The upper class was gained by her intrepidity, her charm, and her elsewhere offending wit, however the case might go.  It is chivalrous, but not, alas, inflammable in support of innocence.  The class below it is governed in estimates of character by accepted patterns of conduct; yet where innocence under persecution is believed to exist, the members animated by that belief can be enthusiastic.  Enthusiasm is a heaven-sent steeplechaser, and takes a flying leap of the ordinary barriers; it is more intrusive than chivalry, and has a passion to communicate its ardour.  Two letters from stranger ladies reached Diana, through her lawyers and Lady Dunstane.  Anonymous letters, not so welcome, being male effusions, arrived at her lodgings, one of them comical almost over the verge to pathos in its termination:  ’To me you will ever be the Goddess Diana—­my faith in woman!’

He was unacquainted with her!

She had not the heart to think the writers donkeys.  How they obtained her address was a puzzle; they stole in to comfort her slightly.  They attached her to her position of Defendant by the thought of what would have been the idea of her character if she had flown—­a reflection emanating from inexperience of the resources of sentimentalists.

If she had flown!  She was borne along by the tide like a butterfly that a fish may gobble unless a friendly hand shall intervene.  And could it in nature?  She was past expectation of release.  The attempt to imagine living with any warmth of blood in her vindicated character, for the sake of zealous friends, consigned her to a cold and empty house upon a foreign earth.  She had to set her mind upon the mysterious enshrouded Twelve, with whom the verdict would soon be hanging, that she might prompt her human combativeness to desire the vindication at such a price as she would have to pay for it.  When Emma Dunstane spoke to her of the certainty of triumphing, she suggested a possible dissentient among the fateful Twelve, merely to escape the drumming sound of that hollow big word.  The irreverent imp of her humour came to her relief by calling forth the Twelve, in the tone of the clerk of the Court, and they answered to their names of trades and crafts after the manner of Titania’s elves, and were questioned as to their fitness, by education, habits, enlightenment, to pronounce decisively upon the case in dispute, the case being plainly stated.  They replied, that the long habit of dealing with scales enabled them to weigh the value of evidence the most delicate.  Moreover, they were Englishmen, and anything short of downright bullet facts went to favour the woman.  For thus we light the balance of legal injustice toward the sex:  we conveniently wink, ma’am.  A rough, old-fashioned way for us!  Is it a Breach of Promise?—­She may reckon on her damages:  we have daughters of our own.  Is it a suit for Divorce?—­Well, we have wives of our own, and we can lash, or we can spare; that’s as it may be; but we’ll keep