The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 216: what you’re looking at

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

LORD CLANDON 191 upon to accompany my uncle the Duke of Marchmont to the altar. Subsequently she learned that I was alive; but into all these details of a sad, sad history it is not my purpose to enter. Suffice it to say that I deemed her faithless, and on arriving in England, I repaired to Oaklands that I might have an opportunity of upbraiding her for the supposed perfidy. That opportunity presented itself, but, alas! I found that she was to be pitied and not blamed. Our mental agony was immense, excruciating, ineffable. But she was a wife. Had she been the wife of a stranger, her position would have rendered her not the less sacred in my eyes, but as the wife of my own uncle — oh, I was incapable of a deed of infamy! “It was eeeuiead that I-was to depart “hia from Oaklands and set out for the Court of Florence, to which I had been appointed envoy plenipotentiary. ‘The moment for bidding farewell drew nigh; my adieux were said to the Duchess Eliza, and yielding to the anguish of my feelings, I clasped her in my arms. The duke beheld the scene, as you have already been informed by the confession ere now read, — that confession of my guilty brother. I fled to the village tavern, and some while afterward my brother joined me, with the intelligence that the Duchess Eliza had disap- peared from Oaklands. She had gone forth as a wanderer on the face of the earth, — she who was innocent! Maddened by the tidings, I sped in search of the unhappy lady. For hours I wandered, and at length I overtook her. It was then midnight, and in a lonely spot by the side of a stream was she seated, weeping bitterly. This spot was miles away from Oaklands. She reproached me not as the author of the frightful calamities which had fallen upon her head, and though she gave way to the most passionate lamenta- tions, she mentioned not my name with upbraiding. She vowed that she would retire into some complete seclusion; where she would linger out the rest of her unhappy days, and this seclusion she was determined should be far remote from the scenes where she had suffered so much misery. My conduct was full of respect and sympathy and grief, and I did not even so much as take her hand; I felt that any demonstration of tenderness on my part would be an insult in such circumstances. I persuaded her to proceed to an adjacent village, where she might repose herself for a few GomiilGaooks (S©)