over the mouth and was fastened with a button. Sagoonah had been up to her own cham- ber to fetch it. “ Here,” she exclaimed, as she re-entered the apartment where she bad left the Queen and the twine,— here is the instrument which served my accursed purpose on that dread day !” Then, in the same vehement and impassioned strain, she went on to describe how she had cape tared the cobra in the leathern case, and how she suffered it to escape thence into the couch of her mistress. The twins shaddered with a cold horror, as if the actual proceeding itself were being now Youlised in their presence ; and even the strong: minded Indore could not repel a‘similap egneation —though there was in her mind a deep feeling of LOAO© COLUM SS (CO)