The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 102: what you’re looking at

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

80 THE COURT OF LONDON influence of the Medusa-head to petrify all the wholesome thoughts that may chance to look in upon her soul! For that same imagination which so lately proved the active element of her life’s happiness and made her love the source of so many Eden-like joys, which decked fancy’s temples with the fairest and brightest flowers, and revelled in the wildest and most romantic castle-building upon the enchanted ground of a foreshadowed future, this same imagination it is that now substitutes wretched phantoms for glowing poesy and the silliest dreams for the most exalted imagery. Yes, that ethereal spirit which was wont to soar like the flight of eagles above the clouds and penetrate even unto the realms of God’s own glory, has now changed into the unwholesome vapour of a will-o’-the-wisp ignobly cours- ing along the surface of the quagmires of the world. But, oh, what emotion of the hidden being brings that deep flush at one instant to her cheeks, her neck, and her bosom, and in another moment chases away the roseate glow and leaves her pale as a marble statue? Now an indescribable dignity pervades that superb crea- ture, as she seats herself upon a table, fancying it a throne, and places her feet upon a chair, believing it a royal foot- stool. For some minutes she remains still and queenlike, as if gazing upon a troop of courtiers kneeling around her. The delusion fills her with happiness, a flood of joy pours in unto her soul, her eyes light up magnificently, her counte- nance glows with the lustre and the richness of animation, her neck arches grandly, and her bosom swells with sensa- tions of gratified ambition and proud triumph. Suddenly a thought appears to strike her. ’Tis a momen- tary gleam of reason that darts athwart her brain, as the flashing levin breaks on a night of gloom; and, oh, how instantaneously the brightness passes away from her features and the cloud comes and settles thereon! For that gleam of intelligence, vivid as it is evanescent, dissipates her joyous illusion in a moment; and although her ideas relapse into chaos and confusion, yet does some sad and mournful im- pression, some strange and lurking misgiving, remain upper- most in her mind, and, in obedience thereto, she slowly takes off her crown and examines it, together with her sceptre. Intently, oh, how intently she gazes upon those objects; then her look becomes frightened, like that of an COmiclooolkxS.