The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 84: what you’re looking at

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

62 THE COURT OF LONDON this is an insufferable insult, sir. And I am sure you don’t want to insult your sovereign, sir, — insult your sovereign? Come, did you ever know me to break my word, sir? Speak — speak, man —Isay. Did you ever know me to break my word? ”’ ‘‘ Yes, and a woman’s heart -— was the dauntless reply given by Tim Meagles. “My God! this is retribution,” murmured the wretched old monarch, as he staggered back and sank once more into the armchair. Then covering his face with his hands, and apparently ceasing to recollect that any one was present to observe or hear him, he exclaimed in a voice of bitter anguish, ‘‘ Oh, Hannah Lightfoot! Hannah Lightfoot! thou art avenged — terribly avenged now! ”’ And the scalding tears trickled between the shrivelled fingers of George III. For, oh, to the memory of this old man came back, with a whelming tide, all the incidents of his early love, — all his false vows, all his unredeemed pledges, all his flagrant per- jury. Vivid and blasting, as the lightning flash, came it all back; crushing and annihilating as the thunder-stroke fell the tremendous weight of recollections upon his mind. Monarch though he were, he was compelled to feel as a man; tyrant as he was over his millions of enslaved subjects, en- slaved in return was he to the merciless despotism of his own conscience. Miserable, miserable king! How little wast thou then! How insignificant in the bitterness of thy woe! From the towering height of his lofty station and from the dizzy summit of his insatiable ambition, did he command the attention of the universe, — he who could not command a single one of all the agonizing thoughts that racked him now. He who awed the nations shrank appalled from the ghastli- ness of his own ideas. The man who had sought to retain the glorious gem of transatlantic power in his own regal diadem, who was even at that moment studying to roll back the portentous tide of democracy which was sweeping over France and threatening to dash its waves against the white cliffs of Albion, who kept his people enchained in iron bonds and sent forth his armies to ride rough-shod over the necks of his wronged subjects when assembling to petition for their rights, — he who did and was doing all this was now crouch- ing, and cowering, and grovelling beneath the spectral shapes Gomichdoo (E(0)