"JOHN COMPANY" TROOPS ON THE MARCH IN INDIA HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE, HAYMARKET, WHERE LOLA MONTEZ MADE HER DEBUT BENJAMIN LUMLEY, LESSEE OF HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE LOLA MONTEZ, "SPANISH DANCER." DEBUT AT HER MAJESTY'S THEATRE VISCOUNT RANELAGH, WHO ORGANISED A CABAL AGAINST LOLA MONTEZ ABBE LISZT, MUSICIAN AND LOVER FANNY ELSSLER, PREDECESSOR OF LOLA MONTEZ IN PARIS PORTE ST. MARTIN THEATRE, PARIS, WHERE LOLA WAS A "FLOP" SUPPER-PARTY AT LES FRERES PROVENCAUX. FIRST ACT IN A TRAGEDY RESIDENZ PALACE, MUNICH, IN 1848. RESIDENCE OF LUDWIG I. "COMMAND" PORTRAIT. IN THE "GALLERY OF BEAUTIES," MUNICH KING OF BAVARIA. "LUDWIG THE LOVER" LOLA MONTEZ IN CARICATURE. "LOLA ON THE ALLEMANNEN HOUND" BERRYMEAD PRIORY, ACTON, WHERE LOLA MONTEZ LIVED WITH CORNET HEALD LOLA MONTEZ IN LONDON. AGED THIRTY A "BELLE OF THE BOULEVARDS." LOLA MONTEZ IN PARIS THE "SPIDER DANCE." CAUSE OF MUCH CRITICISM LOLA MONTEZ IN "LOLA IN BAVARIA." A "PLAY WITH A PURPOSE" LOLA AS A LECTURER. FROM STAGE TO PLATFORM LOLA MONTEZ IN MIDDLE LIFE. A CHARACTERISTIC POSE "LECTURES AND LIFE." FROM STAGE TO PLATFORM COUNTESS OF LANDSFELD. A FAVOURITE PORTRAIT GRAVE OF LOLA MONTEZ, IN GREEN-WOOD CEMETERY, NEW YORK * * * * * THE MAGNIFICENT MONTEZ CHAPTER I PRELUDE TO ADVENTURE I In a tearful column, headed "Necrology of the Year," a mid-Victorian obituarist wrote thus of a woman figuring therein: This was one who, notwithstanding her evil ways, had a share in some public transactions too remarkable to allow her name to be omitted from the list of celebrated persons deceased in the year 1861. Born of an English or Irish family of respectable rank, at a very early age the unhappy girl was found to be possessed of the fatal gift of beauty. She appeared for a short time on the stage as a dancer (for which degradation her sorrowing relatives put on mourning, and issued undertakers' cards to signify that she was now dead to them) and then blazed forth as the most notorious Paphian in Europe.