In 1803, the Crawfords having decided to leave Fort William and live entirely in the country, Sydney, who had a mortal dread of boredom, gave up her situation, and returned to her father, who was now settled near Strabane. Here she occupied her leisure in writing a second novel, _The Novice of St. Dominic_, in six volumes. When this was completed, Mrs. Lefanu advised her to take it to London herself, and arrange for its publication. Quite alone, and with very little money in her pocket, the girl travelled to London, and presented herself before Sir Richard Phillips, a well-known publisher, with whom she had already had some correspondence. If we may believe her own testimony, Sir Richard fell an easy victim to her fascinations, and there is no doubt that he was very kind to her, introduced her to his wife, and found her a lodging. Better still, he bought her book (we are not told the price), and paid her for it at once. The first purchases that she made with her own earnings were a small Irish harp, which accompanied her thereafter wherever she went, and a black 'mode cloak.' After her return to Ireland, Phillips corresponded with her, and gave her literary advice, which is interesting in so far as it shows what the reading public of that day wanted, or was supposed to want.

'The world is not informed about Ireland,' wrote the publisher, 'and I am in a condition to command the light to shine. I am sorry you have a.s.sumed the novel form. A series of letters addressed to a friend in London, taking for your model the letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, would have secured you the most extensive reading. A matter-of-fact and didactic novel is neither one thing nor the other, and suits no cla.s.s of readers. Certainly, however, _Paul and Virginia_ would suggest a local plan; and it will be possible by writing three or four times over in six or eight months to produce what would _command_ attention.' Sir Richard concluded his advice with the a.s.surance that his correspondent had it in her to write an immortal work, if she would only labour it sufficiently, and that her _third_ copy was certain to be a monument of Irish genius. Miss Owenson was the last person to act upon the above directions; her books read as if they were dashed off in a fine frenzy of composition.

Perhaps she feared that her cherished womanliness would be endangered by too close an attention to accuracy and style.

The _Novice_, which appeared in 1804, was better than _St.

Clair_, but such success as it enjoyed must have been due to the prevailing scarcity of first-rate, or even second-rate novelists, rather than to its own intrinsic merits. The public taste in fiction was not fastidious, and could swallow long-winded discussions and sentimental rhodomontade with an appet.i.te that now seems almost incredible. The _Novice_ is said to have been a favourite with Pitt in his last illness, but if this be true, the fact points rather to the decay of the statesman's intellect than to the literary value of the book. Still the author was tasting all the sweets of fame. She was much in request as a literary celebrity, and somebody had actually written for permission to select the best pa.s.sages from her two books for publication in a work called _The Morality of English Novels_.

In the same year, 1804, an anonymous attack upon the Irish stage in six _Familiar Epistles_ was published in Dublin. So cruel and venomous were these epistles that one actor, Edwin, is believed to have died of chagrin at the attack upon his reputation. An answer to the libel presently appeared, which was signed S. O., and has been generally attributed to Sydney Owenson. The _Familiar Epistles_ were believed to be the work of John Wilson Croker, then young and unknown, and it may be that the lifelong malignity with which that critic pursued Lady Morgan was due to this early crossing of swords.

Sydney herself was fond of hinting that Croker, in his obscure days, had paid her attentions which she, as a successful author, had not cared to encourage, and that wounded vanity was at the bottom of his hatred.

The next book on which Miss Owenson engaged was, if not her best, the one by which she is best known, namely, _The Wild Irish Girl_.

The greater part of this was written while she was staying with Sir Malby Crofton at Longford House, from whose family, as has been seen, she claimed to be descended. Miss Crofton sat for the portrait of the heroine, and much of the scenery was sketched in the wild romantic neighbourhood. About the same time she collected and translated a number of Irish songs which were published under the t.i.tle of _The Lay of the Irish Harp_. She thus antic.i.p.ated Moore, and other explorers in this field, for which fact Moore at least gives her credit in the preface to his own collection. She was not a poet, but she wrote one ballad, 'Kate Kearney,' which became a popular song, and is not yet forgotten.

The story of _The Wild Irish Girl_ is said to have been founded upon an incident in the author's own life. A young man named Everard had fallen in love with her, but as he was wild, idle, and penniless, his father called upon her to beg her not to encourage him, but to use her influence to make him stick to his work. Sydney behaved so well in the matter that the elder Mr. Everard desired to marry her himself, and though his offer was not accepted, he remained her staunch friend and admirer. The 'local colour' in the book is carefully worked up; indeed, in the present day it would probably be thought that the story was overweighted by the account of local manners and customs.

Phillips, alarmed at the liberal principles displayed in the work, which he thought would be distasteful to English patriots, refused at first to give the author her price. To his horror and indignation Miss Owenson, whom he regarded as his own particular property, instantly sent the ma.n.u.script to a rival bookseller, Johnson, who published for Miss Edgeworth. Johnson offered 300 for the book, while Phillips had only offered 200 down, and 50 on the publication of the second and third editions respectively. The latter, however, was unable to make up his mind to lose the treasure, and after much hesitation and many heart-burnings, he finally wrote to Miss Owenson:--

'DEAR BEWITCHING AND DELUDING SYKEN,--Not being able to part from you, I have promised your n.o.ble and magnanimous friend, Atkinson [who was conducting the negotiations], the 300.... It will be long before I forgive you! At least not till I have got back the 300 and another 100 along with it.' Then follows a pa.s.sage which proves that the literary market, in those days at any rate, was not overstocked: 'If you know any poor bard--a real one, no pretender--I will give him a guinea a page for his rhymes in the _Monthly Magazine_. I will also give for prose communications at the rate of six guineas a sheet.'

_The Wild Irish Girl_, whose t.i.tle was suggested by Peter Pindar, made a hit, more especially in Ireland, and the author woke to find herself famous. She became known to all her friends as 'Glorvina,' the name of the heroine, while the Glorvina ornament, a golden bodkin, and the Glorvina mantle became fashionable in Dublin. The book was bitterly attacked, probably by Croker, in the _Freeman's Journal_, but the best bit of criticism upon it is contained in a letter from Mr. Edgeworth to Miss Owenson. 'Maria,' he says, 'who reads as well as she writes, has entertained us with several pa.s.sages from _The Wild Irish Girl_, which I thought superior to any parts of the book I had read. Upon looking over her shoulder, I found she had omitted some superfluous epithets. Dared she have done this if you had been by? I think she would; because your good sense and good taste would have been instantly her defenders.' It must be admitted that all Lady Morgan's works would have gained by the like treatment.

In an article called 'My First Rout,' which appeared in _The Book of the Boudoir_ (published in 1829), Lady Morgan describes a party at Lady Cork's, where she was lionised by her hostess, the other guests having been invited to meet the Wild Irish Girl. The celebrities present were brought up and introduced to Miss Owenson with a running comment from Lady Cork, which, though it must be taken with a grain of salt, is worth transcribing:--

'Lord Erskine, this is the Wild Irish Girl you were so anxious to meet. I a.s.sure you she talks quite as well as she writes. Now, my dear, do tell Lord Erskine some of those Irish stories you told us at Lord Charleville's. Mrs. Abington says you would make a famous actress, she does indeed. This is the d.u.c.h.ess of St. Albans--she has your _Wild Irish Girl_ by heart. Where is Sheridan? Oh, here he is; what, you know each other already? _Tant mieux._ Mr. Lewis, do come forward; this is Monk Lewis, of whom you have heard so much--but you must not read his works, they are very naughty.... You know Mr. Gell; he calls you the Irish Corinne. Your friend, Mr. Moore, will be here by-and-by. Do see, somebody, if Mrs. Siddons and Mr.

Kemble are come yet. Now pray tell us the scene at the Irish baronet's in the Rebellion that you told to the ladies of Llangollen; and then give us your blue-stocking dinner at Sir Richard Phillips'; and describe the Irish priests.'

At supper Sydney was placed between Lord Erskine and Lord Carysfort, and was just beginning to feel at her ease when Mr. Kemble was announced. Mr. Kemble, it soon became apparent, had been dining, and had paid too much attention to the claret. Sitting down opposite Miss Owenson, he fixed her with an intense and gla.s.sy stare. Unfortunately, her hair, which she wore in the fashionable curly 'crop,' aroused his curiosity. Stretching unsteadily across the table, he suddenly, to quote her own words, 'struck his claws into my locks, and addressing me in his deepest tones, asked, "Little girl, where did you buy your wig?"' Lord Erskine hastily came to the rescue, but Kemble, rendered peevish by his interference, took a volume of _The Wild Irish Girl_ out of his pocket, and after reading aloud one of the most high-flown pa.s.sages, asked, 'Little girl, why did you write such nonsense, and where did you get all those hard words?' Sydney delighted the company by blurting out the truth: 'Sir, I wrote as well as I could, and I got the hard words out of Johnson's Dictionary.'

That Kemble spoke the truth in his cups may be proved by the following sentence, which is a fair sample of the general style of the book: 'With a character tinctured with the brightest colouring of romantic eccentricity [a father is describing his son, the hero], but marked by indelible traces of innate rect.i.tude, and enn.o.bled by the purest principles of native generosity, the proudest sense of inviolable honour, I beheld him rush eagerly on life, enamoured of its seeming good, incredulous of its latent evils, till, fatally entangled in the spells of the latter, he fell an early victim to their successful allurements.'

_The Wild Irish Girl_ was followed by _Patriotic Sketches_ and a volume of poems, for which Sir Richard Phillips offered 100 before he read them. A little later, in 1807, an operetta called _The First Attempt_, or the _Whim of the Moment_, the libretto by Miss Owenson and the music by T. Cooke, was performed at the Dublin Theatre. The Duke of Bedford, then Lord-Lieutenant, attended in state, the d.u.c.h.ess wore a Glorvina bodkin, and the entertainment was also patronised by the officers of the garrison and all the liberal members of the Irish bar. The little piece, in which Mr. Owenson acted an Irish character, was played for several nights, and brought its author the handsome sum of 400. This, however, seems to have been Sydney's first and last attempt at dramatic composition.

The family fortunes had improved somewhat at this time, for Olivia, who had gone out as a governess, became engaged to Dr., afterwards Sir Arthur Clarke, a plain, elderly little gentleman, who, however, made her an excellent husband. Having a good house and a comfortable income, he was able to offer a home to Mr. Owenson and to the faithful Molly. For the present, Sydney, though always on excellent terms with her brother-in-law, preferred her independence. She established herself in lodgings in Dublin, and made the most of the position that her works had won for her. Her flirtations and indiscretions provided the town with plenty of occasion for scandal, and there is a tradition that one strictly proper old lady, on being asked to chaperon Miss Owenson to the Castle, replied that when Miss Owenson wore more petticoats and less paint she would be happy to do so. Yet another tradition has been handed down to the effect that Miss Owenson appeared at one of the Viceregal b.a.l.l.s in a dress, the bodice of which was trimmed with the portraits of her rejected lovers!

Foremost among our heroine's admirers at this time was Sir Charles Ormsby, K.C., then member for Munster, He was a widower, deeply in debt, and a good deal older than Sydney, but if there was no actual engagement, there was certainly an 'understanding' between the pair.

In May, 1808, Miss Owenson was on a visit to the Dowager Lady Stanley of Alderley at Penrhos (one of the new friends her celebrity had gained for her), whence she wrote a sentimental epistle to Sir Charles Ormsby. The Sir John Stanley mentioned in the letter was the husband of Maria Josepha Holroyd, to whom he had been married in 1796.

'The figure and person of Lady Stanley are inimitable,' writes Sydney.

'Vandyck would have estimated her at millions. Though old, her manners, her mind, and her conversation are all of the best school....

Sir John Stanley is a man _comme il y en a peu_. Something at first of English reserve; but when worn off, I never met a mind more daring, more independent in its reflections, more profound or more refined in its ideas. He said a thousand things like you; I am convinced he has loved as you love. We sat up till two this morning talking of Corinne.... I have been obliged to sing "Deep in Love" so often for my handsome host, and every time it is _as for you_ I sing it.' The letter concludes with the words, '_Aimons toujours comme a l'ordinaire_.' The pair may have loved, but they were continually quarrelling, and their intimacy was finally broken a year or two later. Lady Morgan preserved to the end of her days a packet of love-letters indorsed, 'Sir Charles Montague Ormsby, Bart., one of the most brilliant wits, determined _roues_, agreeable persons, and ugliest men of his day.'

The summer of this year, 1808, Miss Owenson spent in a round of visits to country-houses, and in working, amid many distractions, at her Grecian novel, _Ida of Athens_. After the first volume had gone to press, Phillips took fright at some of the opinions therein expressed, and refused to proceed further with the work. It was then accepted by Longmans, who, however, were somewhat alarmed at what they considered the Deistical principles and the taint of French philosophy that ran through the book. Ida is a houri and a woman of genius, who dresses in a tissue of woven air, has a taste for philosophical discussions, and a talent for getting into perilous situations, from which her strong sense of propriety invariably delivers her. This book was the subject of adverse criticism in the first number of the _Quarterly Review_, the critic being, it is believed, Miss Owenson's old enemy, Croker. As a work of art, the novel was certainly a just object of ridicule, but the personalities by which the review is disfigured were unworthy of a responsible critic.

'The language,' observes the reviewer, 'is an inflated jargon, composed of terms picked up in all countries, and wholly irreducible to any ordinary rules of grammar and sense. The sentiments are mischievous in tendency, profligate in principle, licentious and irreverent in the highest degree.' The first part of this accusation was only too well founded, but the licentiousness of which Lady Morgan's works were invariably accused in the _Quarterly Review_, can only have existed in the mind of the reviewer. One cannot but smile to think how many persons with a taste for highly-spiced fiction must have been set searching through Lady Morgan's novels by these notices, and how bitterly they must have been disappointed. The review in question concludes with the remark that if the author would buy a spelling-book, a pocket-dictionary, exchange her raptures for common sense, and gather a few precepts of humility from the Bible, 'she might hope to prove, not indeed a good writer of novels, but a useful friend, a faithful wife, a tender mother, and a respectable and happy mistress of a family.' This impertinence is thoroughly characteristic of the days when the _Quarterly_ was regarded as an amusing but frivolous, not to say flippant, publication.

_Ida of Athens_ received the honour of mention in a note to _Childe Harold_. 'I will request Miss Owenson,' writes Byron, 'when she next chooses an Athenian heroine for her four volumes, to have the goodness to marry her to somebody more of a gentleman than a "Disdar Aga" (who, by the way, is not an Aga), the most impolite of petty officers, the greatest patron of larceny Athens ever saw (except Lord E[lgin]), and the unworthy occupant of the Acropolis, on a handsome stipend of 150 piastres (8 sterling), out of which he has to pay his garrison, the most ill-regulated corps in the ill-regulated Ottoman Empire. I speak it tenderly, seeing I was once the cause of the husband of Ida nearly suffering the bastinado; and because the said Disdar is a turbulent fellow who beats his wife, so that I exhort and beseech Miss Owenson to sue for a separate maintenance on behalf of Ida.'

In 1809 Lady Abercorn, the third wife of the first Marquis, having taken a sudden fancy to Miss Owenson, proposed that she should come to Stanmore Priory, and afterwards to Baron's Court, as a kind of permanent visitor. A fine lady of the old-fashioned, languid, idle, easily bored type, Lady Abercorn desired a lively, amusing companion, who would deliver her from the terrors of a solitude _a deux,_ make music in the evenings, and help to entertain her guests. It was represented to Sydney that such an invitation was not lightly to be refused, but as acceptance involved an almost total separation from her friends, she hesitated to enter into any actual engagement, and went to the Abercorns for two or three months as an ordinary visitor.

Lord Abercorn, who was then between fifty and sixty, had been married three times, and divorced once. So fastidious a fine gentleman was he that the maids were not allowed to make his bed except in white kid gloves, and his groom of his chambers had orders to fumigate his rooms after liveried servants had been in them. He is described as handsome, witty, and blase, a _roue_ in principles and a Tory in politics.

Nothing pleased Lady Morgan better in her old age, we are told, than to have it insinuated that there had been 'something wrong' between herself and Lord Abercorn.

In January, 1810, Sydney writes to Mrs. Lefanu from Stanmore Priory to the effect that she is the best-lodged, best-fed, dullest author in his Majesty's dominions, and that the sound of a commoner's name is refreshment to her ears. She is surrounded by ex-lord-lieutenants, unpopular princesses (including her of Wales) deposed potentates (including him of Sweden), half the n.o.bility of England, and many of the best wits and writers. She had sat to Sir Thomas Lawrence for her portrait, and sold her Indian novel, _The Missionary,_ for a famous price. Lord Castlereagh, while staying at Stanmore, heard portions of the work read aloud, and admired it so much that he offered to take the author to London, and give her a rendezvous with her publisher in his own study. Stockdale, the publisher, was so much impressed by his surroundings that he bid 400 for the book, and the agreement was signed and sealed under Lord Castlereagh's eye. _The Missionary_ was not so successful as _The Wild Irish Girl,_ and added nothing to the author's reputation.

It was not until the end of 1810 that Miss Owenson decided to become a permanent member of the Abercorn household. About this time, or a little later, she wrote a short description of her temperament and feelings, from which a sentence or two may be quoted. 'Inconsiderate and indiscreet, never saved by prudence, but often rescued by pride; often on the verge of error, but never pa.s.sing the line. Committing myself in every way _except in my own esteem_--without any command over my feelings, my words, or writings--yet full of self-possession as to action and conduct.' After describing her sufferings from nervous susceptibility and mental depression, she continues: 'But the hand that writes this has lost nothing of the contour of health or the symmetry of youth. I am in possession of all the fame I ever hoped or ambitioned. I wear not the appearance of twenty years; I am now, as I generally am, sad and miserable.'

In 1811 Dr. Morgan, a good-looking widower of about eight-and-twenty, accepted the post of private physician to Lord Abercorn. He was a Cambridge man, an intimate friend of Dr. Jenner's, and possessed a small fortune of his own. When he first arrived at Baron's Court, Miss Owenson was absent, and he heard so much of her praises that he conceived a violent prejudice against her. On her return she set to work systematically to fascinate him, and succeeded even better than she had hoped or desired. In Lady Abercorn he had a warm partisan, but it may be suspected that the ambitious Miss Owenson found it hard to renounce all hopes of a more brilliant match. The Abercorns having vowed that Dr. Morgan should be made Sir Charles, and that they would push his fortunes, Sydney yielded to their importunities so far as to write to her father, and ask his consent to her engagement.

'I dare say you will be amazingly astonished,' she observes, 'but not half so much as I am, for Lord and Lady Abercorn have hurried on the business in such a manner that I really don't know what I am about.

They called me in last night, and, more like parents than friends, begged me to be guided by them--that it was their wish not to lose sight of me ... and that if I accepted Morgan, the man upon earth they most esteemed and approved, they would be friends to both for life--that we should reside with them one year after our marriage, so that we might lay up our income to begin the world. He is also to continue their physician. He has now 500 a year, independent of his practice. I don't myself see the thing quite in the light they do; but they think him a man of such great abilities, such great worth and honour, that I am the most fortunate person in the world.'

To her old friend, Mrs. Lefanu, she writes in much the same strain.

'The licence and ring have been in the house these ten days, and all the settlements made; yet I have been battling off from day to day, and have only ten minutes back procured a little breathing time. The struggle is almost too great for me. On one side engaged, beyond retrieval, to a man who has frequently declared to my friends that if I break off he will not survive it! On the other, the dreadful certainty of being parted for ever from a country and friends I love, and a family I adore.'

The 'breathing time' was to consist of a fortnight's visit to her sister, Lady Clarke, in Dublin, in order to be near her father, who was in failing health. The fortnight, however, proved an exceedingly elastic period. Mr. Owenson was not dangerously ill, the winter season was just beginning, and Miss Owenson was more popular than ever. Her unfortunate lover, as jealous as he was enamoured, being detained by his duties at Baron's Court, could only write long letters of complaint, reproach, and appeal to his hard-hearted lady. Sydney was thoroughly enjoying herself, and was determined to make the most of her last days of liberty. She admitted afterwards that she had behaved very badly at this time, and deserved to have lost the best husband woman ever had.

'I picture to myself,' writes poor Dr. Morgan, 'the thoughtless and heartless Glorvina trifling with her friend, jesting at his sufferings, and flirting with every man she meets.' He sends her some commissions, but declares that there is only one about which he is really anxious, 'and that is to love me _exclusively_; to prefer me to every other good; to think of me, speak of me, write to me, and look forward to our union as to the completion of every wish, as I do by you. Do this, and though you grow as ugly as Sycorax, you will never lose in me the fondest, most doating, affectionate of husbands.

Glorvina, I was born for tenderness; my business in life is _to love_.... I read part of _The Way to Keep Him_ this morning, and I see now you take the widow for your model; but it won't do, for though I love you in _every_ mood, it is only when you are true to nature, pa.s.sionate and tender, that I adore you. You are never less interesting to me than when you _brillez_ in a large party.'

The fortnight's leave of absence had been granted in September, and by the end of November Dr. Morgan is thoroughly displeased with his truant _fiancee_, and asks why she could not have told him when she went away, that she intended to stay till Christmas. 'I know, he writes, 'this is but a specimen of the roundabout policy of all your countrywomen. How strange it is that you, who are in general _great_ beyond every woman I know, philosophical and magnanimous, should _in detail_ be so often ill-judging, wrong, and (shall I say) little?' In December Sydney writes to say that she will return directly after Christmas, and declares that the terrible struggle of feeling, which she had tried to forget in every species of mental dissipation, is now over; friends, relatives, country, all are resigned, and she is his for ever! A little later she shows signs of wavering again; she cannot make up her mind to part from her invalid father just yet; but this time Dr. Morgan puts his foot down, and issues his ultimatum in a stern and manly letter. He will be trifled with no longer. Sydney must either keep her promise and return at Christmas, or they had better part, never to meet again. 'The love I require,' he writes, 'is no ordinary affection. The woman who marries me must be _identified_ with me. I must have a large bank of tenderness to draw upon. I must have frequent profession and frequent demonstration of it. Woman's love is all in all to me; it stands in place of honours and riches, and what is yet more, in place of tranquillity of mind.'

This letter, backed by one from Lady Abercorn, brought Sydney to her senses. In the first days of the new year (1812) she arrived at Baron's Court, a little shamefaced, and more than a little doubtful of her reception. The marquis was stiff, and the marchioness stately, but Sir Charles, who had just been knighted by the Lord Lieutenant, was too pleased to get his lady-love back, to harbour any resentment against her. A few days after her return, as she was sitting over the fire in a morning wrapper, Lady Abercorn came in and said:

'Glorvina, come upstairs directly and be married; there must be no more trifling.'

The bride was led into her ladyship's dressing-room, where the bridegroom was awaiting her in company with the chaplain, and the ceremony took place. The marriage was kept a secret from the other guests at the time, but a few nights later Lord Abercorn filled his gla.s.s after dinner, and drank to the health of 'Sir Charles and Lady Morgan.'

PART II

The marriage, unpromising as it appeared at the outset, proved an exceptionally happy one. Sir Charles was a straightforward, worthy, if somewhat dull gentleman, with no ambition, a nervous distaste for society, and a natural indolence of temperament. To his wife he gave the unstinted sympathy and admiration that her restless vanity craved, while she invariably maintained that he was the wisest, brightest, and handsomest of his s.e.x. She seems to have given him no occasion for jealousy after marriage, though to the last she preserved her pa.s.sion for society, and her ambition for social recognition and success. The first year of married life, which she described as a period of storm, interspersed with brilliant sunshine, was spent with the Abercorns at Baron's Court.

'Though living in a palace,' wrote Sydney to Mrs. Lefanu, early in 1812, 'we have all the comfort and independence of a home.... As to me, I am _every inch a wife_, and so ends that brilliant thing that was Glorvina. _N.B._--I intend to write a book to explode the vulgar idea of matrimony being the tomb of love. Matrimony is the real thing, and all before but leather and prunella.' In a letter to Lady Stanley she paints Sir Charles in the romantic colours appropriate to a novelist's husband. 'In _love_ he is Sheridan's Falkland, and in his view of things there is a _melange_ of cynicism and sentiment that will never suffer him to be as happy as the inferior million that move about him. Marriage has taken nothing from the _romance_ of his pa.s.sion for me; and by bringing a sense of _property_ with it, has rendered him more exigent and nervous about me than before.'

The luxury of Baron's Court was probably more than counterbalanced by the inevitable drawbacks of married life in a patron's household, where the husband, at least, was at that patron's beck and call.

Before the end of the year, the Morgans were contemplating a modest establishment of their own, and Sydney had set to work upon a novel, the price of which was to furnish the new house. Mr. Owenson had died shortly after his daughter's marriage, and Lady Morgan persuaded her husband to settle in Dublin, in order that she might be near her sister and her many friends. A house was presently taken in Kildare Street, and Sir Charles, who had obtained the post of physician to the Marshalsea, set himself to establish a practice. Lady Morgan prided herself upon her housewifely talents, and in a letter dated May, 1813, she describes how she has made their old house clean and comfortable, all that their means would permit, 'except for one little bit of a room, four inches by three, which is fitted up in the _Gothic_, and I have collected into it the best part of a very good cabinet of natural history of Sir Charles's, eight or nine hundred volumes of choice books in French, English, Italian, and German, some little curiosities, and a few sc.r.a.ps of old china, so that, with muslin draperies, etc., I have made no contemptible set-out.... With respect to authorship, I fear it is over; I have been making chair-covers instead of systems, and cheapening pots and pans instead of selling sentiment and philosophy.'

In the midst of all her domestic labours, however, Lady Morgan contrived to finish a novel, _O'Donnel_, which Colburn published in 1814, and for which she received 550. The book was ill-reviewed, but it was an even greater popular success than _The Wild Irish Girl_. The heroine, like most of Lady Morgan's heroines, is evidently meant for an idealised portrait of herself, and the great ladies by whom she is surrounded are sketched from Lady Abercorn and certain of the guests at Baron's Court. The Liberal, or as they would now be called, Radical principles inculcated in the book gave bitter offence to the author's old-fashioned friends, and increased the rancour of her Tory reviewers. But _O'Donnel_ found numerous admirers, among them no less a person than Sir Walter Scott, who notes in his diary for March 14, 1826: 'I have amused myself occasionally very pleasantly during the last few days by reading over Lady Morgan's novel of _O'Donnel_, which has some striking and beautiful pa.s.sages of situation and description, and in the comic part is very rich and entertaining. I do not remember being so pleased with it at first. There is a want of story, always fatal to a book on the first reading--and it is well if it gets the chance of a second.'

The following year, 1815, France being once again open to English travellers, the Morgans paid a visit to Paris, Lady Morgan having undertaken to write a book about what was then a strange people and a strange country. The pair went a good deal into society, and made many friends, among them Lafayette, Cuvier, the Comte de Segur, Madame de Genlis, and Madame Jerome Bonaparte. Sydney, whose Celtic manners were probably more congenial to the French than Anglo-Saxon reserve, seems to have received a great deal of attention, and her not over-strong head was slightly turned in consequence.

'The French admire you more than any Englishwoman who has appeared here since the Battle of Waterloo,' wrote Madame Jerome Bonaparte to Lady Morgan, after the latter had returned to Ireland. 'France is the country you should reside in, because you are so much admired, and here no Englishwoman has received the same attentions since you. I am dying to see your last publication. Public expectation is as high as possible. How happy you must be at filling the world with your name as you do! Madame de Stael and Madame de Genlis are forgotten; and if the love of fame be of any weight with you, your excursion to Paris was attended with brilliant success.'

Madame de Genlis, in her _Memoirs_, gives a more soberly-worded account of the impression produced by Lady Morgan on Parisian society.

The author of _France_ is described as 'not beautiful, but with something lively and agreeable in her whole person. She is very clever, and seems to have a good heart; it is a pity that for the sake of popularity she should have the mania of meddling in politics....

Her vivacity and rather springing carriage seemed very strange in Parisian circles. She soon learned that good taste of itself condemned that kind of demeanour; in fact, gesticulation and noisy manners have never been popular in France.' The spoilt little lady was by no means satisfied with this portrait, and Sir Charles, who was away from home at the time the _Memoirs_ appeared, writes to console her. 'You must not mind that lying old witch Madame de Genlis' attack upon you,'

says the admiring husband. 'I thought she would not let you off easily; you were not only a better and younger (and _I_ may say _prettier_) author than herself, but also a more popular one.'