The Queen: “Well, child, you know that the King leaves it to me. I will answer for it that all will be as well with you as with any of the ladies, and I am sure you can’t leave my service then.”
Lady Suffolk: “Really, madam, I do not see how it is possible for me to continue in it. I have lost what is dearer to me than anything in the world. I am to be put upon the footing of the Duchess of R—— or Lady A——, and so by the public thought to be forgiven of some very grave offence because I have been your servant twenty years. No, madam, I never will be forgiven an offence that I have not committed.”
The Queen: “You won’t be forgotten. This is indeed the G.L. (sic) why I am forgiven.”
Lady Suffolk: “Madam, your Majesty and I cannot be named together. It is a play of words for your Majesty, but it is a serious thing for me.”
The Queen: “Why, child, I am the King’s subject as well as you.”
Lady Suffolk: “Madam, what I mean is what I cannot make your Majesty understand unless you are pleased to lay aside the Queen and put yourself in my place for some moments. After twenty years to be ill-treated without knowing your crime, and then stay upon the foot of the Duchess of A——!”
The Queen: “Upon my word, Lady Suffolk, you do not consider what the world will say. For God’s sake, consider your character. You leave me because the King will not be more particular to you than to others.”
Lady Suffolk: “Madam, as for my character, the world must have settled that long ago, whether just or unjust, but, madam, I think I have never been thought to betray his Majesty, or to have done any dishonest thing by any person whatever, and I defy my greatest enemies (your Majesty owns I have such) to prove anything against me, and I cannot and will not submit to anything that may make that believed of me.”
The Queen: “Oh! fie! Lady Suffolk, upon my word that is a very fine notion out of Celia, or some other romance.”
Lady Suffolk: “This may not be a very great principle, but I think it is a just one, and a proper one for me to have.”