The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 64: what you’re looking at

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

CHRISTINA’S ADVENTURES 45 in her memory, that if she was in that Eastern lady’s native land, she would in a moment have fled wildly away from the spot, lest some monstrous reptile should suddenly fling forth its hideous coils around her, or lest some savage animal should spring forth upon her. She could not help thanking Heaven for having made her the native of a land whose climate, though so much maligned, renders it impossible for such causes of terror to exist, but little suspected she for an instant that where no monstrous snake can conceal its slimy folds, and where no savage animal can hide itself in ambush, a human being with scarcely less treacherous intent may find a lurking place. And so it was on the present occasion, for scarcely had Christina turned to leave the spot where a sudden alarm had for an instant arrested her steps, when she was pounced upon by a man who darted forth from amidst the evergreens. So abrupt was the occurrence — so frightfully quick did it seem to follow upon those ideas of the serpent and the wild beast which had just been flitting through her mind — that it overwhelmed her with terror; insomuch that the very cry which rose up to her lips was checked at the moment it was about to burst forth, and she lost all consciousness. Sudden as was that attack, — suddenly too as she sank into a swoon, — with an equal suddenness was she made aware, when startled back to life, that some violent alterca- tion was taking place. She was inside a common cab; a man was seated next to her, — a woman with a thick veil opposite. The vehicle had stopped, and the cabman was venting his abuse upon the coachman of another equipage. A glance from the window showed Christina that this scene was taking place close by the Oxford Street entrance to Hyde Park. It was doubtless the sudden shock which the cab sustained on coming into collision with the other vehicle that had startled Christina back to consciousness. That other vehicle was a private carriage, the coachman of which was throwing the blame of the collision upon the cabman, while the latter recriminated in a much coarser style, and with a horrible imprecation he demanded to know who was to pay him for his broken shaft? For the first few moments all this appeared to Christina to be nothing but a dream, — an illusion which was more or less sustained by the duskiness of the hour and the obscurity which therefore prevailed CORNICLOOKS (CO)