Obrazy na stronie
PDF
ePub

what I trust those who have lived with me, or ever have partaken of my society, would not confirm, of a mind so uninformed and unculti vated, without education or talents, or without any desire of improving myself, incapable of employment, of a temper so furious and violent, as altogether to form a character, which no one could bear to live with, who had the means of liv ing elsewhere;-What possible progress would all this make towards proving that I was guilty of adultery? These, and such like insinuations, as false as they are malicious, could never have proved crime in me, however manifestly they might display the malice of my accusers.

Must it not, then, have occurred to any one, who had seen the whole of this Narrative, if the motive of my accusers was, as they represent it, merely. that of good patriots, of attached and loyal subjects, bound, in execution of a painful duty, imposed upon them by his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, to disclose, in detail, all the facts which could establish my guilt, that these circumstances never would have made a part of their detail? But on the other had, if their object was to traduce me ;if, falsely attributing to his Royal Highness, senti. ments which could belong to no generous bosom, but measuring his nature by their own, they thought, vainly and wickedly, to ingratiate themselves with him, by being the instruments of accomplishing my ruin;-if aiming at depriving me of my rank and station, or of driving me from this

country, they determined to bring forward a charge of Treason against me, which, though they knew in their consciences it was false, yet they might hope would serve at least as a cover, and a pretence, 'for such an imputation upon my character, as, rendering my life intolerable in this country, might drive me to seek a refuge in another; if the better to effectuate this purpose, they had represented all my misfortunes as my faults, and my faults alone, drawn an odious and disgusting picture of me, to extinguish every sentiment of pity and compassion, which, in the generosity, not only of your Majesty's royal bosom, and of the members of your Royal Family, but of all the inhabitants of your kingdom, might arise to commiserate the unfortunate situation of a stranger, persecuted under a charge originating in their malice ;if, for this, they flung out, that I had justly for feited my station in society, and that a separation from my husband was, what I myself had once wished, and what the Chancellor might now perhaps procure for me; or, if, in short, their object was to obtain my condemnation by prejudice, inflamed by falsehood, which never could be obtaind by justice informed by truth, then the whole texture of the declaration is consistent, and it is well contrived and executed for its purpose. But it is strange, that its purpose should have escaped the detection of intelligent and impartial minds. There was enough at least to have made them pause before they gave such a degree of

credit to informations of this description, as to have made them the foundations of so important and decisive a step, as that of advising them to be laid before your Majesty.

And, indeed, such seems to have been the effect which this declaration at first produced. Because if it had been believed, the only thing to have been done (according to the judgment of the Commis. sioners,) would have been to have laid it immediately before your Majesty, to whom, upon every principle of duty, the communication was due. But the declaration was made on the 3rd of December, in the last year, and the communication was not made to your Majesty till the very end of May. And that interval appears to have been employed in collecting those other additional declarations, which are referred to in the Report, and which your Majesty has likewise been pleased, by your gracious commands, to have communicated to me.

These additional declarations do not, I submit, appear to furnish much additional reason for believing the incredible story. They were taken indeed* "for the purpose," (for they are so described, this is the title which is prefixed to them in the authentic copies, with which I have been furnished,)" for the purpose of confirming the "statement made by Lady Douglas of the cir "cumstances mentioned in her narrative," and they are the examinations of two persons, who appear to have formerly lived in the family of Sir John and Lady Douglas, and of several servants of See Appendix (B) No. 3.

my own; they are filled with the hearsay details of other servants' declarations. And one of them, W. Cole seems to have been examined over and over again. No less than four of his examinations are given, and some of these evidently refer to other examinations of his, which are not given at all.

These, I submit to your Majesty, are rendered, from this marked circumstance, particularly undeserving of credit; because, in the only instance in which the hearsay, statement, related to one servant, was followed by the examination of the other, who was stated to have made it, (I mean an instance in which Cole relates what he had heard said by F. Lloyd)* F. Lloyd does not appear to have said any such thing, or even to have heard what she is by him related to have said, and she relates the fact that she really did hear, stripped of all the particulars with which Cole had coloured it, and which alone made it in any degree deserving to be mentioned. Besides this, the parents of the child which is ascribed to me by Lady Douglas, are plainly pointed out, and a clue is afforded, by which if followed, it would have been as easy to have ascertained, that that child was no child of mine, (if indeed it ever had been seriously believed to be so) and to have proved whose child it was, before. the appointment of the Commissioners, as it had been found to be afterwards..

* Appendix (B.) No. 3.
1

So far, therefore, from concurring with the Commissioners in approving the advice, under which his Royal Highness had acted, I conceive, it to have been at least cruel and inconsiderate, to have advised the tranmission of such a charge to your Majesty, till they had exhausted all the means which private inquiry could have afforded, to ascertain its falsehood or its truth.

And when it appears that it was not thought necessary, upon the first statement of it, as the Commissioners seem to have imagined, forthwith to transmit to your Majesty; but it was retained for near six months, from the beginning of December till near the end of May; what is due to myself obliges me to state, that if there had but been in that interval, half the industry employed, to remove suspicions, which was exerted to raise them, there would never have existed a necessity for troubling your Majesty with this charge at all. I beg to be understood as imputing this solely to the advice given to his Royal Highness. He must, of necessity, have left the detail and the determination upon this business to others. And it is evident to me, from what I now know, that his Royal Highness was not fairly dealt with; that material information was obtained, to disprove part of the case against me, which, not appearing in the declarations that were transmitted to your Majesty, I conclude was never communicated to his Royal High

ness.

« PoprzedniaDalej »