Mr. Robinson knew that it would be useless to ask Mr. Harris's
assistance; indeed, his mind was too much depressed to make an exertion
for the arrangement of his affairs. He was, therefore, after waiting
three weeks in the custody of a sheriff's officer (during which time I
had never left him for a single hour, day or night), obliged to submit
to the necessity of becoming a captive.
For myself I cared but little; all my anxiety was for Mr. Robinson's
repose and the health of my child. The apartment which we obtained was
in the upper part of the building, overlooking a racket-ground. Mr.
Robinson was expert in all exercises of strength or activity, and he
found that amusement daily which I could not partake of. I had other
occupations of a more interesting nature,--the care of a beloved and
still helpless daughter.[20]
During nine months and three weeks, never once did I pass the threshold
of our dreary habitation; though every allurement was offered, every
effort was made, to draw me from my scene of domestic attachment.
Numberless messages and letters from Lords Northington and Lyttelton,
from Mr. Fitzgerald and many others, were conveyed to me. But they all,
excepting Lord Northington's, were dictated in the language of
gallantry, were replete with professions of love, and wishes to release
me from my unpleasant and humiliating situation,--and were therefore
treated with contempt, scorn, and indignation. For God can bear witness
that, at that period, my mind had never entertained a thought of
violating those vows which I had made to my husband at the altar.
What I suffered during this tedious captivity! My little volume of poems
sold but indifferently; my health was considerably impaired; and the
trifling income which Mr. Robinson received from his father was scarcely
sufficient to support him. I will not enter into a tedious detail of
vulgar sorrows, of vulgar scenes; I seldom quitted my apartment, and
never till the evening, when for air and exercise I walked on the
racket-ground with my husband.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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